Journaling, Mental Health, Motherhood

Dreams.

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When I was young, I dreamed of the future. I dreamed of marriage and motherhood. I dreamed of who I would one day love. I dreamed of how many kids I’d one day have. I dreamed of the profession I’d one day do (geologist? interior decorator? teacher?). I dreamed of the house I’d one day live in. I dreamed of the future.

Later, my dreams were with worry. I dreamed of parents that loved each other. I dreamed of a world in which my mom was happy and whole. I dreamed of my father’s laughter and lightness returning. I dreamed of no more yelling, no more anger. I dreamed of different answers than those I was seeing – violence and harm. I dreamed of what should have already been given.  

In high school, I dreamed of difference. I dreamed of escaping the mountain. I dreamed of being a part of the busy, fast, moving world. I dreamed of a changed family dynamic that I could understand. I dreamed of meeting the standards of beauty. I dreamed of being liked and being wanted. I dreamed of that which I didn’t have – difference.

In college, I was in a dream itself – one albeit finding and fumbling. I dreamed of getting my life together (it took a few tries). I dreamed of being someone that my parents could be proud of. I dreamed of accepting myself. I dreamed of getting the grades for which I’d be found worthy. I dreamed of friendships kept, relationships lasting, and me not fucking it all up. I stayed in said dreams for many a year.

These days, I dream of peace. I spoke of this peace recently. It is peace within myself. Peace within my living arrangements. Peace within the chaos that is raising children. Peace within my professional landscape. Peace with my parents. Peace with my brother. Peace with my changing friendship circles. Peace with my ex. Peace within my love life (or at times lack thereof). Peace within my body. Peace within this world. I dream of peace.

Future me, what will you dream of? And will you find it?

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Journaling, Mental Health, The magic (in the mess). ♡

Foresight.

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There’s been a shift as of late, a space being made for someone new. I’ve met someone. And as I dip my toes into the feelings of “new relationship” – rushes of dopamine, hints of love drunkenness, and joys over the tiniest anything and everything – I watch myself. Curiously, critically (I am me, after all), and reflectively. I watch what I do and how I act. I wonder.

Am I love bombing?

Am I trauma bonding?

Am I doing that codependency-affection-flooding thing?

Am I going to mess this up, too? (she says, always laying blame inevitably at her feet)

Am I going to turn into my mom – again? (… see above)

I worry, as worrying is me, and poking with ALL the questions at ALL the things with ALL the thoughts is what I do.

I wish to not elaborate here on the answers to the questions above, however, as the answers to all of them are no (when I’m in my right mind, that is, however rarely that may be).

There is something that I keep coming back to though. It’s an excerpt from “Captain Corelli’s Mandolin” by Louis de Bernières, which reads:

“Love is a temporary madness; it erupts like volcanoes and then subsides. And when it subsides you have to make a decision. You have to work out whether your roots have so entwined together that it is inconceivable that you should ever part. Because this is what love is. Love is not breathlessness, it is not excitement, it is not the promulgation of eternal passion. That is just being in love, which any fool can do. Love itself is what is left over when being in love has burned away, and this is both an art and a fortunate accident. Those that truly love have roots that grow towards each other underground, and when all the pretty blossoms have fallen from their branches, they find that they are one tree and not two.”

During the last five or so years of my marriage, I thought of this quote often. Every time it came up on Facebook memories, I re-posted it. Be it to justify and make pretty the reality of my dying marriage, or to cling to it out of hope that where we were at was normal, this quote saw me through. All of our love had burned away, but we had roots. I couldn’t see at the time that those were roots of habit, stubbornness, predictability, and convenience, however. Roots that when finally given a proper looking at practically crumbled, but that’s a story for another time.

These days, I look to this quote in light anew. It is not the roots of it upon which I reflect this time around (there hasn’t been time yet for those roots to grow), it’s the temporary madness. It’s the breathlessness. It’s the passion. It’s awareness that these are times of pretty blooms.  It’s the curious inquiry as to how one helps those pretty blooms last longer. It’s the realization that I am (happily) one of those fools, but at the same time, possessing of agency and mindfulness this time around to better support and guide the narrative, choice, and decision.

It’s hope. It’s open eyes. It’s excitement. It’s tempering. It’s adoration. It’s balance. It’s foresight.

Foresight.

Something I would have given anything to have those sixteen years ago.  

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Journaling, Mental Health

My self narratives.

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A year of beliefs, taken from a year of conversations. All the following came after my words, “I am…

Boring as hell.

Extra.

Terribly socially awkward.

Nerd.

Complicated and not easy.

Doomsponge.

Silly keener.

Not a leader and nor do I find comfort in it.

Entirely too curious.

Doom.

Obtuse.

A cheap bastard.

Being extra AF.

Predictable.

Afflicted with the curse of competency.

Vexed.

Movie dumb.

Pansy Canadian.

The worst.

Being very normal.

Truly terrible.

Not to be trusted with life.

Not very good.

Awkward.

So socially inept.

Dumb.

Oddly excited.

Too doom and gloomy.

Kinda doom reincarnated.

Paranoid AF.

Slightly panicked.

Human.

Fucking vexed.

Intrigued.

Super freaking anxious.

Most proud.

Running solely on caffeine and stubbornness.

Thankful.

Born from the loins of crazy.

Absolutely rattled.

Not prepared.

MOST SUSS.

Not innocent.

Not perfect.

Not without fault.

Two seconds from screaming.

Too predictable.

Crestfallen.

Utterly disenfranchised.

Wrong tho?

Over simplifying the fuck out of everything.

Crazy.

Offended.

A heathen.

Torn.

That way.

A giant confused noob.

Ready to commit violence.

Because I’m scared.

Incapable of making important decisions.

Slightly doubting myself.

Jealous.

Super vocal.

Freaked.

Legitimately terrified.

Gobsmacked.

So enlightened.

Shocked.

Not drunk enough for this.

Stressed.

Exhausted.

An exception to the rule.

So out of shape.

Going to conduct an experiment.

Asking for too much.

Not up to date.

A smarmy asshole.

Wont to do.

Entirely too honest.

Not worth it.

Not worthy.

NOT ALLOWED TO FORGET.

Like, high on life right now.

SO relieved.

Sadly not surprised.

Accepting and embracing this reality.

Without.

Insane.

So excited.

Guilty of.

Really bad.

Here for it.

Wounded.

SO OLD.

For this plan.

Not sure why.

Not allowed.

Much more than what I look like.

Slightly biased.

Stumped.

A silly hopeful optimist.

Curious.

Sleepy AF.

Very people-y, yes.

So fucking happy.

The least fanciest person of all time.

Not going to Google if that is a thing.

So boring.

Crazy owl lady.

Way overthinking this.

Not at all that calculated.

12 years old.

Going to weep with joy.

So god damn tired.

Tired.

Inefficient.

Crispy.

Lame AF.

Reading too much into this.

A terrible person.

Allergic to shopping.

Dumb and hopeful.

Going to be inexplicably joyous.

Dumb when sleepy.

Dreading this with my everything.

Still confused a bit but I always am.

I don’t know how (I am).

Low key embarrassed.

Wading in “I have no idea what I’m doing” waters.

Awe in the stupidity of humanity.

Most blessed.

Lacking cohesion.

Confirmed old.

So mad at myself.

Anxious and nervous.

Always 10 steps behind.

Busy, but often I am equally slacking.

Over it.

There with you.

NOT.

Me.

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Mental Health

I see you, inner child.

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I’ve been doing the work (as per Nicole LaPera), and have been asked to write letter(s) to my inner child. And so, I begin.

Caretaker Sarah,

I see you there, putting others’ comforts and well-being above your own, because that’s what you did as a kid. You did all you could to be helpful and good, so dad and mom kept loving you, even though it wasn’t you they were angry at – they were mad at each other.

I see you, needing to be needed, giving and giving as a means to help you feel worthy.

I see you, not listening to your own needs out of fear of being selfish or rude.

I see your need for approval from others, and a self-worth that depends on what others think of you.

I see you apologizing when you’re not even at fault.

I see you doing everything to avoid conflict at all costs, wanting to keep the peace you could never find in your childhood, at times to your own detriment.

I see you, struggling through being a constant giver to your children, feeling selfish and hallow by dare considering scaling back your selflessness for the sake of your own sanity, and then hating yourself when doing it.

I see you, I hear you, I love you.

They were mad, but not with you.

Anxiously Attached Sarah,

I see you there, struggling with self-esteem, believing you’re not good enough for someone to stay. This is a fear instilled into you by your mother’s inconsistent parenting, toxic emotional responses, and bipolar tendencies. Your childhood was a time of reeling and on unsteady ground. Where could you stand if you didn’t know where you stood with her?

I see you and your need for constant reassurance.

I see you there, among a lifetime of settling. Anyone that will have you, gets you. And then you get fixated, in love with love.

I see you there, clingy and needy. Terrified of being alone and abandoned, you pull and you need and you need. But then you panic and you push and push – what if they leave you? What if they find someone better?

I see you and your anxiety and jealousy and reading too much into EVERYTHING when your person is not there.

I see you, always afraid you’re going to mess it all up, afraid to speak. Fear driving you to deny your own needs for the sake of keeping the course – a course driven by anxiety, worry, and need.

I see you, I hear you, I love you.

She was sick and unwell, and it had no reflection on you.

*

You are enough, Sarah. You are enough.

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Journaling, Mental Health

One way, and then another.

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(I wrote this yesterday and promptly forgot to post it. Please know that today was a better day, however.)

I am having a particularly shitty day.

I’m not here to talk about said day though, because we all have shitty days. We all have days we wish possessed a restart button. We all have days we’ve wanted desperately to be over. We all have been there, and it’s a (shitty) fact of life. A shitty day does not make me unique or special, it makes me human.

In hopes of being able to see myself past this day, I am here to write. Not about shitty days, but about an entirely different subject. One that if I put more focus on, could help me better understand how I operate, and could potentially eschew today’s grumblings about shitty days to another day.

Maybe?

I’ve started therapy again for the second time this year. It’s… been a lot.

There are two predominant reasons as to why I was driven back.

Firstly, my self-confidence is staggeringly low these days. I’ve lost a lot of weight since the beginning of March and I’m now at a size I haven’t seen since high school. Looking at my face in the mirror these days is a continual surprise, and I catch angles of my new figure in photos and am shocked. Despite that, my self-image and self-worth remain unchanged, stubbornly and frighteningly so. What I thought would be a reciprocal relationship of losing weight/loving myself – it has not panned out. My painfully deprecating sense of humour, pitiful self-worth, and floundering sense of self, all of it is still very much with me, 80+ pounds lost be damned. I don’t like it. I don’t like that I can’t be complimented without telling someone why they are wrong for doing so. I don’t like that my immediate gut reaction to men who are interested in me (and lately there has been one in particular who’s caught my eye) is to convince them as to why they are wrong for doing so. My self-confidence seems intent on sabotaging my very self, and I have to stop it. If I don’t, it threatens to push people away. It threatens to be my undoing.

Frankly, I refuse.  Fuck you, self. I’m better than that, and I need to start believing that.

Secondly, and said succinctly, I don’t know how to be alone. Said more specifically, being alone in the evenings is something I possess a staggeringly terrible capacity to tolerate. In the day time, work takes over my mental faculties. I can easily manage my emotions and needs. But once my kids go to bed in the evening and I am left to my own devices from 7:30-10:45PM, it’s a different story. It’s as if I forget that I have hobbies of my own, and I feel lost without someone to chat with and take up all of that “space”. I grab onto whomever (lately, that someone I mentioned earlier) will fill the void of that time chunk, seeking attention and conversation. Which is not bad, per say, but I don’t know how to fill that space on my own. If I don’t have someone there, it all falls apart. I try to distract myself with video games, books, and TV shows, but it’s only a temporary solution. Merely a Band-Aid for my deep-seated need for continuous companionship in my evenings, and if I lack it, I fall. Hard. Therein come waves of feelings of “less than” which start to bleed into my already shitty self-confidence, further perpetuating a cycle of sadness that I do not want.

That I do not want.

I want to be able to be alone (if need be). I want to not find it scarily open and empty anymore if I don’t have someone there to talk to in the evenings and take up the space.

I want to know how to take up that space on my own.

And if I could love/like/not dislike myself just a bit more in such motions?  

I’d like that, too.

A lot.

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Journaling, Mental Health

My first memory.

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I don’t have one.

I try. God, I try. I dig deep into the back of the dusty corner of my memory, but I know know not what is real or taken from a picture. It all feels too far removed for me to be sure. Strings I pull at, hoping I tug at *the* one which unlocks something of truth… but mere strings they remain.

I spoke with a good friend of mine once about this. Her earliest memory is not a memory, but someting taken from a photo. Outside of that, she doesn’t remember much else of her childhood. Her counselor suggested this could have been due to repression – a tampering down for the sake of trauma.

Knowing my childhood, I wonder the same.

I reach out to my brother and sister, curiously so. Do they remember? If so, what was their first? We don’t talk all that much these days, and this question they may find strange. I persist.

But before I hear back, I stop myself. There has to be *something*. Even if it took place at the age of, say, 12 — you have some recollection of your childhood. Why not try to write it out?

I remember long days spent on the very flat and large rock next to the spring wash, towels laid out with Jess and Rachel. Uno played for hours under a warm sun. Dips into the wash – chilly from the snowy runoff. Hair slowly drying in the sun as the hours crept leisurely along.

I remember rides with Aaron in his go-cart. A mad man he was, pedal floored as he raced around the rocky and wooded neighborhood, reckless for speed and thrill. I’d hold onto that red roll cage for the life of me, terrified I’d spill out onto the dusty roads. I still have a scar on my right knee as evidence of that having eventually happpened.

I remember sitting on Kimberly’s deck, drinking tea with far too much milk in it, pretending to be regal ladies. Trips inside her dark house to see what her mom had on the telly – often Supermarket Sweeps. Kim’s laughter at my learning that phone was in fact not spelled “fone”.

I remember my first crush, Jacob, and sleeping with his professional, wallet sized karate photo under my pillow for nights on end. I worshipped that photo. Jacob had no idea I existed, I was merely the younger sister of his sister’s best friend. Back then, tho, I could have sworn it was love.

I remember my dad whistling as he drove. All of us in the back, covered bed of his truck, on the carpeted built in that was dangerously unsafe but perfectly acceptable by the 90’s standards. On the radio would be his Jazz CDs, and like a bird he’d whistle their every note. His radar on the dash occasionally beeping in tune.

I remember my mom’s big, wooden, roll top desk. She didn’t use it all that much, there sitting against the window, but I found it magical. Afternoons I’d spend at it, pretending to play secretary. I’d bring out her ledger books and pens, acting as if I could balance them (spoiler alert: I could not).

I struggle to evoke memories that directly involve my mom, For those that I do, I remember the fighting. I remember the perpetuation of harm. I remember after the most heated of arguments, leaving the house with my dad and siblings, all of us saying goodbye to mom. Again. She was leaving this time. Really leaving. She’d be going back to Canada. She’d finally have enough.

But she was always still there when we got back.

I don’t know what of these are my first memories. I know not the starting point of my childhood recollection.

Perhaps it doesn’t matter. Perhaps, nearing the age of 40, it’s inconsequential in the scheme of things.

I still have yet to hear back from my siblings.

Maybe they don’t remember, either.

Maybe.

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Journaling, Mental Health

Mother.

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Are you her?

Have you become her?

A lifetime of trying

All directions opposite

Has it happened?

The frustration

You feel it.

The anger

You recognize it.

The passive aggressiveness

You’ve been named it.

It’s her

It’s you

The bad guy.

You don’t want it, but

You’ve become it.  

Achingly so.

You don’t want it.

You don’t want it.

You don’t want it.

You want peace.

You need peace.

You crave peace.

Is that a lie?

Are you a lie?

Who are you?

To lay blame

How easy it would be

Trying circumstances

Stressful realities

Lies to cover

A means to survive

Continued existence

To see the next day

For which,

You are her.

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Journaling, Mental Health, The magic (in the mess). ♡

Life and it’s meaning.

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What Are You Willing to Struggle for? Fulfillment involves effort, trial-and-error, failure and learning.

On a surface level, and because I cannot think of a better answer, my children. I will struggle through and for my children. Learning that selfless type of sacrificing was the gift of motherhood, however. I was a person before motherhood, and I continue to be one beyond it.

Attempting to answer this right now in a way that is beyond my children, however, is… beyond me. I am deeply in the throes of toddlerhood these days. Much of the time I am mentally worn, exhausted, tired, and overwhelmed. Struggling (beyond the struggle right now that is making it through the weekend sane and in-tact) is a worrying thing for me to consider.

So, to answer the question, I am willing to hold on and struggle to make it to my kids’ bedtime. I am willing to struggle until I get that chance to breath, to sit down, and be me – not mom, not nurse, not chef, not maid – or the million other identities of motherhood. After my kid’s bedtime is the one period during my day in which I can be selfish, listen to my own needs, and do *exactly* it is that I want to do. For that, and for who I can be who I need to be for my children, I will struggle through.

Do I somewhat cringe at the selfish type of person this makes me feel like? Yes. Will that change my answer? Not likely, if I am being honest. Right now, the capacity I have for struggling is limited to that which fosters my own survival. That is not something I can’t be sorry for. In time, I hope, want, and need this answer to evolve. To think beyond me and to the world at large.

In time.

What Did Your 8-Year-Old Self Love Doing? Remember the joy of doing things for the fun of it? No rewards, no impressing anyone, just for yourself.

I collected rocks around this time. I loved rocks. I had a rock tumbler, and dutifully I collected prized stones that I hoped would tumble into treasures. I used all of my (paltry) allowance on buying those shiny, colourful rocks at those wooden cart kiosks you’d randomly find in stores in the 90s. I’d hold my rocks, sort them, and keep them in special boxes. Rocks were my *thing* and to this day they are a small pleasure of mine. I sadly let my greater love of rocks die at this age, however, when a friend of my father’s tried to quiz me about what were the types of rocks he had found, stating that I should know it, and I shamefully couldn’t answer. I didn’t feel worthy of loving rocks anymore at that point.

Playing secretary was my second love. My mom, who was my dad’s secretary for his door company, had this giant wooden desk at home full of ledgers and papers and pens and highlighters and those old school printing calculators. I would sit there and pretend the afternoon away. Organizing the bits, pretending to take phone calls, writing down pertinent information, ensuring everything was organized. I loved that sense of order.

Lastly, there was an off and on stint around this age with interior decorating. I got obsessed with organizing my room in certain ways and ensuring everything had a proper place. I decided I wanted to do interior decorating for a hot minute as a result. I didn’t realize at this time that it wasn’t the decoration I was there for (I’ve always been terrible at having a cohesive aesthetic). I was there for creating order, sense, and peace in my environments.

What Makes You Forget to Eat? When are you are so immersed in an activity that time passes without you realizing? Psychologist call this flow.

Housing systems in video games (must have a social element/*fuck* The Sims). I find it in the placing of items, the tweaking for perfect alignment, the striving towards some type of cohesion (even if my sense of aesthetic may suck) – it is gloriously soul nourishing and fun.

Spreadsheets. Sorting data. Learning from this data. Fixing and organizing meta-tags, adding in missing information to systems, and creating a clearly aligned cohesive system. For my brain and it’s OCD’ish needs, but also, for a world of more beautifully aligned spreadsheets and data. :>

Writing. While it’ll never be book quality, making meaning onto pages like these. The purposeful stringing together of (carefully chosen) words to create the metaphor/soliloquy/meaning I was going for, and my personal realizations and becomings in its wake.

Lastly, reading. Fictional fantasy/sci-fi nerdery. Following the lives of strong female leads into other worlds and existences that I could only dream of.

How Are You Going to Save the World? You may not end world hunger, but you can make a difference. Instead of focusing too much on finding yourself, lose yourself in something larger.

This question. I have sat with it, wrestled with it, fought myself against it, left it, returned to it, and struggled with it. I’ve never been able to answer it and for too long I’ve let that *be* my answer. But… the following quote has left me in pause.    

“It’s fine to struggle against the constraints of human nature, hoping to mitigate the worst of what’s to come, but it’s just as important to fight smaller, more local battles that you have some realistic hope of winning. Keep doing the right thing for the planet, yes, but also keep trying to save what you love specifically—a community, an institution, a wild place, a species that’s in trouble—and take heart in your small successes. Any good thing you do now is arguably a hedge against the hotter future, but the really meaningful thing is that it’s good today. As long as you have something to love, you have something to hope for.”

  • Jonathan Franzen

I’ve got something to love.

So, think globally, yet act locally. And if I follow my heart, it leads to helping fight the fight of protecting BC’s endangered old-growth forests.

Learning how I can *utilize* my skillsets (particularly those in my second and third answers) in this regard to best help, however? That learning journey awaits me.

If You Knew You Were Going to Die One Year from Today, What Would You Do and How Would You Want to be Remembered? How do you really want to spend your time? What do you want your legacy to be?

One year, hey?

I’d want to spend it loving. Loving my children, loving those in my life that matter to me, and loving myself (and possibly as loving trees, too, ‘cause I am me and I am a *little* extra).

I’ve never thought or believed I needed a legacy. It feels presumptuous. Beyond those in my life that are important to me, I do not need to be remembered. I am no trail blazer. There are far greater acts and efforts that came before me and will follow me. Let them have the stage.

But, in those minds of those I care for, I hope to be remembered as a light. As a hope. As a supporter, defender, and lover. As someone who was good at her job, loved what she did, always wanted to learn, and tried to help others. If they also happen to remember me as a (loving) troll, doomsponge, and being far too eager at times than I ought to be, that’s okay, too. :>

Perhaps these are not the highest of ideals to achieve for in what I leave behind for the world… but, they are me. <3

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[Featured], Journaling, Mental Health

Who?

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I’ve been attempting to re-write my (now deleted, burned, and ashes blown to the wind) about me section for this website as of late. In the wake of all that’s happened this past six months, it rang of a girl I no longer am. 

Separation (and divorce, once we get around to it), co-parenting while living together, being single again, my significantly changed role at work, and an inevitable move that will help further cement these necessary and changed dynamics. 

These are times of upheaval. Growth, becoming, relief – and upheaval.

I find myself standing among these pieces and grasping at where I belong. What shoe now fits. What identity rings true. What and who I now am.

For years too many, I identified myself by who I was to someone else. Mother, wife, sister, and daughter. 

In this time of now — a clawing back of independence and identity, listening to my own needs, and speaking of truths — who is Sarah? 

And so, I’ll write it out.

For what should become as a surprise to no one, I know not how to begin at anywhere else other than my faults.

Socially anxious and awkward. Shy. Unsure, self-doubting, and eternally self-deprecating. Often overwhelmed, terrible at asking for help, and demands of herself a level of work/”doing all the things” ethic that is often to her own detriment. Doesn’t know when to stop in those regards, and also doesn’t exercise enough or get outdoors as much as she should. Conflict avoidant (to the point of numbing out), repressor of feelings, and perpetually worried about “rocking the boat”. Has difficulties asserting herself and would love more than anything to just melt into the background – much like her slippery and evading sense of self-identity. Painfully perfectionist and introverted beyond measure.

Yet, at the same time, there is goodness.

Caring, kind, and thoughtful. Supportive, reliable, and helpful. Stable, peaceful, and patient. Careful, yet hopeful. Organized, meticulous, and detailed. Conscientious, observant, and a defender of the vulnerable. Respectful, progressive, and loving. Joyful and humble (perhaps to a fault).    

(Admittedly, not quite as good as talking about her good bits as she is her “bad”.)

And then there is that which is simply that.

The comforts she finds in the definable. Cozy in the exacts. Beauty and stability in data. Her eye for specifics. A love of words, reading, and stories. An appreciation for wit and intellect. A (100% untrained) connoisseur of tacos, thrift shopping, and Reese’s peanut butter cups. Liberal and atheist, and at one with nature. Nerdy. Give her video games with housing systems and give her board games with friends – she will be content. A complete, utter, and well-meaning doomsponge… but, also, a troll of the most loving proportions.  

And at the end of it all, a survivor of childhood trauma and postpartum mental health reckonings – keenly aware of how they have made her who she is to this day.

New and old truths, new and old shoes. Here lies my journey fourth.

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Journaling, Mental Health, The magic (in the mess). ♡

Oh.

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Finally, the separation was a reality. Happiness became you. You were free. You could live again. Oh, the sweet relief.  

And lived you did. Not long after you jumped onto Tinder (it was what people did, you thought). You were there for things you had longed for and missed. To genuinely talk to a guy, to connect, to shamelessly flirt, and to feel attractive. You soon discovered the (deceptively shallow) thrill of a match. Oh, the validation.  

Matches turned to conversations; your phone glued to hand. You were giddy on difference and change. And thrived in the attention. You came to life. Years of a dead marriage and dead bedroom left you determined. You would harness this energy. You would become again. Oh, the renewal.  

Alas, that wave soon broke.  

For you awoke. 

Eyes opened to the inner voices that lead you to stay unhappily in a marriage for years too long.  

Not a single one of these people would like you in the flesh and blood, Sarah. Your tinder profile, despite how overly honest it is, was nothing but a ruse. You, in all your eagerness and wonder, were but a ruse. Oh, to be a ruse.  

And the conversations turned to ash.  

Rife with uncertainty (where do you go next?), you turned to what you knew. The comfort of World of Warcraft. You hadn’t used your computer much these past few years and it took some adjusting, but your heart sang. You found (some) of your people again. You were having fun again. You were living again.  

But again, you awoke.  

Was this living? Or were you just there to chase the next validation? Dare not find it in yourself, but in those that once showered you with it. They found what you couldn’t. Oh, what you couldn’t.

(And among these messes that you are and where they have led you, there came to be someone else. The one with the voice that you’ve low key had a crush on *for years*. You start talking daily. You somehow end up playing WoW together, and you soon found yourself in Valheim. As your friendship has grown, so does your crush. It’s profoundly silly of you, he’s a thousand miles away. Yet, you know better than to have a single expectation. You’re just enjoying each other’s company, you reason. He’s a delightful escape from your mess, you justify. Oh, to rationalize.)

This past weekend, you deleted Tinder. It was a relief to be on the other side. But… on the other side of what? 

The other side of knowing what you want? You feel no closer to that now than you did at the precipice.

Or on the other side of knowing what you need? For this is a need that does not have the time, Tinder. The bravery. The capacity. The energy. The readiness. And it would be a lie to say I ever did.

And that next validation hit — it needs to come from myself. Myself alone.

Oh, to know.

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Journaling, Mental Health, Motherhood

I see you.

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In the way she navigates life. Taking those purposeful turns and back alleys, expertly maneuvering and avoiding any possible problem or issue. Even at her own peril – her own peril.

In the way she exhaustingly strives to see everyone happy, living in harmony and at peace. Even if it means she’s not there – she’s not there.

In the chronic people pleaser in her. An insistent persistence to please. Even to her own detriment – her own detriment.   

In her biggest want in life: peace. To be with and at peace among all. Even if that peace is beyond her, and there lies a battle within her — battle within her.

In her core fear: conflict. Her fallbacks and coping mechanisms of avoidance and silence. A purposeful hiding of her being – hiding of her being.   

In how she expresses herself only when there is little to no chance of discord. Absolute necessity being the only moments in which she dare gives voice – dare gives voice.   

In her obsession with safeguarding peace. Frozen still I find her. Acting or speaking her truths, she is found unable – found unable 

In her need for perfectionism. A perfectionism born rooted in a frantic need to not disappoint. To be found worthy. To be loved like you should have been – like you should have been. 

And in the very path that guides her as a mother and early childhood educator. Children — those of her own and the lives of others she touches — giving them the peace you didn’t have.

The peace you didn’t have. 

I see her.

I see you.  

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Mental Health, Motherhood, Postpartum, The magic (in the mess). ♡

Still learning.

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“Mama, why wasn’t [insert so and so] listening at child care today?”
“Mama, why did that person stop their car in the middle of the road?”
“Mama, why didn’t you remember to [such and such that my fried brain continually forgets to do]?”

“Because people are still learning, my sweet boy. Still learning how to control their bodies, how to obey the rules of the road, and/or how to remember to do things when functioning on not enough sleep. Life is always teaching us, and we’re always learning.”

A semblance of the above conversation (though for varying reasons) takes place between my son and I a few times a week. So much so that he now chimes in with me in answer, “yeah! They’re still learning!”

It’s a bit of an overly positive take on shitty drivers, I’ll give it that. But, there are nuggets of truth to be found in these conversations nonetheless.

With that said, we’ve recently had a helluva reminder that D and I are still learning.

But first, some backstory.

Six months ago, after having given birth to M, it became rapidly apparent that my mental health needed my son in full time child care while I stayed at home to look after my newborn. I simply wasn’t able to sanely meet both his and M’s needs on the days D was working. It was beyond me, and I feel no shame in admitting that.

Thankfully, we were quickly able to secure full time placement, and it has been the absolute best decision for us all. O adores his “school”, loves the time he can spend there with friends (as he can hardly do that anywhere else these days), and it gives him a place during the day to get out all of his energy and exploratory needs. Furthermore, when he’s at “school”, it leaves me with the sanity I need to care for his sister (now an infant), care for our home, and find some pockets of time during the day to care for myself.

This is not a decision I regret. That being said, I fully get that such an option simply would not be possible or available for some families for a multitude of reasons. Furthermore, some may have chosen differently. I respect that. My anxiety, however, had other plans in store.

Fast forward to now.

After having O at home recently (for reasons that can be found here), I realized something, and it was a something that I had started to clue in on during his week at home this past winter break.

We don’t yet truly, truly know what it means to have two kids.

(It is here I struggle in putting what I mean by that into words. A part of me feels that what I have to say next is not a valid “problem” as it is one born of first world privileges. The other part of me dismisses that notion, and says a struggle is a struggle, and giving words to problems has always helped me better make sense of it all. So, fuck it. I forge ahead.)

We don’t yet know how to fully balance the juggling act of forever meeting the needs of two children while trying to meet our own.

We don’t yet know how to deny the sigh of exhaustion that comes with forever needing to be the type of “on task” that two children require of you.

We don’t yet know how to best give each other breaks (even if that just means one of us being with the “easier” kid in that moment) so that the other can feel the briefest moment of reprieve before having to dive right back in (and how to be accepting of that fact).

We don’t yet know how to quiet the loud sighs of relief come after Sunday evening bedtimes and Monday morning child care drop offs.

How to be at peace in the mess of preschooler + infant “all-day-no time to clean” living… How to give up the illusion that our sore bodies won’t forever be laying or sitting on the floor for YEARS to come… How to not blessedly (and guilty) SAVOUR the daily TV time aka “mom and dad break” that we’ve been having from 4:30-6PM…. These and so much more are things we are very much still learning.

(Truth be told, these are things that we may never learn, or may not HAVE to learn. But, I digress.)

When O is at childcare during the week, I can re-replicate the ease of what it once was to just have one kid. I can breathe. It is a blessing, but, it is also a curse. It’s inadvertently made us be able to deny and delay the demanding, draining reality that comes with having more than one child.

There’s no choice.

Much like winter break, we’ve recently been given no choice but to face this reality head on.

There is much I could say about how it went, but I’ll simply say this: it’s been exhausting, bonding, raw-rubbing, relationship building, HARD-yet-meaningful work.

And while before all of this I may have quite rudely guffawed at the following positivity that I am going to type, I’ll do it anyway. We have been made all the better as a family for it. Yawning, laughing, grumbling, smiling, still learning and all.

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Mental Health, Motherhood, Postpartum

Until now.

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I’ve been managing. Despite being always at home while on mat leave, juggling an infant, and my daily adult in-person interaction since early November being limited to just D and my son’s educators during child care pickup (you’d be proud, Dr. Bonnie Henry, with how well I’ve listened), I’ve managed. Until now.

Then this week happened.

Something snapped, and I let the loneliness and isolation “grief” finally creep in through the cracks. Despair set in, acutely and deeply.

I give up, Covid. You win.

As a deeply introverted, shy, homebody (who married someone that is the same exact way), I am profoundly lucky and privileged it took me this long to get here. I admit to that fully.

Yet, here I am now missing things I have *never* missed before in my entire life. Super busy play cafes, shopping in packed malls, full to the brim drop-in programs, over flowing movie theatres, and grocery stores with isles that have so many people in them you can hardly move. All things I would have non-jokingly told you I was allergic to a year and a half ago.

And when I remember back to the slow and simple days of park get togethers, play dates, and meeting up with mom friends to chat while our kids were being kids — it physically hurts now.

This was not the postpartum experience that I thought it would be. This is not mat leave I wanted it to be. The summer ahead of us, the first with our completed family of four, it will likely not be the experience I wish for it to be (at the rate Canada is going with the vaccinations). I hate all of this.

Perhaps next week I’ll be able to start seeing again the other things to look forward to, the silver linings in our time outside, and the positives in the small joys to keep celebrating.

But, right now? I am in mourning.

There is so much more I wanted to do this time around while I was off work. I had plans. M’s an easy enough baby that it would have worked this time, too, unlike with O. Yet, when I pulled out her diaper bag the other day prior to leaving for her sixth month vaccinations, upon it was a layer of dust. I was at a loss.

There are no thought provoking words or inspirational wisdom to end this piece, and it feels weird without it. Yet, I’m not sorry for it, for all I want and need to say is this:

This really, really sucks.

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Mental Health, Motherhood, Postpartum, The magic (in the mess). ♡

The “if only”s.

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My sweet boy.

As I’ve built this website, I’ve unintentionally had to remember and relive the “trenches” that were the first six months of your life.

I had realizations that came five years late.

Fraught discoveries at all that I didn’t know.

Wishes and hopes for the should-have could-have would-have but never-had.

I got stuck in the if onlys.

If only I could have better known your sleepy cues.

If only I could have better known your hunger cues.

If only I could have better known your signs of teething.

If only I could have better known the million things you were undoubtedly trying to tell me.

If only, if only, if only.

Instead, you were my bundle of hot, angry, and frustrated tears. Exhaustion, worn edges, and frayed emotions became you (and me, if we’re being honest). We lived, cried and grieved as one in the cavernous hallways of colic.

I tried.

To hear you, to see you, and to truss out from the misery of everything the need you were trying to communicate.

But that everything became one, and more often than not, I failed.

Yet here in the now, this is where I stop myself.

For in those failures – failures of first time mothering, failures of laughable pre-birth expectations, and failures of selflessness I wasn’t yet ready to let go of – I grew.

Those were the days that defined me.

If I had those if onlys, would I have learned to say fuck it and let go? To laugh at my utter lack of intuition, and just go for it on a wing and a prayer? To wade deeply into the murky Nile of motherhood, and still be able to find it’s soggy, muddy, messy beauty?

I don’t think so.

I intend not to write these soliloquies through rose coloured glasses, my mental health would have frankly moved mountains for those if onlys. My marriage with your father would have breathed sighs of reliefs in their reprieves.

But in those days, weeks and months — I became. In that battleground of exasperation, love, annoyance, and adoration (and the bravery to admit I felt all those ways), you taught me. You pushed me beyond myself. You gave me the greatest lesson I ever learned.

You made me a momma. ❤️

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Mental Health, Motherhood, Postpartum, The magic (in the mess). ♡

This time around.

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I recently sat down and did a bit of reflection on this piece I wrote a few years ago, but from my now second time mother perspective. Here’s what came of it..

Girl, I love you, but oh my goodness such DRAMATICS. Then again, I remember. Those days would be impossible to ever forget. First time motherhood was quite the significant headfuck for you. ⁣

⁣After your second birth, for the sake of sanity you realize you are historically close to loosing at that point, you choose a different dish. It is one that asks of you way less cooking and close to no prep — a delightfully easy meal of perogies, sausages and corn. Not the healthiest, but it was needed. ⁣

⁣I won’t fool you, things weren’t perfect while you made those perogies, and nor will they likely ever be, frankly. You were anxious and scrambling, but the results were about twenty million times less of a hectic gong show. And not only do you amazingly get to eat that meal together as a family (newborn sleeping in your lap and all), you manage it at two weeks postpartum, too. Perfection be damned. ⁣

⁣You could thank the gods that decided to listen that time around, but truth be told, just thank yourself. Second-time motherhood will instill in you the ability to handle (like a hot, graceful mess) 458634884 *more* things all at once. It is also quite the headfuck, just a slightly more manageable one. We even come to love it. ⁣

💚⁣ ⁣⁣

⁣P.S. I’d be remiss to finish this with out letting you know that here in the future you haven’t cooked this chicken dish in years. O, now a preschooler, has long since refused to eat it. Something about all the items touching (how dare us) and him being seemingly allergic to any and all cooked vegetables. We’re having LOTS of fun with that one.

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[Featured], Mental Health, Motherhood, Postpartum, The magic (in the mess). ♡

Thank you, easier.

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It’s easier this time, this maternity leave. It’s easier because, well, she’s easier. And yet, it’s so much more than that.⁣
⁣
It’s easier because “I know” now the knowledge that first time motherhood denies of you. It’s easier because second children are blessedly unfair in the understandings they afford; understandings that your first (be it you or them) would have never dared relent.⁣
⁣
It’s easier because I’m here, but FULLY here. I’ve stopped listening to the bullshit of everything outside of this, of us, and am embracing a motherly instinct and intuition. Pieces of me that I feel I only just met, but have known all along.⁣
⁣
(And for reasons I won’t elaborate on, out of not wanting this to be about it, and my hurts, it is remarkably easier because my mother is purposefully no longer in our lives.)⁣
⁣
In strange, unexplainable, and starkly tangible ways, it’s easier because of what our world has come to in the grips of this pandemic. The pressure to take the “new baby” out to socialize and to be there for happenings (despite my every inner voice of anxiety screaming in consternation and uncertainty) — it is blissfully absent. Weeks on end we stay at home, only ever leaving for long walks or to pick up O in the afternoons, and it is a peaceful balm to the introversion rooted deeply in my soul. These things didn’t require a pandemic to occur, but they are things I only (and finally) allowed of myself *because* of the pandemic.⁣
⁣
It’s easier because of time. Mothering through anxiety for five years has left me with a hardened knowing. This knowing is not here anymore to impress, or to give a damn about what’s being thought of who she is as a mother. This knowing savours honesty, embraces the mess of it all, and respects and believes in the journey EXACTLY as it is.⁣
⁣
And, let’s be real, it’s easier because of the meds.⁣
⁣
Thank you, easier.⁣
⁣
💚⁣ ⁣

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[Featured], Mental Health, Motherhood, Postpartum, The magic (in the mess). ♡

I promise.

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Dear me,⁣
⁣
I’m sitting here on our phone looking back at pictures you took. It’s January, 2016. You have just recently become a mom for the first time, and are six weeks postpartum.⁣
⁣
The majority of the pictures are of the babe your body created. You aren’t in many, and in those that you are, there is a purposeful effort on your behalf for the photo’s focus to be on anything else but you.⁣
⁣
But, I look to you anyways. Your face. Your hair. Your eyes. The layers that tell a story. Faint smiles, tangled curls in sloppy buns, dark circles and sleepy squints, a breast milk stained cardigan on it’s sixth day of wear. The story of a woman trying. Trying and tired, trying and unsure, trying and afraid.⁣
⁣
Ah, all that what would come in those months ahead. The countless hours of colic, the incredibly little, little sleep, the exasperation at the useless futility of everything you tried, the heart pounding anxiety at anything “gone wrong” that would envelope you in a bundle of trauma. The culmination of it all breaking you. Chasms laid wide, intrusive thoughts hungrily consuming the darkness now bare. An unspoken guilt that consumed you, perpetuating and furthering the cycle. Rinse, repeat, remorse and regret.⁣
⁣
It will be okay, I whisper to you. Gently placing my finger on your shoulder on the screen, as if it could be a hug that transcends time and instils in you the hope you didn’t have. You WILL overcome. The colic goes away, eventually. He sleeps, eventually. You get help from doctors, finally. It starts to work. The pieces come together. You find what he needs. You find what you need. Together, you thrive.⁣
⁣
You’re even crazy enough in five years to do it all over again, mental health reckonings and all. But, we figure it out that time sooner. ⁣She actually sleeps. She’s happier. She’s easier.⁣
⁣
Right now, though.⁣
⁣
It feels like you can’t breath.⁣
⁣
I know. I hear you.⁣
⁣
But, you will.⁣
⁣
We will.⁣
⁣
I promise.

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Mental Health, Motherhood

Today was not our day.

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[I’m posting this because among all the perfect Christmas posts/photos you’ve seen these past few days, it can feel very easy to feel inferior or like you haven’t done enough. If this is you, I see you – I hear you – I am you.]

Today was not our day.

My body deciding that 4:30AM was a perfectly acceptable time to be awake. By 2PM I was running on fumes, which made it very hard for me to cope with…

A profoundly fussy, hostile and (slightly) soul sucking baby still feeling after effects from her most recent vaccinations. Literally un-put-downable, could only be with me and had to always be moving or nursing (when she let me) to abate her hysterics.

+

A tired, overstimulated five year not use to all the gifts, the screen time, and the very many “inputs” of the holidays, but trying so hard to hold his own.

D was able to thankfully hold his own, however, despite having been up the majority of the night before with what we strongly suspect is restless leg syndrome related.

But, to top it off, the Chinese dinner we ordered in (we’re either honouring the half Jewish part of D or facing the realities of 2020, you pick) has left me wth a terribly upset tummy.

We were blessed to be able to open gifts with good friends of our’s over Zoom. But, the other stuff? UGH.

For now, I’m off to eat Reece’s in bed (sorry, tummy) and get lost in the most mindless possible drivel I can find on my phone before passing out in a sea of wrappers.

At least we got new sheets for Christmas?

Tomorrow is another day.

Thank freakin’ god.

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Mental Health, Motherhood, Postpartum, The magic (in the mess). ♡

How far we’ve come.

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I breast fed O until he was 17 months. Assumption dictated I would do the same with my daughter. When M was born, she latched perfectly. Hurray! Then she had to undergo blue light therapy in the hospital for jaundice and somehow, among it, she forgot how to latch. ⁣
⁣
It has been a HARD journey since. I’ve been trying many many many MANY times a day to help M relearn what she had lost, and then following it by hours of pumping so that I could feed her (while D gave her expressed bottles). She was often frustrated, I was often at tears. It felt like all hours of the day were spent on this effort. I was pretty much stuck at home, with my breast-pump as my ankle monitor. I read what felt like every single article in existence about breastfeeding, and my anxiety was a MESS. ⁣
⁣
(Exclusive pumpers and formula users, I have full respect for you. Please know that.)⁣
⁣
But, good news! After about three thousand attempts (no lie — I’m serious) and four weeks, M is finally latching and doing so consistently. It’s not perfect, and we both have some growing to get there, but, we made it. ⁣
⁣
Achieving this with M has been monumental to my mental health. Now, I figure out how to transition her fully to breastfeeding, while ensuring she gets enough and keeps gaining weight. This will be another journey of learning, but it is one I am prepared to embrace. Slowly and carefully for my anxiety’s sake, but in proud abundance of how far we’ve already come. 💚⁣ ⁣

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Mental Health

Goodbye to you.

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I’m feeling this profoundly hard today, and I am making this public so I don’t have to answer (as many) questions later:

My broken, bruised and harmful relationship with my mother has reached beyond its inevitable breaking point, and I am finally having the courage to cut ties and walk away.

And, in time, hopefully heal…

“You don’t have to be a product of the inept, cruel parenting that was shown to you, and this starts with the brave decision that the cycle stops at you. People who do this, who refuse to continue a toxic legacy, are courageous, heroic and they change the world. We’re here to build amazing humans, not to tear them down. How many lives could have been different if your parent was the one who decided that enough was enough.”

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Mental Health, Motherhood

Keeping us sane.

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Shout out to the biggest thing that is keeping me sane during this period of pandemic isolation: daily, morning walks with my kid.

They’re long, meandering, and not always with rhyme and reason (as I am often subject to a four year old’s whims), but they are making this experience survivable and pleasant.
⁣
Now, if someone could please help my kid realize that paths with pebbles are all good to walk on, and not the devil itself, I’d love you for life.

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Mental Health, Motherhood

Do not want.

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I’ve said this and I’ll say it again, I did not expect the mind fuck of parenting that is worrying about your kid(s).

It’s like this gigantic, all encompassing, slightly obnoxious layer to add to the stress vortext that is life.

You can have this part of the job back, Parenting, my brain hurts

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Mental Health, Motherhood

And now, postpartum OCD.

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Postpartum OCD entered my parenting journey at six months in.

It took me doing a lot of thorough and careful research after a counsellor, someone not at liberty to diagnose, made an offhand comment while recommending I see a psychiatrist during my postpartum anxiety and postpartum depression battles.

Despite it having been years since, I have never spoken publicly about this.

I can count on less than one hand the people I have privately told that I have about my postpartum OCD, internal thoughts and actions.

Many of my closest family members do not know.

If I had previously shared my struggles with you about my supposed postpartum anxiety or depression, I purposely did not correct myself.

And typing this right now?

It’s terrifying.

There will forever be a piece of me that believes speaking this truth to power will result in my child being taken away from me.

Even in this very post of me admitting to it, it will glaze over the details of *how* and in what ways I suffer from postpartum OCD. The fear of repercussions — it is strong and deeply, deeply real.

One truth I am not afraid to glaze over is this: there are few things in the world that make you feel more like a terrible person and a terrible mother than postpartum OCD. (Yes, I am far past postpartum now, but I still have the same symptoms — though not as often, so I struggle with what else to call it). The guilt that comes with this disorder is a heavy, heavy load to bear. It hurts in ways I didn’t know one could feel pain, and it can be a gut punch from nowhere that can derail a whole day.

But, I have learned to reframe it. I have learned to positively see the whys. I have learned to function.

Others haven’t. Postpartum OCD is not something widely understood, or rarely talked about. Predominantly from the very people who need help the most, those who are suffering in silence and with my same fears.

If I am ever to truly heal, my truth must be heard.

And if you’ve ever been here, or are here, you are not alone. I hear you. I am you. This will not defeat us.

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[Featured], Mental Health, Motherhood, Respectful Parenting, The magic (in the mess). ♡

Fumbling towards.

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I’m trying to make sense of who I am as a mom. Still.

I don’t really know what this making sense looks like, tastes like, or feels like to wear against the skin of my arms, but I keep trying to reach forward into the realm of mom identities and find something to latch onto.

I’m not the crunchy mom. Not the boss mom. Not the Pinterest/crafty mom. Not the helicopter mom. Not the wine mom. Not the perfect mom. Definitely not the cool mom.

There is nothing wrong with any of these moms, I’m just not them.

In this attempting to make sense of my mom identity, I’m doing something I try hard to not do to anyone else. I’m labeling myself, and admittedly masking it as attempt to try to figure out where I fit. I’m taking a square and pushing it into the round hole of mom identities, and expecting to meet my deliverance.

These walls are too thick.

I guess I could be a wannabe minimalist mom. An RIE mom (on my good days). An obviously plus sized mom. A boring/little too honest mom. Kinda the hot mess mom. A “reads too much and really loves sleep and chocolate” mom.

Or, in any case, the sum of those moms.

But what lies in the lingering and claiming/writing/marinating of such mom identity(s)? Is there sense to uncover? Ease to be found? Will I be less of a foggy mess and more (wiggles fingers *magically*) “with purpose”?

Side note: will blogging in this bloody thing become not be such a forgetful, directionless conquest?

Or in claiming something, anything, on this mothering journey, and trying to fit into it — will it only further lead to my own bewildered, dazzling confusion?

Perhaps this making sense… it is more than a label. More than a type. More than a niche.

Perhaps it is simply settling on where I find myself smiling in this mothering journey, and letting that be the sense and the identity that I need.

I don’t know. But I’m fumbling. It is a peaceful, awkward tumble. I’m reaching towards and casting away. Eventually, I’ll land.

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Mental Health, Motherhood

The words.

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I’m unexpectedly revisiting an old journal of thoughts that I opened as I couldn’t remember it’s purpose.

These are the words of postpartum anxiety and postpartum depression.

Attempting to get philosophical about how much I’ve grown or healed since these days is a bit too wax-poetic for the raw pain of what this experience was and sometimes continues to be for me.

But, I can now say, and truly believe, that my kid loves me. 💚⁣ ⁣

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Mental Health, Motherhood, The magic (in the mess). ♡

He CAN.

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We just got back from a trip to Las Vegas.

We’re home, unpacked, resting and watching O engage with his play space like it’s the most magical ever (and thank goodness for that, ‘cause we are tapped and have nothing at this moment to give him).

We may be tired, but the trip worked out well.

It was sad to say goodbye, as it always is, but I’m happy to have learned more about the resilient parts of my child.

He CAN stay the night somewhere else and actually sleep.

He CAN stay up late, or skip a nap, and not be a total mess as a result.

He CAN withstand a plane ride and all it’s weird/loud sounds and “not being able to move around lots” bits.

He CAN warm up to animals and in time, pet them and grow to be okay around them.

He CAN be at large gatherings for long periods of time and not completely shutdown because of all the loud sounds.

He CAN make his own way in places he’s never been and with people he’s never met or remembers ever meeting.

He CAN find camaraderie with his counsins and love his Vegas family from the get go, even if he hasn’t seen them face to face much in his life.

He CAN bust a sweet dance move to any length of music (expected or not), dislike other people’s “ceilings” and be terrified of his baby cousin no matter how freakin’ hard you assure him that he’s safe.

Some of these things may be obvious, and they should be even more obvious to me as an early childhood educator.

That’s the thing with post-partum anxiety + first time motherhood, though.

You convince yourself of everything but the obvious.

It was so good to be proved wrong. 💚⁣ ⁣

Thank you to those who told me it was time. You were right.

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Mental Health, Milestones & Genetics, Motherhood, Respectful Parenting, The magic (in the mess). ♡

This is what I know.

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For the past five or so days I’ve been on a massive cleaning, purging, MAKE IT LOOK GOOD frenzy. It was brought on by some other changes going on in my life, changes that are going to give me more time to invest love into our home, and this endeavour of organizational overhaul was seemingly the best place to start.

(Can I just say that organizing does my brain better than ANY therapy, religion or mindfulness could ever dare hope to? It’s good. So freakin’ good. Like thrillingly good. ANYWAYS.)

As I’ve been tossing, donating, giving away, straightening, fixing, redecorating, focusing on what matters, etc., I’ve had time to think. Time to dwell. Time to ponder and ruminate.

And I’ve come to this conclusion, a conclusion in answer to my last post… if I wish to write (which I do), and have it be from a lived experience, then isn’t the answer simply to write what I *do* know?

And what is it that I know, anyways?

So, to begin (and perhaps one day end…):

I know what it is to be a mom and feel like I have absolutely no freakin’ idea what I’m doing, but, amazingly, things seemingly work out okay and my kid loves my anyways (*pats self on back*) – even if I genuinely have NO idea how.

I know what it is to be on the receiving side of the toxic realm of mommy shaming in this world we live in, and how inexcusable, hurtful and NOT necessary it is, and that I so very much want to spread LOVE to make all the moms I know feel worthy and good enough – ‘cause I don’t always feel that way myself.

I know what it is to be a mom of a child with special needs/special rights, who asks of the world differently than what it’s able to typically give, and the tears and the struggles and the JOYS that come with such an identity of nurturing.

I know what it is to mentally struggle as a mom, and to struggle deeply, bearing fourth my vulnerabilities to the therapists and close friends in my world, always hoping my story gets better… or helps another know that the light isn’t always so dark.

I know what it is as a mom and wife to be blindsided by the addition of a baby and now toddler, and how it forever changes one’s marriage, and how HARD that can often be to help kindle, heal and give it the attention that it needs.

I know what it is to be a mom without a village, or without a real and *present* network of support (except Tina, god bless that woman), and how “without” that can make one feel, and sometimes less than – and the startling realization of being able to physically count on so few.

I know what it is to become a mom at an older age than some, and the shock of a system it can still be at times to put on mommy shoes when for so, so long that was never, ever the case – and the at times *incredibly* trying adjustment it can be to shift into a mothering state of mind.

I know what it is to be a somewhat “new to being a mom” in this very digital world of Facebook mom groups, mom blogs, “overly eager advice sharing people with a keyboard”, and the trials, triumphs and tribulations that have so far come with parenting in a (perhaps too) technological rich realm of information/misinformation.

I know what it is as a mom to want to embrace said technology, but only giving teeny tiny little bits of it at a time to my child, deeply afraid of it being harmful to his growing brain or becoming unstoppable – as technology in my life past was want to do.

I know what it is to be a mom that is guided deeply by the tenements of trust and respect for my child, even when he’s doing what a two year old often does, and how I refuse to shush or distract him from what he’s feeling/going through for the sake of an easier road – even if an easier road sometimes would be much, much easy to bare.

I know what it is to be a mom who is bigger than most, who looks different than others, and who doesn’t always love her body – even if my kid ADORES it, tummy and all (which boggles my dang mind).

And as all moms do, I know what it is to sacrifice. To give up sleep, food, my own needs and my own wants, all for a child who is rested, full, healthy and happy. How he gets there, I’m not so sure, but I’m seemingly doing *something* right.

This is what I know.

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Mental Health, Motherhood

She writes.

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My urge to write is deep and nagging. I long to divulge like the books I bury myself in, hoping to drip in similar soliloquy and metaphor. I just don’t possess such abilities, be it I lack the imagination, right words or the experience, and thus the words I sting together sound hallow. Like those of a school girl bitterly writing her pained experiences of the heartaches of being a teenager, devoid of an aged knowledge, but rife with scorn and annoyance. (See how forced it is even when I try?)

There is little bitterness in my life right now, however. I am in a good spot. My mom journey is in a good spot. I am happy in this spot. I am comfortable in this spot. But it is in pains that I find I can do my best writing (though this is based on knowledge from my high school years, full of similar strife to what I previously referenced). Does sorrow still hold my best words, my best promise of a written creation? Or have I moved beyond that? Have I become something more?

I am unsure and at times unwilling to find out. My issues with the way I write, wishing it to be so much more than it is, stop me from pouring fingers onto keyboard clicks. I don’t truly know what to write, and I fear of sounding juvenile, of bringing to something a lack of meaning from a contently led life. I fear not knowing enough to truly write from lived knowledge, but rather bits and bots placed on paper made to make happy those who know my writing. Aimed to impress with overly used clichés, familiar heartache and the same old swoons.

But the satisfaction of those swoons quickly thaw, and I long for more. I long to be deeply understood. I long to pour all of me out, thin and transparent against the screen, and to then be carefully collected and embraced. I don’t truly know what there is of me inside this brain and body that doesn’t feel embraced or understood, however, but there lays a hunger — a dull ache of words having gone unsaid. Emotions not given their due right. Hope and fears diverted rather than divulged.

I want to follow that ache, to live it, to drown in it, to write it – and to come up from its depth with eyes wide open.

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Mental Health, Motherhood, The magic (in the mess). ♡

Returning to where I need to be.

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Okay. I am about to feel incredibly silly for writing this all out, as I have not completely become confident in sharing and living it yet, BUT… this is an act of holding myself accountable. Continue on I can and will.

In my ongoing journeys of post-partum anxiety, post-partum depression and post-partum “what the fresh hell has happened to my life” I have been seeing a counselor and attempting to heal. Born anew I do not expect to be, but eventually finding again the harmony, security and joy to what I once lived is a hope of mine.

So, how I am being instructed to go about doing that is through the act of mindfulness.

There are many interpretations of mindfulness out there, but I personally like this one best: an embracing of awareness in the presence, and cultivating that awareness with kindness and curiosity.

I’m not always the greatest at practicing mindfulness (even though I talk about its teachings often in my career), but I am thankful for what changes it has made thus far in my struggles and the potentials it has in helping me. It helps my brain stop when nothing else can, it grounds me and it allows me to embrace the here and now.

And there is one particular mindfulness strategy I have found to be invaluable to me thus far, and it is known as 5 4 3 2 1.

After taking some purposeful, deep breaths, here is what it asks of those who practice it to do:

  • Acknowledge FIVE things you see around you.
  • Acknowledge FOUR things you can touch around you.
  • Acknowledge THREE things you hear.
  • Acknowledge TWO things you can smell.
  • Acknowledge ONE thing you can taste.

(The above can be rearranged if a particular sense is much more abundant than the rest).

I have come to embrace this strategy as it takes me out of my head. It stops the thoughts. It returns me to the physical and lets me simply be. In a world of anxiety and depression that is nothing but a warzone of emotions and panic, it is a lifesaver.

The super nerdy, I’m embarrassed to admit part: recently, in a hope that it better helps and reminds me to practice 5 4 3 2 1, I put together a mindfulness kit for myself to let me have one of every sense readily available to me. The items I choose were ones that particularly spoke to me and bring within me a great sense of peace. My kit now goes everywhere I go, and it looks a little like this:

  • See: pictures of heavily forested landscapes
  • Touch: aventurine worry stone
  • Hear: “zen” chime
  • Smell: essential oils (lavender and orange in particular)
  • Taste: yes, that is a mint tin, but there are totally green jolly ranchers inside of it. :>

And it all else fails, a deck of mindfulness cards with other exercises to try if needed.

So, long story short, if you see or hear of me peddling around a chime, staring at trees and smelling heavily of lavender/hippie fabulousness, I haven’t quite lost it. Yet! Rather, I am taking a moment to return to where I need to be. Please be patient with me, as I might not always get there, but I’m trying.

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Mental Health, Motherhood, The magic (in the mess). ♡

A tender spot.

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The interesting thing about those who suffer from post-partum anxiety (which I can probably just call anxiety at this point considering that I’m now 15 months PP) is this: one’s absolute lack of staying in the present. And by interesting, I mean freakin’ terrible.

My kid was super sick over the weekend. Like, all I want to do all day long is lay on your body please don’t move, OH GOD HOW DARE YOU MOVE, sick. He held our weekend hostage, but whateve, that’s parenting.

In the midst of it all I made an attempt to cheer him up a little bit. Everyone loves a little tickles, right?! So, he squirmed rapidly in my arms, leaned to the right and promptly bit the ever living crap out of me. It HURT. I’ve got a sweet bruise from it now that is painful to touch. It was a legit bite.

Of course, the second it happened, I was in immediate panic mode. For example, the thoughts that were racing through my head: omg, he’s gonna be one of those kids. He’s gonna be a biter. He’s not gonna have any friends. All the other kids around him are gonna be afraid of him. So, *calculates exact wording and plan of action in her head*, this is how we’re gonna approach it. When it happens at childcare, this is how we’re gonna manage it. When it comes up in parent teacher meetings, this is how we’re gonna address it. We’re gonna see him through this, we’re gonna help his manage his frustration in ways different but not harmful, and it’ll all be okay. We’ve got this, we’ve got this, we’ve got this…

Aaaaaand, in the span of 8 seconds, I was five years ahead of myself disaster planning and readying for the worst while somewhat maybe actually DESPERATELY hoping for the best.

With some gentle reminders from D, such as the fact that our child is really freakin’ sick (with a cold that I too now ferociously have), tired and not wanting any of our shit, I was able to snap back to the*now* and take a deep breath.

But I fail to comprehend how, as a parent, to live in that now. To stop and take note of exactly where I am. I wasn’t like this before I became a mom, and, now that I am, it’s hard. Really freakin’ hard. Even more so when you’ve got a FIERCE bruise on the precious flesh of your inner arm staring you right in the face.

So, I love you terribly, sweet boy, but next time? Try not to hit a spot that is so tender. Both physically and emotionally. 💚⁣ ⁣

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Mental Health, Motherhood

The bough.

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I’ve been quiet on here for a bit, hey? I haven’t forgotten about Soundly Sarah, however. Rather, I’ve chosen to be purposefully quiet. While I have had many, MANY things I have wanted to write, a large part of me couldn’t consciously put any of it to paper until I addressed something that took place not long after I last posted here. Addressing that something has been an extremely private, long, arduous, six month journey for me, however, and I have returned here now as I am finally ready to write it out and begin again in this space that I have so missed.

On a Friday morning near the end of July, I had a breakdown. It was a full on, anxiety ridden, nerve stricken, tears and screams, I’m losing my mind, I can’t breathe, I can’t think, why am I shaking?! breakdown. It was very real, very scary, and with D’s help, immediate medical attention was sought for me to understand what the hell was going on.

But to make clear to you what I eventually learned about myself, I first need to give a bit of back story.

Many of you are already aware, but for those who are not, the first hundred days of O’s life were a nightmare. He would not, could not, be put down. At all. He slept nowhere but on us (no matter how many times or how hard we tried to change that). If he was awake, he had to be moving or breastfeeding 95% of the time or he was livid. It was all this and so so so so so much more. A part of me has chosen to purposefully forget some of it because I just have to. His colicky, angry and needy demands drained from me every ounce of energy, every ounce of sanity, and my every ounce of EVERYTHING, joy included. The posts I put on FB from during this period were mostly a façade of the few good moments he did have. All the other moments that didn’t make it on FB were the REAL ones, and by god did those real ones hurt.

But after those first hundred days, we found a bit of reprieve. We found a little bit of peace. I was able to find some happiness once again. I started to feel a bit more human. I bit more myself. A bit more like I could do this motherhood thing and that we would survive.

Near the end of July, however, O began a vicious cycle of teething. At the time I didn’t know it, however, as you tend to not know a lot of stuff during that first rodeo until you get slapped in the face with it, and boy – did it ever. The reprieve we had been experiencing? It was shattered to the ground, stomped on, set on fire and proceeded to have its ashes obliterated into one million pieces. Well, that is exactly what was happening in my head at least. Because, unlike freaking out like a normal person and hoping for the best, I began to have a series of PTSD like flashbacks that quickly worsened.

Imagine holding your child as they are screaming at you, unable to find comfort or calm. You are sitting in a rocking chair in their dark room, trying your best to help their exhausted, pained body. But rather be there and be present, your mind is waging war on you. Your mind is telling you that you are going back to those first one hundred days and you are never leaving it. Your mind is telling you this is it from now on. Your mind is telling you that there will never be better. Your mind is SCREAMING at you, as you struggle to breathe amidst a rapid tightening of chest, that this is going to be FOREVER. There is no escape, there is no way out, you’ve gone back and you will never return.

And then imagine telling no one for days and days that this is happening to you continually and soon constantly because you are ashamed, unsure, embarrassed and deathly afraid.

On that Friday morning, the bough finally broke. Like a river it all flowed out, unstoppably and rapidly, and the shell I had been frantically trying to encase it all in soon gave way.

With the help of BC Women’s reproductive mental health unit, psychiatrists, counselors and medicine, I soon came to learn of a thing I had never heard of before. Postpartum anxiety. I knew of postpartum depression, but anxiety? That was a new one. Additionally, I came to learn of the concept known as intrusive thoughts. They were the thoughts that were giving way to the PTSD like flashbacks and they were the thoughts I soon set out to try and understand, come to peace with and, if I was lucky, banish for good.

However, the weird thing about getting help for mental illness – which anxiety falls under – is that it breeds other things. Admitting it can be a chain reaction, and a revelation of so much can be equally clarifying AND unhinging. It brings you up the depth to which you’ve denied, it forces you to acknowledge that which you have refused to do, and it leaves you raw. It leaves you weak. It leaves you to realize just how deep, multifaceted and pervasive our minds can be, and how much they will refuse to let go and morph anew no matter the amount you shake.

Six months later, I still wouldn’t call myself healed, but I’m trying. There has definitely been some harder moments, and they’ve absolutely effected how I deal with the outside world (I apologize to those who might have read this who I KNOW have gotten the receiving end of some of that), but I’m trying. Intrusive thoughts are still a daily struggle of mine, though they have decreased in intensity and occurrence. But I am making my way back. Always.

Most importantly, and this has taken me a LONG time to say, I finally know now and can say with confidence that this doesn’t make me a bad mom. This doesn’t mean that I don’t deserve O. An inability to cope doesn’t make me abnormal. It makes me human. Admitting it here, on a public blog, can in fact be empowering. It can be healing in itself. And while this has been a damn hard journey to wellness, I am determined to get that shell of mine back. That is a belief that I refuse to let go of. And to those of you who are willing to join me for this journey, thank you. I appreciate you more than you know.

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Mental Health, Motherhood, The magic (in the mess). ♡

A year ago today.

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A year ago today and ever since then…

You made me a mom. After years of uncertainty, you arrived. Squishy, small, loud and proud, you arrived and opened a door that I will never, ever close.

You taught me a meaning of love that was entirely and utterly selfless, eternal and profound to the absolute depths of my core.

You reopened within me a humour and laughter that was warm, joyous, tirelessly in love and kind. Forever my tickle and cuddle monster you will be.

You brought to my marriage a new lens to which I could view my husband/your dad. His hardened exterior crumbled just a bit more as he gave to you everything he could possibly give; compassion, tears, snuggles, worries and mirth.

You prompted a yearning for me to want to live in a better world and for me to be better myself, as I emulated my very best attempts at grace, dignity, respect and trust.

And finally, you gave to my career a new understanding, an unseen beauty, a purposeful slowing down and an opening of eyes. Not only to the image of the child, but to the image of the parent amongst a world that refuses to stand still.

So, no matter how tired, overwhelmed, anxious and unsure I have been throughout our journey thus far, I am forever and without question grateful for you.

Happy first birthday, my sweet boy. 💚⁣ ⁣

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Mental Health, Motherhood, The magic (in the mess). ♡

My weekend has been won.

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It’s been a rough three weeks.

O’s had teething issues, tummy problems, sleeping woes and a clinginess that has been nearly suffocating. I’ve had some difficult mental struggles that I’m still trying to understand and make sense of… and D, the super hero that he is, has been working extra extra extra extra hard to make sure that we’re both okay and happy, but he too is getting rather worn around the edges as a result.

This morning, however, O let me sleep in until 6:30 and I was able to make, eat and *enjoy* my breakfast all while he contently played on his own in his space. I can’t remember the last time this happened. By 7:25AM, my entire weekend had been won.

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Mental Health, Motherhood, The magic (in the mess). ♡

Work WAS the vacation.

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When I was pregnant and mat leave was on the horizon, I was so excited about how much time I’d have off from work. It was like I’d be having a year long paid vacation and it sounded amazing! Come sooner, mat leave, I’d say. Mommas ready for some time off!

Ah, hindsight. Work WAS the vacation. THIS stuff of parenting feels like *THE* work.

This is work that has no sick days, no room for late shows, lunch breaks, early clock outs, hell — start and end times in general, no time to slack when a supervisor isn’t watching, coworkers to joke with in the middle of the day, retirement dates, vacation days, understanding if you’re not at your best ’cause of life circumstances… It has none of that, and some days it lets you know like a punch in the face.

I adore, cherish and love my son with my whole heart. But today, especially today, and everyday before it has been a reminder that the real work of my life has just begun.

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Mental Health, Motherhood, The magic (in the mess). ♡

“Bad Moms”, you say?

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There’s a movie coming out soon called Bad Moms. The trailer for it is pretty wonderful (if you haven’t yet seen it: https://youtu.be/P0FNjPsANGk) and the concept of the flick is essentially a group of overworked, overtired and generally DONE WITH EVERYTHING moms that finally give themselves a break from their demanding lives and it’s endlessly selfless responsibilities. Upon doing so, they are then confronted and called out by their local group of perfect, sanctimommies for not living up to their standards. From what I assume, as I do not know how the ending goes, lessons and truths are eventually learned by all.

This hot mess mom movement (which is legitimately a thing and has been for years, though called different names) is fascinating to me. In truth, I see a lot of myself in its workings, but at just six months in, many may just equate that to me being a first time mom and the confusion of trying to figure everything out in the only way I know how. However, in a year or so’s time, when I ideally will have a bit more of a grasp on what I’m doing, I still see myself identifying with the moms in that movie who felt like they needed to *temporarily* give zero fucks. Not because I can see the future, but because I believe in what it represents.

While still pretty new to this game of motherhood, already I feel the pressures from just about EVERYWHERE to do better and be better. Without abandon, the growing standard of what a mom should be, could be and needs to be is sky rocketing to the height of impossible ideals. Ideals which so often fail to take into account context, culture and environment, mind you, but are batshit rampant nonetheless. These ideals are SUPER pervasive and, intricately laced within them, are attempts to subjugate what our children should be, could be and needs to be into the expectations of overachieving, over-succeeding, perfect spawns of creation (but more on that point at a later time).

Inadvertently, I’ve gotten these pressures from some of the closest people in my life. Suffocatingly real and somehow always there, they are with the best intentions or not. They have come from well meaning people, and people who have simply had an opinion or were probably just trying to help, but it is a game I’ve already realized I do not wish to play. I do not feel I need to justify my parenting to anyone but my son or my husband, and nor will I ever again. I will not give anyone that power, for in doing so lies a dangerously, slippery slope. One thing prompts another, another and another, and before long I’m madly juggling to hold on not to what I deem important, but what society and its sticky fingers believe should be the standard of how I do motherhood. Yeah, I’ll pass.

At the heart of all this hot mess/bad mom reality, I don’t see laziness. I don’t see neglect. I don’t see a mom who shouldn’t have had kids. Some may say this is too optimistic and too kind of me, but I see a woman who isn’t willing to forget her needs on the journey that is motherhood. This is not me saying that all the ‘perfect’ mommas out there have forever put themselves last, rather, for any mom who has chosen at a time to put herself first? You have committed no crime.

There is no me if I don’t have the time *for* me. If that means during naps the kitchen doesn’t get cleaned or the laundry doesn’t get done for awhile, so be it. If that means we don’t leave the house for a few days ’cause the dumbness of people hurts my brain, so be it. If that means I have to put O down for nap earlier than normal for a few times ’cause I just can’t deal right now, so be it. None of these things are choices made without thought. Behind them lies purpose and intentionality. Behind them lies a recognition that I need time to focus on me right now so that I can be the mom I want to be, and sometimes I might need that for days at a time. Shit might not get done as a result. And you know what? THAT’S OKAY. I’ll still love and care for my child so much that it hurts (as I do right now and always), just not within the confines of how society or anyone else thinks I should. To hell with that.

A raw beauty is in a hot mess mom, and that beauty doesn’t make you or me a “bad” mom. It doesn’t mean we aren’t cut out for this. It makes us real, it makes us honest, and it makes us alive. So, carry on, brave soldier. I’ve got your back.

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Mental Health, Motherhood, The magic (in the mess). ♡

Observations of first time motherhood, (part 12^234234).

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  1. The closer the bond you form with your baby, the more watching ANYTHING showing a child lost, hurt or killed makes you loose your shit. NOPE, NETFLIX, NOT GOING THERE ANYMORE.
  2. 6AM is now sleeping in, and it is a marvelously blissful thankyoubabyjesus BEAUTIFUL thing when it happens.
  3. Days when you are able to accomplish eating all three meals, making the bed, brushing your teeth and putting clothes on ALL parts of your body are days that you’re pretty sure you are a rock-star. Bonus: If you get a shower in, you’re probably ready to go on tour to cement your status as rock elite.
  4. You look at moms/dads juggling with more than one baby/child and you are pretty sure they are god damn wizards. HOW?! WHEN?! AND FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THINGS HOLY, WHY?!
  5. Every time you run errands, you now question if it’s worth it to drive to more than one place. Do you really want to pack your child in the car TWICE for what you need? Do you really need that other thing? Is it worth the potential crank? Or the potential super freakin’ short nap they’ll take on the way to the other place while later on rejecting the much better nap they could have had? THESE ARE THE ETERNAL QUESTIONS. Being “out” is now a game of how many things you can magically get accomplished in one, close to home, walkable shopping center that doesn’t really have everything you need but you’re DETERMINED to make it work anyhow and all within the time frame of your child’s happy wake period, if you’re lucky. (You’re usually not.) (I *WILL* get better at this.)
  6. Worrying that you’ve actually created a drug like dependence on Enya in your child is now a thing.
  7. You are 100% positive you have the cutest baby in ALL of the land to EVER exist. Sure, those other babies are pretty adorable, but YOUR’S is the cutest there ever was (said every parent in man-kind).
  8. The things you and your SO celebrate will be forever changed. “Guess who went poo today!” “Whoa, did you hear that burp? That was a burp!” “He slept an ten extra minutes for that nap!” And somehow, no matter how mundane to the average outsider, these moments to celebrate feel just as epic to you as anything ever worth celebrating before.
  9. Pretending to look/talk/play with your child in their stroller is an amazing way to avoid having to interact with people in public that you don’t want to. Weird guy gonna walk by you on the street? HI BABY, I LOVE YOU BABY, PAY ATTENTION TO ME BABY.
  10. After a brutally long day of mothering, you will sometimes find yourself, after having FINALLY gotten your child to freakin’ sleep and while getting some YOU time, now staring lovingly at pictures of them on your phone. You are absolutely addicted to this thing your body made and no matter how tired or over it you get (you are human), you can never seem to get enough. A crazy, profound love has been born into your world that is infinite in its ability to fill your soul to the brim while leaving you wanting, needing and forever reaching out for more.

Obviously, these are all from the context of my own life, and, like all things, they do no blanket apply to every first time mom or mom in general… but, with hope, some of you were able to relate!

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Mental Health, Motherhood

Thirty minutes.

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Like many other babies his age, O is in the midst of a period where he only sleeps 30 minutes for every nap he takes. He started this off and on a good month or so ago, and now has solely taken naps like this for the past two and a half weeks. Additionally, in between his every thirty minute nap, he has the tolerance for being up around two hours before cranky town hits. Naturally, our daily schedule has adjusted to accommodate this, though not by choice. If I didn’t have to constantly feel as if I was living life by the clock and always chasing the next nap, I wouldn’t. The needs of my child say otherwise, however, no matter how much of a schedule whore it may make me seem.

For me and I imagine millions of other moms, nap time is a time of reprieve. A time when, after giving every piece of you to your LO, you can give something back to yourself.

But in those thirty minutes do you…

Read (a choice I have made more so lately)?

Peruse other hobbies (a choice I have not made enough lately)?

Clean (a choice I made far too frequently last week as it had been neglected and we were expecting company)?

Play SimCity on my phone (a choice I wish I would make less of)?

Sleep (a choice that is a joke within a thirty minute time frame)?

Eat (a choice that should always take precedence, but often doesn’t)?

Write a post on Soundly Sarah (a choice I have neglected lately, oops!)?

Just be thankful you have that time?

Do you choose one of those?

Some of those?

All of those as you frantically try to jumble it into 1800 seconds and end up not satisfied at all as a result?

Evidenced by the fact that I’ve only been able to just now write this while on bed rest from a hurt foot, I don’t know how to answer those questions. Is this how it’ll always be?

In terms of better prioritizing, scheduling and letting go of the reins at times for things to happen as they will, I could have the answers I seek. But I did not expect this aspect of motherhood. I did not expect for my needs to be sequestered into 30 minutes time chunks. I (obliviously) imagined dreamy, two hour naps of bliss and relaxation. Eventually, those may come, but nap time in general will happen less if they do.

This obliviousness, or delusion, rather, it went so far as to tell multiple people before giving birth that I was worried I would get bored or stir crazy while on mat leave. I didn’t realize it would be nothing like that. I didn’t realize the second I’d have some time, it would be gone. Nap after nap, I find myself just getting started on ‘me’ when it’s nearly ended. So often, I hear O on the baby monitor at a point when things have just gotten ‘good’. Is that horrible of me to admit? Or merely human?

I write this for it leaves me in a spot of motherhood that I still find myself flailing, unsure and a bit ruffled. No matter the changes I could make, I am stuck at these questions. How do I redefine and pair down what I truly need while I am immersed in all that is motherhood? How do I make space for my desires and interests in a way that now accommodates times as a resource precious as gold? How do I refuse to loose myself among the demands that this new life entails? And, in this so often mother eats mother world, makes you feel like an selfish jerk for wanting it that way?

How?

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Mental Health, Milestones & Genetics, Motherhood

How can we ever really know?

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O was born with a couple of things that make him different than the typical baby boy. Some of these things will require surgery in a years time and one is something that cannot be seen by the human eye.

This unseen part about him is chromosomal. To be more specific, he has a large deletion in his 3rd chromosome. This deletion may be the reason for some of the other, differing, things about him — or it may not be. It’s hard to say. All that is known right now is the unknown, as his deletion is considered rare to the geneticists at BC Children’s and it hasn’t been seen enough to know what it could imply health wise, now or later, if anything at all.

In an attempt to understand how this came to be, be it from D and I or how our DNA combined, blood work was done on us. As of a few days ago, I now know that I too have this large deletion in my 3rd chromosome and that I passed it on to O in the womb.

I’m writing this here, in this space, because I need to better understand what this means to me. I need to voice it, to put it in text, to make sense of it. Selfishly, I need to be told it will be okay (even if the irrational side of me disagrees), again and again, on top of how many times I’ve already been told as much. I’m in the midst of scheduling a follow up with the geneticists to be told the same. Everyone is hinging on the fact that I seem to be okay, same with my other family members who may or may not have it, and so O should be okay too.

But how can we ever really know that? Am I okay? What about later on? Have I missed something my entire life? Was there something I should have questioned but never did? Is my son going to suffer because I didn’t? These are huge, unknowable, worrisome questions — I know. But how does one continue on as normal when they find out that something is missing in the base of their DNA? In the base of what makes them human? And that they’ve passed it on to their son, with repercussions entirely unknown?

Nothing I can do can change this, I get that, and I know that I need to be positive. I have to be. Not just for me, but for O and D. But how?

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Mental Health, Motherhood, The magic (in the mess). ♡

Precious, brutal, beautiful and exhausting reality.

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Before I ever became a parent and, at times, before I had an inkling that I might like to be a mom, I worked (and still technically do while on mat leave) in the field of early childhood education. To it I brought a bachelors of ECE and, prior to giving birth, racked up about four and half years of experience in the field — both with ITs (infant/toddlers) and TFs (three to fives). During the entirety of my pregnancy I was employed knee deep in the trenches of toddlerhood, and I believed that I’d be bringing to motherhood a cornucopia of knowledge and experience. Others in my life continually reinforced this thought of mine. With all of this on my resume, how could I not?!

Ha.

Haaaa.

Hahahahahahaha.

Too bad I had absolutely NO FREAKIN’ IDEA what to do with said knowledge and experience. Upon O’s birth, I was blindsided. My education, something my sweet husband anxiously worried would set me far ahead of him parenting wise, it felt like it meant nothing. My employment, and the fact that I had previously been working all day long with ITs, it was laughable and hardly the real thing — I got to send them home at the end of the day! My passions that I brought to the field of ECE, and the beliefs I garnered throughout it of children and childhood, it fell to shambles in the midst of a postpartum depression that could no longer even tell who I was when I looked in the mirror.

This should hopefully be news to no one, but nothing, and I mean NOTHING, can prepare you for being a first time mom. Anybody or anything that tries to tell you differently is lying. All that I brought to it (which I felt was a lot!) and the preconceived notions I had of it being otherwise, they were broken. Broken as in picked up, shattered to the ground, stomped all over, set on fire and then blown into the abyss. It was a delusional, humbling and hot mess of confusion for a good while there.

Now that I’ve survived the first four months of O’s life and know what it is to sleep again, I am thankfully beginning to see where my education, employment and passions can start being applied (more on that later). I am able to finally dig into those reservoirs and have them be useful, when before it felt as if they would drown me. I am excited for what awaits in that regard (also more on that later!). Most importantly and with relief, I have now added to that repertoire what I didn’t realize I lacked before. The grounded experience of REALITY.

Precious, brutal, beautiful and exhausting reality.

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Mental Health, Motherhood, The magic (in the mess). ♡

Real and at times blisteringly honest.

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I’ve got too much stuff in my head and a wanting to put it somewhere. The notes app on my phone is overflowing with half written posts, thoughts, questions, ideas, lists combining all four of those things and life. A whole lot of messy, confusing, wonderful life. This is not something new since becoming a mother, but it has definitely become amplified as a result.

Writing has always been a part of me, but in strange ways. Ways which start as thoughts that desire (quite obnoxiously) at 3AM to flesh out and make sense of the raw truthiness of everything and how to find it’s humour, compassion and warmth. While I’d MUCH rather sleep, in it I find comfort. Speckle it’s written component with shitty grammar (my specialty!) and badly lighted Instagram shots, and you’ve got me.

So, with all this new and unexpected time I’ve suddenly found in my life (yay for a sleeping baby!) I made a thing. A blog? A diary? A public thoughts dump? One of those or all of those, it is to be my place to share what I’ve already been writing/will write on this absolutely exhausting yet achingly beautiful journey of first time motherhood that I find myself on, and a place where in posting said things I might further connect, push myself, be challenged and grow.

Like it and follow it if you want. If you enjoy it, feel free to share it. I can’t promise how much I’ll post to it (though I will be doing a bit of “backdate” posting for stuff I’ve already written), and I cant promise it won’t be something I’ll forget about from time to time when life gets in the way (another of my specialties!). But, I can promise that it will be real and at times blisteringly honest, however, as I simply don’t have the time or patience for anything less.

p.s. And yes. I totally named it Soundly Sarah. 💚⁣ ⁣

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Mental Health, Motherhood, Postpartum, The magic (in the mess). ♡

Baby whisperer. Magic worker. Helper extraordinaire.

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Tina.

Baby whisperer. Magic worker. Helper extraordinaire.

You’re amazing.

I can’t count how many times you’ve already helped save my sanity and allowed me to feel normal again in this life of motherhood. You’ve helped without asking, and before I even realized how desperately I needed it, and you continue to do so. You’ve been there without judgement and just listened, knowing I didn’t need to be told by yet another person what I should or shouldn’t be doing on this crazy journey of raising a human being.

You’ve taken O in his moods that others have run from (no lie) and you have soothed him in ways I didn’t think possible (seriously, I’m pretty sure you’re better with him than D and I are sometimes). I cannot begin to explain what a relief that has been to us. Going ANYWHERE is about ten million times easier when we know you’re going to be there and having you over in the evenings has made our lives less overwhelming at a time it has felt impossible to feel that way.

Thank you, thank you, thank you. If you ever have a child of your own I can only dare dream to provide the kind of assistance to you that you have been to us these past three months. You are an absolute gem. <3

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Mental Health, Motherhood, Postpartum

What even IS baby sleep?

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Since he was three weeks old, O has slept in our arms for 99% of his naps and sleeps at night (he is now almost eleven weeks). He is typically tummy down as he leans against our bodies (while we lean back). It started originally as he began to absolutely LOSE it when we put him down in our bedside co-sleeper bassinet. This and a variety of other symptoms lead our pediatrician to believe he has reflux, which with the help of medicine and changing how we do things, has helped make him a much happier baby.

He will now tolerate periods of back/tummy play and being in his swing (we went through a five week period where we couldn’t put him down PERIOD without him loosing it). But getting him to sleep on somewhere that is not our bodies is something we’re having a lot of trouble managing.

I understand this is typical of a lot of newborns and there are very valid reasons why he wants to sleep on us. I just keep envisioning this still happening at 8+ months because it forms a pattern of behaviour, and that makes me kind of want to loose it. We are continually having to find new ways for him to sleep on us while we we try to rest but not really rest and it’s exhausting, no matter how much we break it up into shifts. I miss lying down and have legitimately forgotten how to sleep that way. My hips also kind of want to kill me for all the sitting down I have to do with him.

For those of you who have been able to get a baby past this phase, how did you do it? Here is what we’ve been doing or have tried thus far:

  • He is mostly nursed to sleep (has been since birth, he loves it and nothing puts him out faster). If I don’t do it for him, he freaks. If he could nurse all night, he would. My nipples disagree.
  • He will not take a pacifier (I have tried ten million times). I am his pacifier.
  • Elevating his bassinet, using white noise, making it smell like me, positioning him with towels to be on his side and warming it have all been tried.
  • He LOVES to move his arms and legs. Some of it is his Moro reflex, some of it is it’s just what he loves to do. He pretty much looks like he’s conducting an orchestra all day long and is never still. You can guess how much this desire of his lets him sleep deeply when laying down somewhere that is not on us.
  • Swaddles and Swaddle transition blankets/gear DO NOT work. We have had a rare occasion where they have, but it is not reliable. Anything that restricts his hands or legs pisses him off for hours at end and defeats their purpose. We legit tried them for weeks and weeks — it was horrible.
  • Carriers equally piss him off and while he will fall asleep in one while we take long walks, that’s not solving this problem.
  • I tried co-sleeping with him leaning against me and by me. He either kept waking himself up as his flailing/movements kept hitting me or he couldn’t last longer than five minutes, no matter how milk drunk I got him or where I put him. I am unable to nurse him easily while laying down, and him doing it on his own to get back to sleep is not possible.
  • He has slept in his swing, but it’s very sporadic and getting it to happen regularly is something we can’t seem to master, no matter how much advice we follow from baby sleep blogs.
  • Putting him to sleep on his own his tummy freaks me out. Please don’t suggest it. I understand babies sleep deeper on their tummies and that’s part of why he does when he’s on us, but he’s WITH us while doing so.

This too shall pass.

I know.

But, for now, HELP PLZ.

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Mental Health, Motherhood, Postpartum, The magic (in the mess). ♡

Hurt in the most beautiful way.

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O is now a week old, and with it, here is what I’ve so far realized:

  • You now find yourself Googling the most random questions about baby care at 3:30AM and it has somehow become a perfectly acceptable time to do so.
  • Watching your child randomly burst out into a smile while deep in sleep is the cutest freaking thing ever.
  • Watching your child get woken with a start because his dad snorted like a freakin’ chainsaw in his sleep (which also woke dad up) is the greatest thing ever.
  • Post birth hormones and emotions, and their ability to make you weep about anything and everything, could very well make you the greatest star of any Hallmark movie made.
  • Breastfeeding is the thirstiest friggin’ work EVER, no pun intended! I think I drank a gallon of water yesterday and still needed more.
  • Sleep is now for the weak. ‘nough said.

Above all else, the amount of love and adoration and happiness and joy you feel for your little one literally makes your heart hurt. Hurt in the most beautiful way.


💚⁣ ⁣

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