It takes a village...

     So it's been two and a half weeks since we came home from the hospital with our little 7 lb. 6 oz. angel, and we have never been more tired, frustrated, depressed, sleep deprived, or happier than we are now. We have sleepless nights, and napless days. We have changed more diapers and onesies than we thought possible. We have learned that our little one makes more noises when she's asleep than when she's awake. These past 2.5 weeks have felt like a lifetime and yet they feel like all we did was blink. Overall, we know that our lives have been changed for the better. From the first day when we discovered we were pregnant to now, our lives have been blessed.
     Some of my readers know how much we struggled with getting pregnant. It may not be a struggle like others, but for us we couldn't figure out why we were having such a hard time. In the four years that we have been married, we didn't exactly take specific measures to prevent our family from growing. So when we decided to start trying, actually trying to expand our family it took us a bit. Three months shy of trying for a year, we found out we had finally succeeded. Our day of elation began with Mike finding out before I did because I didn't dare look at the pregnancy test (for fear that it was another negative). Nine months of 1,000+ changes later, we came home with a tiny, perfect human.
     Motherhood is challenging. Nobody really talks about how hard it is, because describing it is nearly impossible. The amount of hormones racing through you and the exhausting experience of being born for your newborn, make for a roller coaster ride for which you can't truly prepare. You get anxious, depressed, happy, sad and more and then you cry and cry and cry. You cry because you're happy, and then you cry because you're hormonal and you want to be a "good mom" but you don't feel like you're making the cut. Then you cry because you feel like a strain on those around you. You feel like you're draining the strength of your husband and that he's constantly trying to lift you up and take care of the demands of a newborn.
     The hardest part for me is to remember that those who are around you, who want to help you, they wouldn't do it if they couldn't. They wouldn't help you if they didn't have the ability or the time or the patience to help you. And the trick is to let them help you. They say it takes a village to raise a child and that is the truth. It also takes a village to help the mother.