From the ground up.
“You glow differently when you’re healed" as written by Joena, and it’s the absolute truth. I can’t even begin to give you an exact number of how many times I've cried throughout these last two years, because it’s probably in the thousands. I have cried alone, with my baby, with my husband and apparently it’s gotten so heavy the emotional trauma I’ve been through, that I’ve cried at work, while watching television, listening to music and watching a series. To be frank, I’ve always been an empathetic person, I cry when someone else’s eyes get swollen, red and water works are about to begin. It’s in my personality, I can always place myself in others’ shoes. However, this time in my life has felt like the hardest, even after losing my dad at nineteen, when I thought my life had finally begun.
Motherhood can feel very lonely. No one talks about how the recovery happens, you just see the mom, holding her baby in a wrap across her chest, dressed in some leggings and a tee, smiling through the bleeding, the physical pain, the exhaustion, the fact that her life is probably on a loose string, not a tight one and running on low caffeine because she’s breastfeeding. I have felt extremely lonely even with company present. I love my baby, there’s no doubt about it, but I can only share with her a conversation long enough that her gaze at me lasts about 10 seconds before she runs and goes to do something else, and I still haven’t finished my first sentence. So, it’s sort of unproductive. Yet, she was the only person I could provide compassion and patience to. I couldn’t even talk to my husband sometimes because he was also going through his learning experiences, his own healing and also adjusting to this new life and everything we were going through. He could only afford to offer me so much space to share what I felt and still, most of it, he couldn’t understand, because he wasn't going through my physical changes and he had never experienced postpartum depression. It was so infuriating and frustrating that he could not understand my emotions and what I was going through and I blamed him for a lot of it because he was the closest person to me. It wasn’t his fault. As for anyone else, I was nice to aquaintances but even friends that I had a close bond with, seemed to have also been fed up with my traumatic experiences. And then, I shut off completely. When I felt like I had no one else to hold accountable, other than myself. It’s like my body on it’s own, told me “you’re tired of trying, you’re tired of giving and not receiving, it’s time to set boundaries, take care of yourself and work yourself from the ground up”.
I left so many things undone. I was working on my podcast and I felt I had even disappointed friends who were willing to be a part of my professional journey and I couldn’t even get myself to finish conducting the interviews I had planned. I was trying to workout and get healthy, but I kept choosing the wrong meals and trash to snack on. I felt that I was detaching from the job I spent years working towards. I felt that I couldn’t stop thinking about the past, things that were not said and done, things that hurt me and felt extremely personal and damaging. I felt that I couldn’t move on. I. WAS. STUCK. It only took me seven months postpartum, to realize it was a pause, not a stop.
It was a pause for reflection. A pause for investment in myself. A pause for a restart to life, to look at it from a different perspective and approach it the way I’ve always wanted to go about it. Seven months later, after having a baby, after losing our home, after hurt and forgiveness, after many hospital visits, after crying myself to sleep at night, to waking at 3 a.m. to feed our baby. I learned how to rise every morning a bit more grateful. I learned how to be present and not dread the worst that could happen. I learned how to be still and not get anxious, but to embrace the silence and the beauty that surrounded me, even within the four walls I spent the last year in. I learned how to say thank you for the roof I have over my head, for the breath I took waking up this morning, for having my baby and husband by my side, for my husband and I still choosing each other every day, for the smiles that happened dispersedly throughout the week with family, for the random calls and text messages I received from longtime friends, for the messages I’d received when I decided to share my story from the inside, out.
My healing began when I felt that I had no one else to blame other than myself for the things I couldn’t do. I was so upset and devastated even when I couldn’t claim my old life back. I started to embrace this new version of me. I appreciated the things that were removed from my life, the turns that I had to make and the wild and unexpected changes that led me to where I am today. I learned that I had to sacrifice the old me, to bring in expansion, abundance and love. With that being said, that first of April, I started to think more about what I was eating, why I wasn’t feeling good physically, why I had an upset stomach, why my psoriasis was flaring up, why I was feeling sluggish and tired even after a full night’s rest, (which is rare and now considered to be five hours length not eight). Once I started to eat better, I started to feel better, I started to look better and I just kept going. I started to unfollow pages that didn’t help me in my emotional healing, I started to follow pages that brought inspiration, that had open talks about a range of topics, that could mentor me even millions of miles away, but I had access to digitally. I wanted to learn how to meditate. I wanted to be more connected to the universe and spiritually gain back what I once had. I started to take more walks, to go outside more, to connect more with nature. I started to write, my blog, in my journal and in my phone; I sometimes would record voice memos just to share what I was feeling and it later became inspiration for my own posts. I was learning to love solitude. I began to understand that I needed to love myself before I could call in the abundance that was waiting for me.
I removed beyond the expected from my life and everyday tasks. I removed toxic energy, I removed doubt. I removed pitifulness towards myself. I removed excuses I kept making for myself. I removed the things that didn’t serve me purpose. I removed the shame I had towards my body, my growth, my healing and my fallouts. I changed the idea of what luxury meant for me. I couldn’t want a more simple and humble life these days. I couldn’t crave peace and joy more than ever before. I am not afraid to say no to things that I always felt I had to say yes to. I am no longer complacent, nor am I worried about failure. I am grateful that I have learned that I need to be at my lowest, to build myself, to reconstruct and heal.
Motherhood and all it’s experiences, is still taboo, even with all the sources and pages I follow that try to bring awareness to it. But something I found to be gratifying is that sharing my own experiences, has brought together not only mothers, but women of all shapes and sizes and experiences, and even men who have message me, acknowledging the progress I’ve made, and feel that if I was able to do it, they can too. We’re all human, we all are going through many things simultaneously, we are all learning. It takes bravery to say I’m done with the old bullshit and I need to get myself together. It takes courage to say, I’m not happy where I am, I am ready for abundance, may it come in the way it wishes to.
“You glow differently, when you’re healed”. I glow differently these days.
