This week has been hard, but I am still holding on. Nothing dramatic or life-altering happened, yet it has been one of those weeks when “no” seems to show up more often than “yes,” and even the simple things feel heavier than they should.
Eight years ago today, I woke up as a mother for the very first time. I had a brand-new baby boy in my arms and absolutely no idea what the years ahead would bring. Honestly, I loved being pregnant. I know not everyone gets to say that, so I recognize how fortunate I was. During most of my first pregnancy, I felt energized, hopeful, and deeply aware that life was changing in a beautiful way. The real challenges did not arrive until the very end, when sleep became nearly impossible. Carrying a baby who was almost eleven pounds will do that to a person.
For me, pregnancy felt like freedom. I loved my growing belly, my awkward waddle, and the quiet excitement of imagining our family taking shape. I embraced that season fully. Then Oscar was placed in my arms, and everything shifted. That moment was mesmerizing. It marked the beginning of motherhood for me, but it also began something much bigger: the lifelong process of becoming. From that first day, I understood that motherhood was not a role I would step into once and master. It would keep changing me, stretching me, and teaching me.
Paving the Way for Motherhood
Over the years, I have often thought of my life as three very different lives. Somehow, I lived all of them as the same person, yet the seasons were so distinct that it can be difficult to connect them in my mind.
At this point, those seasons divide almost evenly into thirds. My childhood and teenage years were spent in Florida, surrounded by a loving, traditional family, close friends, and plenty of laughter. As the daughter of a pastor, I also had some unique opportunities to travel while growing up. I went on mission trips to the Mexican jungle and spent a winter in Israel. Those experiences shaped me. They gave me a deep love for travel, learning, and understanding cultures beyond my own. That curiosity still stays with me.
When it came time to make my own adult choices, however, I did not exactly begin with a steady plan. I left the local community college after one semester so I could get married quickly. At nineteen, I believed I would simply take a semester or two off and return before much time had passed. But life does not always follow the bright, confident plans of a nineteen-year-old. That marriage ended quickly and painfully, leaving me shaken and eventually sending me to North Carolina.
That began what I think of as my wandering years. When I first moved here, I lived with my parents while I tried to find my footing. I needed to work for a while and establish residency if college was ever going to become a possibility again. My parents opened their home to me with grace, and I will always be grateful for that safety and support.
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After a year or two of working different administrative jobs, I found a position at an insurance agency. Slowly, I worked my way back into community college. I took classes at night and worked full-time during the week so I could pay for them. Eventually, I found roommates, moved into an apartment, and began building a path forward. It was not a straight path, and it was certainly not an easy one, but it was mine. In time, I transferred to N.C. State and graduated with a degree in Political Science and a minor in Spanish.
Later that same year, I met Jerry. As our story began to unfold, I realized I would be staying in Raleigh for a while. This was the beginning of my third life, the life that felt most like my real life.
Life as Mom
This morning, I set my alarm for 6 a.m. so I could wake up, pour my first cup of coffee, and enjoy a little quiet before the kids came out at 7. We have a morning system that usually works well for our family. When they wake up, often around 6:30, they play in their rooms for a bit. At 7, they come out for breakfast. Over the past eight years, I have learned something important about myself: I am a morning person when I get to wake up on my own terms. If someone else jolts me out of sleep, it is not nearly as peaceful.
On this particular morning, though, I woke up on my own at 5 a.m. Instead of scrolling through Facebook and waiting for the alarm, I decided to start the day.
As I sit here before sunrise, thinking about my three lives, my eight-year-old boy, and my five-year-old firecracker, I cannot help but laugh. I am completely and undeniably a mom. And I love it.
The Role of Mom
We have all heard celebrity speeches where someone thanks their children and says their greatest role in life is being a mother. I am not an actress, but I understand that sentiment in my own way. My mind still organizes my life into different roles I have played as a woman, a daughter, a student, a worker, a wife, and eventually a mother.
When I think back on those wildly different seasons, I can see the different versions of myself trying to find where I belonged. It feels a little like I was trying on roles until one finally fit in a deeper, truer way.
The role of Mom fits.
I am not someone who wishes I could go back and change every hard part of my past. I know I am here because of the life I have lived, including the mistakes, heartbreaks, detours, and unexpected turns. And if you have watched The Flash, you know how complicated time travel can get, so I will leave it at that.
Hang on
If I could send a small message back to my younger self, though, I might tell her this: hang on. Just hang on. Hang on when loneliness feels so deep it turns your stomach. Hang on when money is tight and you cannot see how the bills will work out. Hang on when you have to move across the country just to catch your breath. Hang on when the first school says no, and then the second school says no, and then you discover you are missing a high school math credit that will cost you months of progress. Hang on when someone breaks your heart. Hang on when you break your own heart. Hang on when you fail. Hang on when you wreck your car again. Hang on to hope. Hang on to truth. Hang on to the possibility that something better is still ahead.
I never traveled through time to give myself that advice, but in the hardest seasons, hanging on was often the only thing I knew how to do. I knew it somewhere deep in my gut. When I had no clear plan and no easy answer, I could still hold on. And so often, it was mothers who encouraged me, supported me, and helped pull me through. Mothers understand this kind of endurance. They understand the slow work of growing, waiting, birthing, changing, grieving, and beginning again. They know how to hang on.
Hanging on is What Moms Do
Eight years into motherhood, I feel more grounded in who I am than I ever did before. Part of that comes from what motherhood teaches me every day. It shows me where I need to adapt, where I need patience, where I need strength, and where I need to let go. But another part comes from the quiet, collective understanding that this is what mothers do. This is what so many of us are doing all the time. We hang on.
This week, the news has felt relentless and life has felt complicated. People seem tense, tired, and easily stirred up. Yet here we are, celebrating life. We are celebrating our firstborn and the day that changed us forever. It feels like a strange contrast to the mood I have carried all week, but maybe that is exactly why it matters. It reminds me to pause, notice what is good, and hold on to it.
Maybe you are also hanging on right now. Maybe you are wondering how you will take the next step, and then the next one after that. I want you to know something: you do not have to understand the whole path today. You do not have to know exactly how every step will happen. But you can hang on and trust that the next step will come. Then another will come after that. Eventually, the season will shift. One day, you will look back and see how the pieces fit together, even the ones that once seemed impossible to place.
We may be hanging on by a thread, but let’s keep holding on. Someday, we will be the ones telling a younger woman, a tired mother, or a frightened girl to hang on. She will need us to show her how. At some point, you will find a moment to be grateful. You will catch your breath. It will happen, even if it does not happen today. So hang on.
Funny. That sounds exactly like something my mom would say.
