A New Thing

Shortly after Noah turned one, a verse from Isaiah captured my heart. So it's sweet to me that Isaiah 43:19 grabbed my attention a few weeks ago, right before Rosie turned one. 365 days of life with two kids, and I haven't quite caught my breath yet. I felt like in dark places after my first was born, God was close to me and drew near to me. I learned a lot of deep and meaningful things in the first 15 months of his life, and I don't feel like I've had that same experience this time around. Thankfully the lows haven't been quite as low, and I've certainly done a thousand things differently, too. But I feel like I also haven't had the highs, the breaks, the -- dare I say it -- rest that I was able to get during the day with just one kid. (My one-child past-self hates me for saying this, by the way, because nothing takes away from the fact that it was a HARD season. Yet, I find myself comparing now to then and wishing for old hard instead of new hard.)

I'm not saying God still isn't still present and with me now, but I guess I'm having trouble on my end. I have double the distraction and half the sleep. With Noah, I was certainly quite tired (don't hear me understating this because time and distance has taken the edge off), but after about 8 months, he finally settled into a nap routine and I had two "breaks" most days even though nights were still awful. But I cherished those two breaks! They allowed me to sit and waste time, to do physical therapy, to do a workout (yay endorphins), to journal and do Bible study, to nap. I'm still figuring out how to catch a break this time around. And I'm wondering why I think I'm entitled to one? The line between self-care and selfishness is hard for me to navigate right now.

With one kid, once we got into a rhythm, we could more or less plan on it sticking for 2-3 months until the next big change, at which point we'd have a week or two of frustration, an a-ha moment, re-calibration, and a week or two of adjusting to the new normal. With two kids, my Type A brain is reeling. (And it's "only" two kids!)

It's hard not to miss the downtime of morning nap. I dread laying one down only to leave the room to get bombarded by, "MAMA WILL YOU PLAY WITH ME" for an hour and a half while all I yearn to do is drink hot coffee and eat my breakfast in introverted silence. Sometimes I have it in me to sit down and engage and enjoy sweet one on one time with my firstborn. I never regret it, but it's the hardest thing to do right now, and consequently it almost never happens. So then I feel guilty, too.

It's hard not to miss morning walks. Noah and I took really sweet morning walks the summers he was 1 and 2 (they dwindled a bit last summer once the heat wave hit and I was in my third trimester). Walking with the two of them now is still better than not walking, but it wears me out for the rest of the day if we manage to do it! The heat is unbearable right now. Or maybe it's the humidity that makes it ungodly, but between that and almost pushing my own body weight when we walk, it's not as relaxing as it used to be. It's hard for me to admit that the season of little littles dwindles as my oldest grows too big for the stroller.

It's not at all helpful for me to compare seasons, but it's hard not to. There are wonderful things about not being home with just a baby all day. But the hard things stand out more right now. It's clear to me over and over again that my expectations are left wanting, yet I'm not quite ready to let go of them.

So... they tell you every kid is different, and I guess I'm just learning that in a tangible way. And each journey with each kid is different, too. With the first, every age and stage seemed distinct and surprising and new. With the second, the first year seemed more fluid and about 5 times faster. Some things are similar: both of these kids have a feisty attitude, they had major major sleep regressions from months 4-7, they didn't fall into a nap routine until 8 months, they don't sleep through the night until after a year. But the chaos and noise and NEED is compounded. While my heart is ABSOLUTELY filled with twice the love, I'm finding that twice the patience, twice the kindness, twice the energy... that's harder to come by.

I ended up crying at a playdate at the park last week when everything kind of accumulated. I forget to give myself permission to say that things are challenging. Like, I complain about them out loud, but I don't actually give myself grace for them! Life with two is hard. And it's been compounded by work stress for Ross and for me (another post entirely), by financial stress, medical bills, the fact that we built a new friggin' building in our backyard this winter in addition to all the sickness and sleeplessness. My car has had more in repairs than it's actually worth in the past year and a half, and the check engine light came on again. I LOST MY HEARING AID the weekend of my brother's wedding. Then I LOST NOAH'S HEARING AID a few weeks ago. Family drama with loose ends that leaves us feeling inept and unsure. Feeling completely invisible and not recognizing myself in the mirror.

Anyway, this wasn't meant to be a long-winded list of grievances. This... is where I am. A little bit of chaos with a lot of emotional responsibility mixed in. I want this to be my starting place. This holy, parched, broken ground where I NEED a new thing to spring up.

Here I Raise my Ebenezer

Then Samuel took a stone and set it up between Mizpah and Shen, and called its name Ebenezer, saying, 'Thus far the Lord has helped us.' 1 Samuel 7:12

The due date was supposed to be June 20 (2016)-- exactly one week after Noah's due date of June 13 (2014). I would've been 38.1 weeks pregnant today. I went into labor with Noah at 38.4 and had him at 38.5 weeks.

Saturday.

I'm really anxious for it to get here. So much life has happened in the last 9 months, but it's hard not to remember how much life hasn't happened. It's been, quite literally, a pregnant pause. I don't feel like I've dwelt unnecessarily on this day, but as Noah's birthday approached, I couldn't help but know that this day was approaching as well.

I think it's affected me more than I realized. I've always been the hurry up and wait type. Like, I get all worked up for this milestone or that birthday or these anniversaries, and find myself disappointed that life didn't turn into rainbows and butterflies once the obstacle was behind me. This week was no exception.

Ross has been working his butt off on a long to-do list, finishing the last 15% of a whole bunch of house projects for Noah's party this past weekend, and it's safe to say I've been in panic mode about it. Really nitpicky. Mean. Not fun to live with. But it HAD to get done. And it wasn't until I was in tears at midnight on Friday night that I realized... I need closure. I need to feel like we brought our first baby home to an eventually safe place, and to have that whole lost season of chaos behind me. And I need to feel like we did THIS baby justice. Even though we aren't bringing him or her home, I want to feel like WE COULD HAVE. Like the house is READY.

Last fall, I was so worried I wouldn't be able to bond with Noah, to study for my IBCLC exam, to finish the house, in time for this baby's due date. But we did!

And oh, the house. I feel petty talking about it, and I'm sure my bitterness comes through even when I'm trying to make jokes. Is it a first world problem? Heck yes. If I could do it differently, would I? Heck yes. Don't buy a fixer-upper at 28 weeks pregnant. It seemed like a grand adventure at the time, but after the wilderness we'd been through in the years prior to getting pregnant with Noah, I really should've used my third trimester to rest, to recover, to prepare. To draw inward and nest and connect. Not to work two jobs, sometimes both in the same 24 hour period without sleep. Not to come "home" to a suitcase in a relative's bedroom. Not to avoid the actual house we bought because the sights and sounds of a construction site instead of a home filled me with a deep sense of panic and loss of control.

There's still a lot of work to do, but we worked right up to the start of the party, and for the first time ever, our house has a DONE list! Every room except the laundry room has walls, paint, trim, no exposed wood putty... It's amazing. The sense of relief I felt after Noah's party was palpable and surprising, even to me. His party was a birthday party and a housewarming party and a "welcome back to the land of the living" party. I feel like it was a tangible chance to get some closure on his tumultuous newborn days. An Ebenezer stone for where we've been and where we're going. We can move forward into toddlerhood with one baby. We can graciously say goodbye to what could have been with the other.

I don't need rainbows and butterflies now. I just want to make it to Saturday, take a deep breath, and move into Sunday. 

A Fierce Flourishing

I joined MOPS* back in August and I was kind of stressed about the first meeting. It meant Noah was going to miss a nap. Let's just say that in general, I don't handle change well, and in the throes of postpartum anxiety and new motherhood, I REALLY didn't handle change well. But I went. And I haven't looked back once.

The MOPS theme this year was A Fierce Flourishing, and oh, how I needed to hear that was possible. Even though I'd had my child 15 months prior, I was really only just realizing the depths of my postpartum pain and anxiety. I've spent a lot of time and money since then, trying to make progress in both, and I've seen plenty of ups and downs there. But you know what gave me the most freedom this past year? The most relief? Being in a room full of other moms. Seeing that no two are alike but all of us love our children fiercely. All of us are horribly afraid of 'failing' as a mom, whatever that looks like. All of us have struggles. And never once did I feel judged when I shared heavy thoughts, or cried, or vented about having a strong-willed child.

When the leaders introduced the theme at the first meeting, they read this year's verse to us: "For you shall go out with joy and be led forth in peace; the mountains and the hills before you shall break forth into singing, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands." Isaiah 55:12

It took all my willpower not to start crying then and there. The relief was palpable. Like a weight had been lifted. These words were like a balm to my heart. When I heard this, I'd been waking up each morning with a feeling of dread. With a heavy heart and the assurance that I couldn't possibly do this day all over again. The racing thoughts, the heart palpitations, the frequent night wake-ups with insomnia in between, the baby nap strikes, and always, always, the pain.

To be reminded that God calls us to JOY, and that he promises PEACE was exactly what I needed to hear. It got me to come home and open up my Bible and look to all the places where God reassures us that his promises are TRUE**. That this word does not go out and come back empty. In fact, that same chapter in Isaiah says that!

"'For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
neither are your ways my ways,' declares the Lord.
'As the rain and the snow
come down from heaven,
and do not return to it
without watering the earth
and making it bud and flourish,
so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater,
so is my word that goes out from my mouth:
It will not return to me empty,
but will accomplish what I desire
and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.
You will go out in joy
and be led forth in peace;
the mountains and hills
will burst into song before you,
and all the trees of the field
will clap their hands.
Instead of the thornbush will grow the juniper,
and instead of briers the myrtle will grow.
This will be for the Lord's renown,
for an everlasting sign,
that will endure forever.'"
Isaiah 55:8-13 (emphasis mine)

I notice the twin threads of peace and joy everywhere now. The words stand out on any page. It's been funny to see how they've played out in the last 9 months. I got pregnant shortly after that first meeting, and when the panic overwhelmed me, I cried out, "how is this joy?!" I had just emerged from the newborn haze with Noah, I had a plan that felt manageable, and I was seemingly on the road to physical and emotional recovery. I was deeply fearful of how a pregnancy would impact that. But several friends were able to whisper, "there is joy here." And when I let go of my fear and my plans (again) and started to get excited about another baby, literally a bundle of joy from a good, good Father, we lost it. Again I cried, "how is this joy?!" And God rushed in with peace beyond understanding.

And now, as MOPS wraps up for the year, that's where I sit. Alternating between peace beyond understanding, and fear that I will do something to somehow ruin this peace. So yeah, I still have a ways to go.

This year, we focused on embracing rest, noticing goodness, and celebrating lavishly. Our devotional for the year notes that, "we become more ourselves when we celebrate, rest, and notice... and that looks a lot like flourishing." I LOVE that I can claim it fiercely. That I can take all my pent up anxiety and direct that energy into flourishing instead of floudering. Into activities that refresh me instead of drain me. And MOPS has absolutely been an activity that refreshed me from the inside out.

I'm so grateful to the MOPS ministry for reminding me of God's sovereign rule even as I adjust to this new role of motherhood. I looked forward to every single meeting, when I knew I would be able to rest in the presence of other adults and feel cared for. It has meant the world to me, and I'm so excited for next year!


------------
*MOPS stands for Mothers of Preschoolers, but is actually available to anyone with children under the age of 5. I wish I'd joined when Noah was a baby!

**See Hebrews 10, 1 Thessalonians 5, Deuteronomy 7, 1 Corinthians 1

Mother's Day

What a funny holiday. I feel like I'm still in the new mom trenches enough to be learning the weight this job carries, and I'm hardly able to vocalize my gratitude to my mom, who did this x 4!

As for my own little family, it's been fun to start new traditions. Ross has been really good about utilizing my favorite love language (words of affirmation) to cheer me on and refuel my mothering tank. I love that. I love learning to accept compliments and grace, even though I have plenty more failures than successes in this parenting gig. I love that it's a new holiday for us, and not fraught with the pitfalls and failures and dashed hopes that have come with past birthdays and anniversaries.

I love the HILARIOUSLY excited face Noah made when he got to help me eat gluten-free donuts in bed this morning. I love the equally excited face he made when I opened the gift he made for me in Parent's Day Out. (And I really love the sweet photo album his teachers put together.)

I will say, though, one emotion caught me by surprise this year: sadness. Our pastor at church prayed for "all the moms who lost babies this year," and I found myself fighting tears for the rest of the day. Everyone's story is deeply personal, but the more time passes, the more comfortable I am sharing mine.

We miscarried a baby in the winter of 2009 and it took me a long time to grieve that loss. I finally started to process it a year before we got pregnant with Noah, and I spent the majority of the first trimester with him so anxious about every little thing going wrong.

Carrying and delivering Noah was a delight, and life with him is a grand adventure, to say the least! We got pregnant again last fall, and experienced a lot of highs and lows in the short 3 weeks between the first positive pregnancy test and the subsequent abrupt loss.

Among all my worries about having two kids under two, postpartum depression, pelvic pain... the one that didn't really cross my mind was fear of losing this baby. I was bigger and sicker than I ever was with Noah, and I guess I took his eventual full-term pregnancy for granted because I was genuinely shocked when I woke up one morning in October to signs of a miscarriage.

But even there, I found love. I was surprised and humbled by the support and care I received for a life that was so short. It meant the world to me. I grieved a lot of the milestones that come with the first 20 weeks. Since this baby's due date was so close to Noah's, I would be caught unaware with memories of announcing our pregnancy at Thanksgiving, feeling him kick for the first time on Christmas, and finding out we were having a boy during Restaurant Week and celebrating with a steak dinner.

But as the holidays ebbed away, so too, it seemed, did my grief. I noticed a quiet stillness in my heart. Welcome after months of panic attacks and sleepless nights and prolonged postpartum pain.

As spring comes, again catching me unaware is the memories of the burgeoning belly, the baby showers, the anticipation, the Braxton-Hicks. And I find myself mourning the loss of the baby even as I see God's lovingkindness woven throughout this baby's whole story. In wisdom and hindsight and what can only be Divine Intervention, I'm often filled with gratitude for a good, good Father.  Most days I'm well aware that God is a better parent than I will ever be, and that two of our babies are living in the presence of Goodness and Light and that's okay. I'm even happy about that, actually! But as we approach this little one's due date, the sorrow is creeping back in. Noah has legit baby FEVER and points them out everywhere. He asks for his friends all day long and I know he would love the company of an impending arrival.

But even here, on the days I'm frankly quite overwhelmed with Noah's sheer TODDLER-ness, I find comfort in knowing that maybe God knew I wasn't ready for two just yet. And yeah, there's a lot of guilt that comes with that comfort. It's not that I'm glad we miscarried. Not at all. But I'm glad God cares for me and knows what I need.

And I'm so very grateful that he made me a mother.

When Acute Becomes Chronic

I've been thinking a lot lately about self. As in, two years later and I'm still not myself. In a grand sense, I'm so very grateful. To remain unchanged after becoming a mother is unfathomable. I don't necessarily miss the self who was a little more "put together" with plucked eyebrows and painted toenails and daily quiet time (okay, I miss the daily quiet time). But let's be honest, I've always been pretty low-maintenance when it comes to exterior perks and that's okay.

I haven't been the same since I had my son. I love him infinitely. He makes me smile like nobody's business-- far more than anything else makes me smile these days. But it's not fair or possible to draw my light from him all day every day. I cry to the Lord, and He hears me-- He's molding my heart to be more like His-- but He's not healing me the way I want. Physically, emotionally, mentally, I'm not myself anymore. It doesn't feel fair to my son, to my husband, to my family and friends, to me... for me to be... not me.

Even my future self, the one I see at the other end of this chain of lights, the one I draw toward me one or two bulbs at a time, on a good day, remains ever far away.

I miss the part of me that had inner vibrance. Some spontaneous, uninitiated joie de vivre, at least sometimes. I get glimpses of her, when I'm clear-minded enough to hold a thoughtful conversation. When I'm spilling over with words that need to find a page. When I have energy to move my body.

I wouldn't say I'm depressed. My counselor concurs, as does my paradoxical response to numerous anti-depressants and anti-anxiolytics. Dare I say? I'm sick. I don't look nearly as sick as I did a year ago, and my level of pain is decreased by at least 80% on a good day compared to this time last year. Once or twice a month, I can muster up a "real" workout and enjoy the adrenaline rush immensely, even though I pay for it for the next 5-7 days. I can have a good "normal" weekend from time to time, but it's always followed by a truly horrible week.

I can't help but feel like I've fallen into the doughnut hole. Of course, there's the political one, where health insurance (which I'm so very grateful to have) only skims the surface when the doctors who are willing to step out on a limb charge by the hour, and don't file with insurance. (Because when you're sick and overwhelmed, it's no big deal to collect paperwork and navigate insurance bureaucracy, right?!)

But this is the doughnut hole where I fear acute becomes chronic. The one where you sense very few people still take you seriously. The one where you doubt yourself, even as your gut tells you, there's more out there! This cannot and will not be how you feel forever!

How long do you have to be a shell of yourself to call it chronic fatigue? I know it has to be long enough and low enough to bring you to a point where you're willing to admit this is a real thing, even though it terrifies you to your Just Do It core.

As a healthcare provider, do I respect my clients enough when they bare their "please tell me I'm not crazy" secrets? As a patient, is it worth staying up late to write a narrative of the last two years for a doctor who may or may not want to read it?

At what point is it optimism to get my hopes up that maybe this next doctor knows that how I feel is real, and at what point is it foolishness?

At what point is is helpful to cut out this food or add that supplement, and at what point does the trying and failing do more harm than good? The kind of harm that makes you feel like this is all your fault even though surely you just drew the short straw. (And how long does it take these dang expensive vitamins to work, anyway?!)

At what point, I wonder. At what point does acute become chronic?



See also: these fascinating essays on women and pain.

See also: the genius spoon theory.

Postpartum Anxiety

The fool says in his heart, "There is no God." 

They never call on God. 

But there they were overwhelmed with dread, 

where there was nothing to dread. 

Oh that salvation for Israel would come! 

Psalm 53 

"What does an unused prayer link look like? Anxiety. Instead of connecting with God, 

our spirits fly around like severed power lines, destroying everything they touch. 

A godlike stance without godlike character and ability is pure tension." Paul Miller

Allow me to start by saying that I'm hesitant to share this. The very last thing I want is for Noah to read this one day and feel like my postpartum anxiety/depression is somehow his fault, because it's not. Never for a second would I blame him! My inability to cope with the realities of motherhood, however, was a problem. No, scratch that. It was my reaction to my perceived inability. Mom-guilt and insecurity quickly turned into a fundamental shame in who I was as a person. That I was too much and not enough all at once. The shame was the straw that broke the camel's back. It was the tipping point in the perfect storm that had been brewing for, well, years according to my therapist. I went from extremely stressed, to anxious to the point of dread on a daily basis.

Walking around clinically depressed and anxious feels like staggering about, alone, on barren, deserted island. It can make you feel like you have no mooring; no place to throw an anchor; no shelter from the storm that tossed you ashore in the first place.

So in the end, I'm sharing. Because no new mom should feel ashamed when she's on the verge of tears and someone tells her to be grateful that she "only" has one kid and that it only gets harder from here on out. No new mom should be made to feel inadequate when someone tells her that they've never seen anyone else struggle so much with postpartum recovery. No new mom should feel the soul-crushing disappointment in herself when she's surprised by motherhood in all the wrong ways. When she's eating her pre-baby words and struggling to adapt to the role of motherhood, no new mom should feel ALONE.

This is the story of my pain, and maybe you will find in it an echo of your own story or that of someone you love. Consider taking the EPDS or reviewing this symptom checklist if anything henceforth sounds familiar to you.

.......

It all started when Noah started sleeping through the night consistently a few weeks after his first birthday. It seemed like suddenly I found myself at the beginning of July, after a month of rain, and I could see the sun for the first time in a LONG time. I had a few weeks of sleep under my belt, seemingly out of nowhere I had a toddler who could walk and talk and play, and life was so different than it had been just one or two months prior. I missed my baby, to be sure, and I still feel a familiar sadness when I think about all the sweet early moments I missed out on due to pain and anxiety, but mobility (and sleep) changed everything this summer and I couldn't deny that Noah was an awfully fun little guy to hang out with. Every stage is bittersweet, but I'm finding that each one is also progressively more fun as I get to know Noah better and better.

With the sun out at last, we could take playdates to the pool! We could take long walks every morning in the beautiful summer light! I had energy again! I could workout if I wanted to! I lost the last bit of baby weight and had a whole closet of clothes accessible to me again that I hadn't worn in almost two years! I could, and did, go to the farmer's market and start eating more vegetables after far too long of a hiatus. It's no secret summer is my favorite season. I felt like a new dawn was rising as I re-entered the land of the living and emerged from babyville. But it didn't take me long to realize I was not okay.

I was functioning. I was having fun! I was no longer having insomnia or heart palpitations, but I couldn't shake the feeling that I wasn't quite living either. At first I thought, okay, this is life as a mom. I will never be the same. And I WILL never be the same (thank God)! But I like to think that's because more has been added to my life and I've changed and grown into this new shape as I adjust. Not because the substance of my old self has been taken away.

This summer, Noah and I took daily morning walks and I started listening to sermon podcasts again. It was refreshing to just let truth wash over me. It's so easy for forget that I'm not the center of my life and that I'm certainly not in charge of it.

This summer, I realized I needed to change jobs. Again. But this time, the decision was not terribly debilitating. Now that I'm getting more settled into it, I'm relieved to find that my instincts were right, and this job is a great fit. But still, because of, or perhaps in spite of this decision, I was anxious. I was fearful. I had a certain peace that I was doing the right thing, that this was the best choice for my family, but I still wasn't okay.

This summer, Ross and I went to an amazing marriage conference once a week for 5 weeks. We started to reconnect and we were shocked and saddened at how far apart we'd grown in such a short time.

But the hardest thing was the thing that wasn't changing: the pain that I'd been having since I was 16 weeks pregnant. Ebbing and flowing with my hormones, but always there, always worse at the end of the day, was the pain. Somewhere in the haze of the early days of motherhood, my pelvic pain went from being a source of frustration to a source of concern to a trigger for hopelessness and despair. I'd been a compliant patient in physical therapy for 9 months by the time summer rolled around, and initially it was a life-saver. But the pain plateaud around March no matter what I did. In fact, certain aspects of it were starting to get worse again. It was so depressing. It was so painful. It was so discouraging. I was starting to feel like it would never ever go away. Like I would never feel normal again. Like I would never feel well enough to have another baby. Like I would never be able to love this baby the way I wanted to, because it hurt to lift him, it hurt to hold him, it hurt to rock him.

That kind of pain... I wouldn't wish it on anyone. By the end of most days, it was debilitating physically. I couldn't find it in me to stand and make dinner or tidy up. But emotionally? The pain was devastating. I felt like I was missing out on those "pay off" moments of parenting. Sure, having a toddler is chaotic. But people say, oh, when they snuggle up on your lap or fall asleep in your arms, it's so worth it. I felt like I didn't have that. I'd never been able to hold my crying or sleeping baby without my body screaming in pain. So I went back to my Midwife and thus began two months of constant appointments in August and September.

Back to the pain management OB, back to get another ultrasound, back to acupuncture, ramp up the physical therapy visits. Meanwhile, onto all of Noah's one-year appointments: pediatrician, shots, ENT, audiology... And then, I'm not sure if this was a cause or effect of additional stress and anxiety, but abdominal pain started waking me up at night. So I had an endoscopy. I had more labs drawn. More ultrasounds. More appointments. And more medical bills. And more hopelessness. Feeling like I was getting nowhere, and just spinning pointlessly in a cycle of pain and debt.

After Noah was born, I spent a very long time focusing on Noah's needs and putting him at the center of my life. This summer, I started to feel stifled by those expectations, and started feeling like it wasn't fair that I never got a break. Like I was physically worn out. Like I needed a spa day or a vacation or... something. Every time something else spun out of control, I thought: I'm terrible at this. I'm terrible at being a mother. I cannot balance this. I cannot manage this. Those were the sermons I preached to myself: I can't. I just can't.

And maybe I wasn't sharing enough, or maybe I cry wolf too much, or maybe it's simply that no one in my life was able to speak into that for me, to point out Satan's lies, to look me in the eye and remind that me that God CAN. To say, "Remember every other time you've reached the end of yourself and God drew you out of the muck and mire? He's still there. He's always there, but how gracious would it be for you to invite Him to partake in this moment with you? Into this embarrassing season of feeling hopeless as a mother and desperate for physical relief."

But it took me months to get to that realization. Until then, I was just in endless dialogue with myself: It wasn't supposed to be like this! I wanted kids! We prayed and planned. I take care of babies for a living! I loved Noah more than life, and I COULD NOT HANDLE the feeling that I was failing him day in and day out. In the isolation borne out of a long, dark, cold, anxiety-ridden, sleep-deprived winter, I had no one to bounce these thoughts off of, nor the mental clarity or inner confidence to do so. I had no barometer of 'normal.' Just occasional and seemingly benign comments here and there from people who didn't-- couldn't-- understand. Those words hurt. And made me feel more inadequate. And more abnormal.

Then, blessedly shortly before Noah's birthday, something clicked and I thought: what if this doesn't have to be normal? What if it's pain AND ... ? What if I'm depressed? What if my hormones are so out of whack that even though I'm a year out, I have had postpartum depression this whole time?

I truly don't know where this thought came from, but some freedom came with it, immediately. What if it's not my fault!? What if it's not just because I'm not trying hard enough or balancing well enough or doing things just the right way? So I got a referral and filled out the counselor's paperwork, and I was shocked. Shocked. At how many boxes I checked. How many symptoms I had.

Like many new moms, I was given a postpartum depression quiz shortly after Noah was born, when I was tired and sore, but also still riding the endorphin train. It's supposed to be hard at that point! I totally expected that! I did not expect to feel almost exactly the same, physically and mentally, a year later. I have no idea why I didn't think to take the survey again in the middle of December, when I dreaded going to bed only to be woken up every hour. When family obligations felt like a physical weight in my sleep-deprived state. When the long days started at 4am and I truly didn't know how I'd get through them in our drafty, unfinished house. (I don't know how I did, actually. I don't even remember.)

So in August, when the counselor tallied up my postpartum depression score, looked right at me, and said, "how did you get to this side of winter? How were alarm bells not going off everywhere?" I felt the weight start to lift. She said, "of course, the Scale is just a tool, and not necessarily diagnostic, but these scores suggest that you were terribly, frighteningly depressed. How did you get to the other side?!"

At those words, I wanted to cry tears of relief. Those feelings hadn't been normal! I wasn't inadequate for feeling like I was trapped and unable to talk myself out of it! But also, I saw God's hand. How had my depression score dropped from 24/30 to 11/30 in 4 months? Time helps. Sleep helps. Perspective helps (some of those extra-hard weeks really were just a phase). Sunlight helps. Exercise helps. A balanced diet helps. But really when it comes down to it, it's not hard for me to see that God was gracious and he removed me just far enough from the forest that I could see the trees again. I had been lost in a very dark place, and I couldn't recognize that because all I could see was this sleepless night, or that cranky day, or this extra-painful week. But once I could see the big picture, I could ask for help. More importantly, I could RECEIVE help for what it was, instead of a threat to my sense of capability.

When I think back to that symptom checklist, I think I was most shocked at the reality of the line I checked and starred near the end of the list: This is the worst that I have ever felt. When I saw that truth for what it was, and when I let it sink it, it hurt. Last winter was worse than being 15 and anorexic. It was worse than being depressed senior year of high school when I couldn't get out of bed and couldn't do school and cried about everything. It was worse than freshman year of college when all that unresolved depression left me unmoored and unable to recognize this girl who couldn't just sit down and study like she needed to. Worse than the bad breakups that haunted me. Worse than the hardest days of marriage.

The worst I'd ever felt... not only was that a bold statement in a season that I thought would signify that hard times were behind us, it was a disappointing realization in itself to feel this way during what I'd always envisioned to be one of the happiest times of my life. To be sure, the happiness did come in bits and pieces, slowly, and then all at once. Big love is winning over big heartache. Today, the exhausting is from keeping up with an active toddler and not from sleepless nights. And the joy... it overwhelms me at times. Our child is a delight, and I'm so grateful that he's ours, but there are a lot of things I would be tempted to change about the first year, if I could. (Things about myself, not about Noah.)

But I can't. Instead, this fall I started saying no to some things, but yes to others. No to the old job. No to a semester of Gospel Community. Yes to the support group, yes to MOPS, yes to spending allthemoney on acupuncture in a last-ditch effort to ease my physical pain.  Each of these steps would normally have felt very vulnerable, but for some reason they just weren't. I had nothing left to lose. What I was doing-- surviving-- wasn't working.

It was a breath of fresh air to sit at a table with other moms at my first MOPS meeting, toddlers safely tucked away in the childcare rooms, and to hear that God promises to send his people out in joy and lead them forth in peace (Isaiah 55). I thought, what a perfect way to end this summer. There IS more. There's joy to look forward to. There's peace regardless of circumstances.

Because now I see. Joy is not something to be attained. It's something to be received. A gift freely given, but often turned down in the pursuit of happiness. Here's the thing about reaching the end of yourself: depravity can be fruitful. God can plant the seeds for a harvest of plenty in the most barren soil. In our time of need, he loves to show us that he loves us. As a parent, I've garnered a new appreciation for the way God calls us to seek him for rest, comfort, reassurance, guidance. I can learn to give well as a parent when I, in, turn, receive these gifts as a beloved child.

I'm starting to get excited about motherhood as an opportunity to be enjoyed (as I first envisioned it) and not just an obligation to be feared (as I came to feel it). It's an opportunity to see God work in a new way. An opportunity to make new friends and have new eyes and, most of all, a new heart. A heart of freedom and not of burden.

I'm thankful for those uncomplicated moments this summer when I started to see myself in there again. After being buried for so long, it feels like catching a glimpse of a friend in the mirror when I say yes to the spontaneous outdoor concert, when I reach out to a neighbor and let our kids run around while we talk about everything we have in common, or when I'm running errands alone in the evening, car-dancing to CDs of music from high school. In those moments, I find a certain lightness of being, a simplicity, a reassurance, a whisper of hope. All is not lost. God can rebuild the years the locusts have eaten.