My journey into motherhood

Today is Mother’s Day and I am consumed with so many emotions. You see, my journey into motherhood, like many others, was not a smooth one. My husband and I endured fertility treatments for 3 years and it took every ounce of emotional and financial reserve that we had at the time. There were tons of tears and countless moments of anticipation only to be followed by heartache and frustration. Thankfully, we were blessed with our children and for that I am eternally grateful. Every single tear and worry I had during that time was worth it to be able to fulfill the desire to be a mother!

I remember my young, newly married, determined self being told that having a child through my own pregnancy wasn’t an option. Initially, I was quick to respond “it’s ok, we’ll just adopt”. Knowing there were hundreds if not thousands of babies that needed a home. But then my heart grew closer to the desire of having my own pregnancy and so we pursued the path to fertility treatments. We experienced many conversations with doctors that provided us hope and doctors that shattered our dreams. It was quite the roller coaster and I praise any of my friends that are still in existence because I’m sure I was not showing up as my best self during that time of my life. Every pregnant story I heard would send a wave of excitement and grief through my body at the same time. Of course I was excited for them, they were creating life, but it was also a gut wrenching reminder of something that I couldn’t achieve at the time and the possibility of it seemed too daunting.

Thankfully, a friend of mine shared a woman’s group with me and I found myself surrounded by women who actually understood the emotional roller coaster. They understood the fire that would spread through my body when someone would say “just give it time” or “it will happen when it’s suppose to”. They understood the pain that rang so deep throughout my body every time I got another reminder of what I wanted and what I couldn’t have.

I am so grateful for those women and think about my time spent with them. We learned about women in the bible and found strength as a community to work through these emotions as we traveled this road toward motherhood. Not knowing how to prepare because there wasn’t a roadmap. Some roads were lit with promise of the future and some were so dark you couldn’t see your own hand in front of you.

There were times that I wanted to give up, but ultimately I had my heart set on experiencing a pregnancy and was willing to extinguish every option to get it. Thankfully my husband was on board and we served as each others support during this time. I am also so incredibly grateful for the guidance of the doctors and modern day technology as it made that dream come true for me. I was able to have a front row seat to the movie I had been watching for 20+ years, but this time I got to not only watch it, I got to be in it.

But that was just the beginning. Motherhood has since been a rollercoaster ride for me as I experienced fear and anxiety throughout the pregnancy and well into raising my children. The ironic thing is that so many people recognized this anxiety and wrote it off as “part of the job description” or something I “just needed to shake”. What I would love to share with any woman in this role who is experiencing anything similar is that these emotions are all often “normal”, but I don’t believe that it is a cross for us to bare. I believe that all of our emotions are generated because of a thought that we believe. During this period, my thoughts ranged from “am I going to really be able to have what I’ve always dreamed of?” to “when will something go wrong?”.

I want you to know that I am 100% grateful for this experience in my life as it has shown me the power of our minds. I had medical providers all around me telling me everything was fine, but my brain was telling me differently and that kept me in fear. I didn’t know how to “turn it off”.

But now I do and I am so eager to offer that peace of mind to other women. The work I do as a coach is to help women see that they are in control of their thoughts which create an emotion or feeling about something in their life. So if you are finding yourself feeling “stuck” in a feeling that isn’t serving you, there is a way to “turn it off”. One beautiful thing is that this work does not just apply to motherhood, it applies to every part of life.

I want to offer you the opportunity to do something that your future self will thank you for. If you are feeling stuck in fear or worry or really any thought that isn’t serving you, please know that there is another option. I have confidence that this work will teach you how to identify your thoughts that aren’t serving you and create thoughts that do. Sounds simple huh? It actually is, but without the guidance of someone that is not in the emotion, it’s sometimes impossible to do. Even as a coach, I need an outsiders perspective because no one is exempt from this work.

So, what are you thinking? Are you ready to start putting your power of thought to the test? If so, I’d love to help you! Feel free to contact me with any questions or to further discuss.

Thank you for letting me share this part of my journey with you, my purpose is to inspire women to confidently live the life that they dream of!