I love being a mother. I love being her mother. She's the best, most beautiful, sweetest, smartest baby girl born to me EVER. (Yes, she's my first child.) Considering the road I took to get to this point, writing this is even more sweet.
One of the things preventing me from posting was that I suffered from postpartum depression. Because I don't really want to go into it, as this is a public blog and I still want to maintain SOME semblance of privacy for professional reasons, just suffice it to say that it got bad and took some time to get better. I still have bad days, but they're not nearly as bad as they were. Like, 10% of the previous level of bad, which I will GLADLY deal with to never feel like that again and to be so in love with my little girl finally. I loved her even during the PPD, but there was fear and anxiety mixed with it which confused me and hurt me.
That said, I've been receiving treatment to get better and I'm doing much better. I've been back at work for a while, and I feel like I'm almost back to my strongest when it comes to teaching, which feels great. I'm trying to find the balance, but I'm not going to lie... it's HARD. And I'm nowhere near finding it! And in sacrifice of doing my jobs of both teacher and mother, I've been neglecting my physical health. (Better that than my recently-threatened mental health, but still.) I could list all the terrible things I've been doing, but instead I'll list what unhealthy things I haven't been doing to make myself feel better:
- heroin!
- crack!
- any drugs that aren't prescribed for me!
- abusing prescribed drugs!
- forgoing any chance for sleep!
- drinking alcohol! (well, abusing alcohol - I've had maybe 1 drink a month since giving birth)
- walking around nuclear plants!
- texting while driving!
- pouring sugar directly into my mouth! (Not yet, anyway.)
Oy, I know. It's finally getting to the point where it's not only the spirit that's willing, I'm tired of feeling gross. Plus my clothes are getting tight, and I can't afford new ones right now, so I gotta knock that crap off! Plus I have a little girl who's going to watch what I put in my mouth and want to run around being a little kid, so I need to be a good role model and be able to keep up with her.
That said, BABY STEPS.
Here's what I want to do ultimately: Eat clean food that consists of protein, vegetables, and good carbs; exercise regularly doing things I enjoy; cut out the junk food - both fast food and processed; cut out SUGAR.
For now, I'm focusing on drinking more water than soda, adding in more vegetables, and starting to incorporate exercise slowly. I want to get in some sort of cardio for 15 minutes a day. Yes, that's not a lot, but I'm THAT out of shape. (For now I'm going to play "Just Dance" on Xbox 360 Kinect - it's fun AND it makes me sweat! I might also do some beginner yoga videos on YouTube.) I also want to do my back stretches; I have a lot of back pain that's lasted for at LEAST a month, and I need to get rid of it. Obviously, losing weight would help, but when I focus on weight loss I tend to fail quicker. Focusing on building healthy habits keeps me sane while also having the nice side effect of losing a little weight.
Yeah, this totally detracted from talking about my beautiful girl and motherhood. What can I say, I need to be a good, healthy person, and that will help me be a good mother ultimately. Besides, this would be even MORE boring if all I did was talk about how beautiful and perfect my child is - which no one will believe because all parents are biased when, in fact, my child IS the most beautiful and perfect 6-month-old ever. ;D
Wish me luck in my health pursuits! I've got a lot of unhealthy demons to blast.
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