In general, posting personal things on social media makes me uneasy. I’m not talking about personal content that’s design related or mother related – I feel that if I didn’t share that I would be doing a disservice to the world. I’m talking about personal content like my relationship with my husband, my kids, my pregnancy. Those topics feel more untouchable to me, for whatever reason and it’s completely personal to me. I’m not here to advocate for one way or the other (anyone else here sweating right now?) Having said that, I’m going through this funny thing where I feel like I haven’t been pregnant for the last (almost 10 months) because I didn’t post a picture of myself in front of a wall with my hand over my belly. I didn’t post a picture with a two paragraph caption about being pregnant, so does that make it less real? I didn’t post pictures every couple of weeks of my growing belly with a hashtag of the number of weeks. Is my pregnancy less important now? The rational answer is, of course not. That makes no sense. But for some reason that answer is harder for me to internalize than I would like to admit. It got me thinking about how I struggle in general with feeling  content and happy without external validation. I shouldn’t need people to validate what I’m doing in order for it to feel real or for people to follow me on social media to feel relevant, and yet with every new follower I feel like I’m one step closer to being the female Moses leading the masses to redemption. In this case, redemption being my obliterating talents when it comes to design.

I want out of this way of thinking, I want to do things differently this time. I want to make choices that are true to me and what I value (as long as Ezzy agrees with them) I pay way too much attention to all the noise around me. All that loud, contradicting noise. It’s like I’m a bird who was born while its mother was out hunting food & any time I hear an opinion my initial reaction is “mama?” as if that’s what I’ve been looking for.
I end up taking on all these opinions & then those opinions cause me inner turmoil for 3 days. It makes me question what I’m already doing and think it’s not good enough. Then I feel overwhelmed by the thought of needing to change what I’ve been doing, do something new, and worry about all that time I spent doing the “wrong” thing.

When I’m working I feel guilty I’m not spending enough time with my kids. When I’m not working I feel guilty for not contributing, as if contributing to my kids isn’t enough.
When I’m spending all my time with my kids, I feel exhausted and worn out. When I take time to do things for myself, I feel guilty and selfish. When I’m involved in everything my kids do, I feel that I’m stifling them. When I take a step back and forget to feed them for 3 days, I feel like I’m neglecting them.

My goal is to gain strength from within ME, within my quiet self who is far from perfect. Who doesn’t buy organic fruits and vegetables, who has a daughter who doesn’t eat her vegetables, who has a two year old who leaves the house in a diaper and nothing else (but isn’t he cold?) maybe, but I’m too lazy to get him dressed 3 times a day. I need to gain strength from someone who brushes her kids teeth twice a day but also lets them eat an abundance of sugar, from someone who is screen free around her kids but has the patience level of a 72 year old man, from someone who needs visual confirmation every time she drops her kids off at school or camp. Yes this person, which is me, is who I need to gain strength from because this person is the only person who can change me and help me grow.

I just got a mosquito bite, zika?