Tag Archives: life

Wordless Wednesday: Imperfectly Perfect

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I know this is supposed to be wordless. Given that I’m the one hosting, I feel I’ll be forgiven for a few words. The other night, in #PPDChat, @jamesandjax suggested we all snap a photo of a messy area in our homes and our smiling children to post on Wednesday. For some of us, this means finally coming out of the “closet” if you will…. shedding the guilt we carry for not living up to the impossibly high standards of June Cleaver.

After a lot of consideration, I decided to snap a photo of the top of a kitchen cart. No matter how many times I try to clean it off, it gets covered up again, like a chaos magnet. Things come and go from the top of this cart more almost as often as a MARTA train. But there’s always a gaggle of things there. I have learned to live with it. One of these days, I’m going to keep it clean. And free of things which do not belong in the kitchen. Or maybe not. Either way, it’s okay. It’s mine and I’m okay with that. All that matters is that the kids have had a day full of love and laughter.

The other picture is one of my son, right after eating a very healthy breakfast of a Mixed Berry Fruit Bar. What? Grains and fruit!

Leave the link to your post below. All comments are moderated the first time they are left here due to the sensitive nature of my blog, but rest assured, I’ll be approving them as quickly as possible today (I can do so from my phone!)

I look forward to a whole slew of imperfectly perfect and HAPPY households today!!!

P.S. I couldn’t get my son to smile. But that’s okay – we’re being real here, right? Also, if you look closely at the kitchen cart, you’ll notice the drawer is broken. It’s been that way for a long time.

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Just Talking Tuesday: Redefining Perfect

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Parenthood is messy in real life.

Hollywood, media, and advertisers would have you believe differently.

Your house is picture perfect. Hair – perfect. Toddlers perfectly dressed without a drop of food or stains anywhere, well behaved. Everyone smiles and says cheese.

Thing is – it’s all just that – a snapshot of perfection styled with the help of an entire crew for EACH PERSON in the photo, movie, or commercial.

What if you took a snapshot of your own life? Of your house? Yourself? Your toddler or baby?

What would it look like? Is it perfect?

I’m willing to bet it is perfect.

Maybe not by Hollywood’s standards.

But by REALITY’S standards.

Real life, as I said when I started, gets messy.

What matters at the end of the day isn’t that the sink is full of dishes.

It’s not the massive pile of laundry threatening to devour your entire house.

It’s not the food particles permanently affixed to your toddler.

It’s not that you didn’t get a chance to shower or put on make up.

It’s not that you’re still in your pajamas.

What matters at the end of the day is whether or not you connected with your children.

Whether or not, in THAT DAY, your children felt loved and felt a connection with you.

Because that is what they will remember – not the cleaner than clean house – they’ll remember the Mommy who took time for them. Who got down on their level and loved THEM.

That? Is perfect.

Come back at 7am for a link up here. Several of us will be posting pics of our imperfectly perfect houses a long with happy pictures of our toddlers.

Because that?

Is redefining perfect in the rawest form.

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Whatever Wednesday: The State of Me

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I would be a hypocrite if I did not take time for myself. After all, that’s what I firmly advocate for moms who contact me. We absolutely need time for ourselves so we can thrive and our families can then thrive.

Lately, it’s been hard for me to do just that. Not so much because I don’t want to but because I have been awful at making time for myself. But I’m having to shuffle my priorities and force myself to do so.

Sometimes, the blog may go quiet for a bit. It’s not because I don’t care. (I’ll never stop caring) It’s not because I don’t want to blog. It’s because I need a break.

I know life gets crazy for everyone. Here lately, it’s been very crazy as of late.

The trip to Austin for the PSI fundraiser was a lovely break. However, the craziness started before my journey to Texas.

In late April, my husband was laid off.

Sick kids.

School got out for the summer.

Back on government assistance. Which, by the way, is NOT easy to qualify for as they want every single last document under the sun and it’s all due 10 days before they send you a letter (and yes, I got a letter like that). They really work against you to keep you off the system. And what really sucks is that with hubs’ job, we were finally phasing out of needing the assistance.

He gets unemployment but it’s not nearly enough to support a family of five. So I’m looking for a job. And that means I may have to cut what I do here unless I can find some sort of financial support for the blog soon. Sadly, it may even affect my ability to participate in #PPDChat. That makes me very sad. It makes me especially sad because I know I won’t be happy doing anything else but supporting moms. I truly feel it is what I was called to do and I know in my heart I am good at what I do here at Postpartum Voice, Twitter, and other websites.

Hubs is working at getting his own computer biz started. He’s great at repairing and working on computers so he’s getting that on the road right now. He has one regular business client at the moment and some random individual clients as well. It’s growing but again, it’s tough going out there these days.

This summer also saw a very stressful situation between myself and a family member. I am not going to go into details but suffice it to say it led to some of my worst days since the depths of hell with my Postpartum mood disorder. The end of that week found me in tears and watching four and a half hours of stand up comedy. That was followed by a severe adrenaline withdrawal.

The next week was Austin. Austin was great. Until I came home. My original flight was canceled and I did not leave the airport until nearly 6 hours after that flight. I have never been so happy to be back in Atlanta!

The following day, my 4yo started Pre-k.

The next day, my 6yo had her tonsils out so she was home for a week.

Then my 4yo got sick this past weekend.

Now hubs is sick, 2yo is showing signs of getting sick, I’ve got PMS, the dog is scratching and licking places she really shouldn’t be on a constant basis because of her allergies (and no, Benadryl doesn’t work – bathing her a minimum of once a day does), our washer is on the fritz and will flood the back porch in the blink of an eye if you leave it alone at the wrong time, and… ugh. See the damned snowball in Georgia? That’s my life. And I am not coping well with it right now.

Today though, the girls are back in school. Hubs just left for a computer job for his business client and Cameron is (somewhat) playing independently as I type this.

I had a huge vision for this blog when I revamped it and am hoping to get to these changes soon – I really want to start posting a vlog for my Just Talking Tuesday posts. And WordPress has recently introduced this new service which allows us to PHONE in our blog posts. How cool is that???

I also want to start a forum for readers to share with one another.

But right now, I need to take care of me before I can take care of others. So if I don’t post for a few days, it’s not because I don’t love you. It’s not because I’ve stopped caring. It’s because I’m simply practicing what I preach and taking care of me so I CAN take care of others. I don’t deserve any less. And neither do you.

Most nights lately have found me passed out on the couch after the kids are in bed. Last night my husband tried to wake me up and get me to go to bed. I fell asleep in the middle of tweeting, y’all. In the middle of TWEETING! That’s tired.

Please pray for us as we move through this tough time in our lives. Pray that my husband is able to expand his business quickly. Pray that somehow I manage to get financial support for the blog worked out. I’ll be putting up a page soon specifying a wish-list of needs. First things first, I’d have to go to self-hosted in order to do any sort of ads. If I do run ads, rest assured that I will vet any and all support for moms and will NOT under any circumstances allow the placement of ads for any medication or supplements on my blog. I will remain committed to supporting moms in whatever choices they have made without judgment. We all have to walk our own path and deserve to do so without guilt brought on by the judgment of others.

Thanks for reading.

I’m going to close my laptop after I hit publish and go talk my son out of wearing his sister’s tennis shoes.

Just Talkin’ Tuesday: How can you tell when “normal” is returning?

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Every Friday, I am the volunteer on duty for Postpartum Support International’s warmline. (That’s right – you can call for them for help and I’ll actually call you back on Fridays! It’s staffed every day of the week by amazing volunteers though!) A few months ago, right after I started volunteering, a woman named Joan phoned the warmline. We talked and she used the term “Warrior Mom.” If you read Katherine Stone’s blog, you know that’s how she refers to Postpartum mamas. I asked Joan if she read Katherine’s blog. She said she did. Somehow we ended up talking about my blog as well. Turns out she reads mine as well. By now, we were both practically in tears. I had never spoken to someone who actively read my blog before. To hear the emotion in her voice as she talked about how much it meant to her truly blew me away. Joan and I have kept in touch via email since then. It is with her permission I share her story with you.

Joan emailed me today to ask a question of me. As soon as I read it, I asked her for permission to post her words to my blog. She agreed and I hope y’all will provide some good feedback for her current concern. Without further ado, here’s Joan’s email:

Hi Lauren:

I hope all is well with you. I have contacted you in the past, and I hate to be a burden, but was wondering if you could shed some light or your perspective on something I have been thinking a lot about lately. During the recovery process, how does a mom know if she is getting “better” versus the normal adjustment period to motherhood. PPD/PPA throws you all off and it’s hard to remember what “normal” is, especially when nothing is normal anyway after the birth of a baby. I have started a new med (2 weeks in – gradually increasing and so far – knock on wood- no weird side effects) and I know I need to be patient with it for sometime still, but I’m stuck in that conundrum. Is this PPD/PPA or is this a normal feeling? I think when you become a mother you give up so much naturally of yourself and you become someone else (for example I will forever be Joan plus J’s mom plus working Joan plus friend Joan, etc. etc. ) and need to merge all of those identities together. It’s hard when PPD (and the darn anxiety that about kills me at times) makes life so unbearable at times. It would be hard without the evil beast mixed in to straighten that all out in my head.

If I can ask, what were signs for you that things were returning to “normal”? Or, is there a common theme amongst survivors about when they knew that they were beginning to get well? I have read a lot of blogs, but am looking for any kind of advice if you are willing to share with me (if you don’t mind).

Any words of encouragement/advice/insight you can provide are always appreciated! Thanks for everything you do!

Warmest Regards,

Joan

My husband and I cajoled each other about our “new normal” after the birth of our second daughter. NICU, Cleft Palate, crash course in at home neo-natal care, both of us on antidepressants before it was all said and done, yeah, there was no going back to our own normal life. Hell, I think Normal may have even sprouted wings and flown to Jamaica. Not that I blame it at all, just wish it had offered a ride or at least one last romp before bailing.

I know my new normal settled in slowly. At first there was a routine of what I did when I first got up in the morning. Then I would add a new thing the following week. I stopped obsessing about how much milk I pumped because instead I was munching on chocolate. I began to think of pumping as me time instead of “I have to do this” time. I had more days of happiness versus irritability. I began to realize slowly that a bad day did not mean a downward spiral. I knew my signs and triggers and more importantly, I knew how to stop them. The world around me seemed to brighten. For me, recognizing my arrival at better involved my ability to take better care of myself WITHOUT guilt or anxiety about those around me not being able to function if I did take time away from them to do so.

What did “better” look like for you? Do you still struggle with adjustment to motherhood? What’s the most challenging for you as you journey/journeyed to better? Let’s get to Just Talkin’ and help a mama out in the process!