Finding Balance: Wellness for the Everyday Struggle: January 2018

So for any of you in Northern Illinois (or really anywhere in the general midwest right now, you're familiar with sub-zero temperatures, right?!

That totally ruins my running plans. Not just because I'm a wimp (don't get me wrong, I *am* a wimp), but because running now means either running all by myself when Eric is home, or running with Legan, with or without Eric. The times I could run all alone during the week are generally dark and super early, or pretty late, so yeah, no. Especially in sub-zero temps. But running with Legan in sub-zero temps is also pretty not OK.

For Christmas this year, we (ok, I) bought ourselves (us) a really cool thing. It's called a BundleMe. This lets us at least take Legan out some this winter. It keeps his little body and hands and everything in basically a lovely sleeping bag over his blankie and clothes. But his face is still out, and so with -20 wind chill being a constant for a couple of weeks, well, we didn't do running.

He does love his stroller cozy (as we call it) though!

But, no gym membership out this way, nor can we afford one as the nearby rec center is pretty freaking expensive considering that childcare is an extra fee. Erk. And we don't own a treadmill. So while I've been trying to keep up with yoga (at least 15 minutes 3-4 times per week) and my squats/push ups/and hopefully something else) routine 2-3 times per week, we've been being fluffy and lazy the last month or so.

This week, hooray, the cold snap broke and now we're able to run a bit again. Trying to go 3 x per week. Hopefully it's going to keep happening. Legan seems to like going so long as we keep the run at 30 min or less, so he doesn't get too bored. We're working on figuring out the best routes to use with stroller and potential snow on sidewalks, etc. It's been...interesting, but we definitely got 4-5 runs in before Christmas polar vortex, and today will mark our second run since it broke 3 days ago, so honestly going alright.

Going to only include a couple of photos now, because I haven't taken many in the last week. Andplusalso I just made and ordered our Christmas/New Years Cards & 2018 Calendars and I'm just tired of looking at photos of him for now. Wow, right?

He's got a truck!

Just getting into playing pretend, and he loves to "drink" out of his Lego cup

Sometimes when it's too cold to be outside, he helps daddy play games

His award winning smile

He loves towers

Oh, and cars. He also loves cars.

I can't help but wonder sometimes whether Postpartum Depression & Postpartum Anxiety (PPD & PPA) are more of a personal physical issue, or a societal problem.

This face makes it pretty hard to be too sad

I don't mean to discount anyone's experience or feelings, I'm just putting some thoughts out there to muse on.

But I wonder if the reason such a large percentage of women suffer from PPD/PPA, somewhere between 11 & 20% of women who give birth are diagnosed. Sources: American Psychological Association and HuffPost. That to me is huge, perhaps an entire 1/5 of moms have something wrong with them?

Maybe, just maybe people get upset, depressed, or anxious not merely because of an imbalance in their brain (not that I'm discounting that imbalances are real, just perhaps there are other factors), but maybe because something external is so broken that it's causing ridiculous amounts of stress?

I mean, yes, having a newborn is stressful in and of itself, for sure. But what if you suffer a birth trauma and people around you are ignoring/arguing it? What if the trauma of your birth causes a misplaced sense of fear or dread of your baby, because the trauma happened as your baby was brought into this world? Emotional associations like that are very prevalent in my life at least.

Or, what if you are worried that you will lose your job if you don't get enough sleep and aren't back to 100% on the job at 6 weeks postpartum? Just as possible that you have no paid maternity leave and have to go back much sooner than that, or worry about how bills will be paid and how food can get to the table.

Don't forget help and support. You've just been through a very physically taxing, painful experience (no matter how your birth went), you're phsyically recovering, and most likely your partner had 0-3 days off. 3 days?! So while you feel like you've been through a car-wreck, ditto for your baby (babies), you are now fully responsible for taking physical and nutritive care of both of you for many hours a day. This stops you from sleeping when baby sleeps, because you need that time to take care of both of your needs. This is only compounded if you have other children at home. Even a wonderful partner can't help if they have to be at the office.

What if a few of those are hitting you at once, or all of them? And I'm only speaking from my experience and what I've heard of, I'm sure there are plenty of other scenarios that are common for new moms but are truly a crazy part of our society.

What if after birth, you had a team of people to help care for you and your babies (whether newborn or previously birthed babies)? A team of people, to trade out cooking and cleaning chores, so that you can focus on healing and bonding with just your baby?

What if you had 12 months off, paid, so you can nurture yourself and the next generation of the population, and you didn't have to worry about how to work on only 3 hours of sleep?

What if how you fed your baby didn't attract any unpleasantness, whether it's people uncomfortable with you nursing/pumping or people unhappy that you choose to formula feed. What if you could just make choices and not explain yourself all the time?

What if you had been raised in a community where you had previously helped out other new moms with their basic life chores while they were recovering from birth, and were able to see many other new moms struggle and learn, so that you didn't feel alone when it was you? What if it was OK to talk openly about those struggles? Furthermore, what if you had been able to just learn basic baby care easily because you spent all this time with other new moms and babies, so that you weren't surprised by things like babies that only nap on you, babies that nap 20 minutes, babies that spit up happily for no reason, babies that projectile poop everywhere, or how often all these babies need to eat.

I'm dreaming here, but it sounds really nice. I have a feeling that if everyone had a welcome, inviting, supportive community around them, that could actually help you after birth, and help you learn about babies better pre-birth, and let you know that so many sleep deprived parents feel totally useless and inadequate (aka you're not alone and you're probably not doing any worse than anyone else).....how much could that reduce the number of people suffering from PPD/A?

How much could society help us, and therefore help itself, having healthy and happy parents and kids, to grow up into the next generation of adults?

To me, it seems like the odds are stacked against everyone here, and quite frankly I'm feeling like PPD/A numbers are under reported. I feel like more like 35-50% of new moms suffer from these, and I feel like it's time to make some changes to help that.

Ok, I'm done with my downer message. Have some happy baby photos. We're happy to be bringing in the New Year with a bang, and hoping to make it a great one.