some truths about postpartum.

I felt called to write this blog post, so here goes. On social media we see a lot of highlight reels, a day in the life, a picture perfect recap of ones day, month or year. However, is it really an accurate depiction of their real life. I can confidently say, it is not. You may find the odd social media mama who is sharing the real, raw and nitty gritty realities of motherhood but they are few and far between. So I want to make a couple things clear.

Postpartum is hard. Like really hard. It is also immensely beautiful and transformative but we neglect the truth when we only show the snuggles, the perfectly sleeping baby, the photo of a smiling mama breastfeeding, the video of dad rocking his new babe. Were missing the in-between, the screaming baby, the poop explosions, the crying mama, the sleep deprivation, the engorged breasts, the ins and outs of figuring out breastfeeding, the discomfort from whatever way you brought babe into the world, the diapers mom is also wearing, the potential trauma you and your partner is dealing with... there is SO much to postpartum. I feel it's almost neglectful to let first time parents venture postpartum alone, without any sort of warning.

I say warning but really I mean guidance or truth. Postpartum is hard and I think when we neglect to recognize that, we neglect to validate a new parents experience. I remember when I was newly postpartum with my first, still in hospital thinking... "am I the only one who feels this way, am I the worst mom ever, is this normal, am I normal..."

I am not saying any of this to scare a first time parent but rather to let you know that if and when things get tough, you are not alone. You may experience overwhelming emotions, you may feel trauma from your birth experience, you may not feel connected to your babe right away, you may feel resentment towards your partner, you may feel completely lost in your new postpartum body, you may feel rage like never before, you may just want to run away. I want you to know if you feel these things, you are not alone. It does not last forever. You are so crucial to your families life. You are an amazing parent.

I am sorry as a society we have blinders on to the truth. We like to ignore the harder parts of parenting. We don't like to talk about mental health struggles. However, whether we like seeing and hearing about these things, they're still happening and still very very real.

It is part of my mission to make the ones around me to feel seen and heard. That my friend includes YOU.

Signing off for now, xo.