Right after we shot this
I felt so full of energy,
and then I sat down & told my “coming to motherhood” story.

The series of events that made me a mother.
It wasn’t giving birth,
it wasn’t breastfeeding or the first latch
or making it through my first outing with my new babe.

It was navigating my baby’s serious health issues,
and our healthcare system.
It was believing in myself & my intuition enough to fight to get him help.
When I truly put myself & what other people thought of me aside.

It was a building of tension so extreme,
the release of which was grief, and fear, and relief all at once.

It was the single most isolating experience of my life.
It was the moment,
driving home from the hospital in the middle of the night, in a snowstorm that made us slide all over the narrow Philadelphia streets,
and made it hard to see through the windows, our breath creating clouds inside the car,
our silence as oppressive & heavy as the storm outside

and yet another doctor telling me that what I feared was happening, wasn’t. That I had nothing to worry about.
That I was overreacting.

The height of loneliness
when I settled back into the depths of the thick fur lined hood of my winter coat,
my jaw set,
and decided that for this baby,
for this child, I would
Burn. It. All. Down.
That I would fight harder than I’d ever fought for anything before & that I wouldn’t stop until I had a clear answer.
Truth
and he was ok.
In my eyes & on my terms.
No matter what anyone said to me or about me.

Our world right now feels like a pressure cooker,
tension building.
So many of us are poised
for a fight
for ourselves
for our future
for our children & loved ones

There will be a release,
and whether it is positive or negative,
hopeful or terrifying,
it will create relief.
The relief of knowing.
The relief of confronting reality & forging a plan.

Birth is like this.
A building of tension & anticipation
followed by a release so profound it changes you forever.
And the relief that there is a path forward.
Full of unknowns yes,
but the truth of the completion is it’s own certainty.

I’m due on election night.
Y’all ready to ride with me?

#36weeks