I want to share something with you that I have not said publicly before. Not fully, anyway.
I did not meet my mother until I was 15 years old.
I grew up feeling like an outsider, in the places I lived, in the spaces I moved through, in the rooms I was supposed to belong in. Regardless of how much everyone around me tried, I only truly felt at home when I was in school.
So when I had my daughter in 2022, the love I felt for her was immediate and overwhelming.
But so was the fear.
I was terrified of getting it wrong. Of messing her up. Of not being worthy of the honour of bringing her to life. And more than anything, I was afraid of being absent in her life, of her ever feeling alone the way I had felt growing up.
That fear did not make me a bad mother. But it crippled me in those early weeks at the exact moment when I needed to be present, grounded, and okay.
My caesarean incision was painful in ways I had not been prepared for. I could not lactate. My mother could not come immediately. My husband could not get leave from work. And I was alone with a newborn, a body that was healing, and a heart that was full of love and terror in equal measure.
No one tells you that the love and the fear arrive together.
You don’t hear enough that you can be completely devoted to your child and completely undone at the same time.
That is what I wish someone had told me. And it is one of the reasons Umi exists.
What I know now, that I needed to know then:
The overwhelm is not a sign that you are failing. It is a sign that you are carrying too much alone.
The fear does not mean you are unfit. Sometimes it means you love your child so much that the weight of it has no words yet.
And the isolation is not inevitable. It is the result of a gap in support systems, in community, in the structures built around new mothers.
Healing is available. But it rarely happens alone. It happens in community, with the right guidance, in a space where you do not have to perform okayness.
This July, we are opening that space.
Better Umi’s Group Therapy: Healing the Mother Within: From Survival to Wellness, is a 3-week integrative therapy program designed specifically for African mothers, led by our Therapist-in-Residence, Coach Nwadiuto Akwitti.
Whether you are a new mother still navigating those early overwhelming months, or an experienced mother who has been carrying things quietly for years, this is for you.
It worked wonders for me. I believe it will do even more for you.
Initial Therapy Sessions: July 17–18, 2026 2 Weeks Integration: Daily guided healing prompts within a supportive community Final Integration Session: August 1, 2026
Register here: umiformothers.com/gt
Spaces are limited. If you have been thinking about it, now is the time.
This is not a program for mothers who are broken. It is for mums who are ready.
I am always rooting for you,
Moyinoluwa