Dar es Salaam, Dec. 28 -- “Completely life-changing”. “Nothing could have fully prepared me”.

These are the sorts of phrases you often hear from women when they become a mother.

These descriptions can point to the complexity and depth of the experience.

It can be joyous and stressful, exhausting and euphoric, profound and mundane. Its unlike any other life transition, and – try as we might – hard to capture in words or short phrases.

It turns out, though, there is a word for this process of becoming a mother: matrescence. Its a simple but powerful concept thats changing the way we think about mothering.

Heres what matrescence means and how the concept can help mothers and those supporting them to n...