Being a mom is one of the most rewarding, blessed, joyous, and EXHAUSTING things ever.      I am constantly on duty, 24/7.  From the first time anyone ever asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up my answer has always been the same; a mommy.  (Of course there were some other answers too, like an Attorney General, Neurologist, Zookeeper, Ballerina, and Artist, but a mom was always there too.)  Being a mom was my biggest goal, and is the best and hardest thing I have ever accomplished.

When I found out that I was pregnant there was nothing comparable in existence to the sheer fulfilling joy that I felt, and still feel.  When I look at my daughter my heart swells and at least once a day I am brought to tears when I realize how smart she is and what a beautiful person she is becoming, as well as what a genuine personality she has.  Unfortunately, that isn’t the only time I am brought to tears during the day.  Sometimes when I crawl in bed at night all the flooding emotion from that day finally breaks down into uncontrollable sobbing.  There are times when I finally get to get a shower uninterrupted for the first time in a week, and the tears roll silently down my face.

I’m not sad, I’m not angry, but I am exhausted.  So much of my time and energy is put into everything and everyone else around me.  I start the day out as a whole person and bit by bit, little by little, I give parts of myself away.  By the time I can muster up the energy to crawl into bed, I am gone.  I am only a shell of a person.  I’ve given everything that I have into everything that I do.  Only in the last month have a started to change.  One day my eyes opened up and I saw that I was slowly tearing myself down and becoming somebody that I never thought I would be.

I was empty and could no longer give myself anything.  If I didn’t have anything to offer myself what could I possibly offer anyone else?  How can I give my daughter the life she deserves day in and day out if I couldn’t even give myself a proportion of me?  So I changed.  I make time for me now, even if it is half an hour at the end of the day to scrub my face, shave my legs, listen to music, and enjoy an uninterrupted shower.  I deserve it.  Sometimes I wonder if I’m the mom that my daughter deserves, and I wonder if I’m enough.  My answer is yes.  A screaming, vibrant, healthy, YES.  I am a mother but I am a person too. I deserve my own time of day, and I am enough.

-Rachel