This morning I went back into the very first few posts I wrote on here back in 2016. I wrote about magic, true magic. I wrote about miscarriage, and love, and pregnancy, and birth. The nostalgia that filled my soul was necessary medicine. It's been such a heavy month as we are all aware.
I told myself, "Oh, just take me back, just once, just to experience it one final time."
We cherish and treasure special moments in our lives, but for me it's just never enough. I just want so much to live inside those magical moments again. To be reminded of the true magic and love that this world and life has to offer. Falling in love with life all over again!
The past 10 years have felt like drifting ever so slowly away from that. With little glimpses, here and there, of the magic and the love. Is the world getting darker? Heavier? Are there ways for me to create more magic and love in this world?
There are little things around me that remind me that the magic is still there. That maybe there are still some chances to make this world a better place. And the ability and opportunity to raise my children up to be good people, kind leaders, and beacons of strength and light to the world. My own stepdaughter is bringing new life into the world soon here! Another gift. Another chance. Another tiny human to help make this world a better place.
It's the only thing keeping me going these days.
I recently have had the opportunity to go back to school, starting in the Fall. But I carry so much doubt and conflict within me, about my own ability to make it, and even still, so what if I do finish school, who's to say that it will mean anything, anyway? We are talking about nursing school, by the way. It's not just a trade school this time, it's a big deal for me!
I question myself. Do I want this? Like, really want this? What about my ADHD? What about my consistent struggles with depression? Most days, I struggle just to get out of the house, take a shower, or clean some dishes. But I want to be a Neonatal Nurse? It seems like one, big impossibility.
Yet, my body has literally grown life inside of it. Despite so much! Something that you might consider an impossibility, yet I somehow achieved (more than once)!
But can I base the success of a nursing career on my physical achievements that my body had no choice but to push through? I'm not so sure.
I want to believe in myself. I want to go back to school. I want to have a career.
I'm scared of making the wrong decision. I'm scared of putting my time, focus, and energy into the wrong thing. I carry guilt that going back to school will be time and energy away from being a solely dedicated mother to my kids. And I know this guilt comes from a place of trauma and neglect from my own childhood...because all I wanted was a mom to be there for me, but she was everywhere but there for me. And I told myself I was going to be everything my mom was not.
This has created an unhealthy view of motherhood for me. That any time I am not focused on my kids, any time I have chosen to do something outside of motherhood, I am automatically being selfish and neglecting my kids. Obviously, I know this is untrue. And in fact, I know that trying to establish a career for our future is a good thing...not just for me, but for the entire family.
I go back to the mentality I carried back in 2016, back when my son was only a year old, back before I ever imagined having more than one child. There are still parts that I hold onto from that time. I still believe in the magic. I just wish that I could relive that time of my life once more so that the belief in myself and the future that I hold feels more tangible.
If there was something I could go back and tell myself before becoming a mother, it would be to go easy on myself. That there are multiple ways that I can be there as a mother while also building and creating a future for us as a family that does not mean I am neglecting or abandoning my children or motherhood itself.
It's such a black and white way of thinking that I need to break in order to better myself. And maybe I was led back to my first blog posts today as a reminder that the magic exists. That anything really is possible. That my children deserve a future where I exist outside of them, so that I can provide a more stable future for them.
It is one of my goals in life to be able to help my children and their children if they are ever in a position where they aren't able to help themselves. And currently, I am in a position right now where I am unable to be be able to help myself! Seriously, if something were to ever happen and I found myself alone with the kids, there would be nothing I could to to help them in the moment. I have an opportunity to build something. To create a foundation for our future. So I am going to take it.
Despite the doubt, despite the misplaced guilt, despite everything in me that tells me, "I can't" or that "I shouldn't" or that "it will be a mistake..." I need to block those voices out and be bold and brave, just like I was when I first discovered I was pregnant with David. Those feelings I got the moment I saw those positive lines on the pregnancy tests...fear, apprehension, excitement, exhilaration, bewilderment, awe, doubt, and exhaustion. Feelings I am all too familiar with in this very moment.
Perhaps it's being on the cusp of a new chapter in life. A new journey about to begin. As afraid as I am, there's magic in the nothingness around me, and a bright future ahead for us all. Maybe I just need to imagine myself as being pregnant with a future, a blossoming career. But instead of trimesters, we're calling them semesters haha! Instead of birthing a human child, I'll be birthing a future me and my family can rely on.
I got this!
