Breakups, career changes, never ending rent increases and suddenly you find yourself at the salon saying

“I don’t know, I just need something different”

Not too long ago I experienced this. After spending the last 5 years with the same dark brunette hair, I had the urge to go lighter, add dimension and just mix it up. Even after I did it and loved it, it was trippy for my brain to see in the mirror, like it wasn’t quite “me”

I don’t think it’s actually our hair we want to look different, it’s that something about us has changed and we want our outer reflection to match that change.

I was 8 months postpartum when I decided to change my hair and while I thought I was out of the initial “Don’t do anything crazy to your hair” stage, what had been happening behind the scenes was so much change, so much evaluating and so much time in limbo.

Everytime I saw my new hair and did a double take I noticed my thoughts strayed from the hair fairly quickly and moved to

“What am I doing with my life”

“What is this new version of myself?”

“Will I ever feel in the groove again?”

There usually isn’t one obvious moment where the old chapter ends and the new one begins which could be why a change in our hair gives us something tangible to point to and say, See? This chapter is different.

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As much as I would love to sit here and preach to you from the other side of “change” I’m still very much in the middle of it. While I do feel like I have more direction I still don’t know exactly how I’m going to get there and that sends my brain into a panic more times than I would like to admit.

Me vs. my brain:

My brain loves a problem it can solve. Give her a checklist, a deadline, a metric, a before-and-after and she’s thrilled. But give her an undefined season of life where the only instruction is “keep going and see what happens”? Absolutely not.

Have you ever noticed when everything seems to be going right you suddenly ask yourself, “Wait, when is the other shoe going to drop?” It’s almost instant that your brain starts thinking of problems that it needs to solve. I’ve realized that when my brain can’t find a real problem to solve, sometimes it creates one.

Am I behind?

Should my business be growing faster?

Should my body look different?

Am I doing enough?

Last week I had a rough mental day. I got very in my head about how far along I was in life and I felt like a failure. Something about this particular day made the voices in my head so loud that it felt like my inner thoughts and dialogue were yelling at me.

So I’ve been thinking, further along in what exactly?

I knew becoming a mom would push me to be more efficient, more vulnerable and more willing to be bold. I think I just thought if I was doing those things I would instantly be rewarded for showing up. It almost felt like an unspoken bargain I had made with myself,

If I do the scary thing, surely life will reward me quickly enough that I won’t have to feel scared for very long.

Somewhere along the way I made a subconscious deal with life…

I will be brave, but you have to show me pretty quickly that being brave was worth it.

I’ll put myself out there, but then I need the numbers to go up.

I’ll work differently, but then I need the money to follow.

The problem isn’t wanting those things. I still want them. The problem is treating their absence as evidence that I’m not becoming fast enough.

While things can change quickly, me showing up once or twice and being vulnerable doesn’t make me someone that can maintain career growth, more money or even a mortgage. And most importantly thinking I should have those things right now is taking me out of the present and to a place of constantly worrying about the future.

Since my mental breakdown (thanks eclipse season) I’ve been asking my husband, “What was your favorite part of the week” or day or weekend and after the fourth time asking him, I realized the biggest contributing factor to my freak out was the fact that I wasn’t where my feet are.

Whenever I’m feeling a little too stuck in the future, I like to tap into my “Vacation self” where I imagine how my “Vacation self” would handle the situation. Instantly I’m way more relaxed because… I’m on vacation! It doesn’t matter if the day doesn’t go exactly as I planned, I have the freedom and choice to do what I want that day.

Now I know what you’re thinking…

“but I don’t have freedom everyday”

The vacation self practice isn’t magic because nothing goes wrong, it’s magic because it gives you permission to be present with where you currently are instead of constantly rushing and stressing about the next thing.

You become aware that the experience is temporary.

We know the vacation will end, so we don’t want to waste a second of it.

But regular life ends too.

Childhood phases end.

New-business energy ends.

Bodies change.

Seasons change.

The in-between eventually becomes the chapter you tell stories about and that’s what makes the “vacation self” practice magic.

Luckily I don’t think you have to stop wanting your dreams just to be present. I don’t need to stop wanting the career growth, the house or the version of myself I’m still becoming. I just don’t want to spend this entire chapter looking over my shoulder for the next one.

Because one day I’ll know how all of this turned out. I’ll know where the business went, how motherhood changed me and who I became on the other side of all this uncertainty.

Right now, I get to live it

So maybe you don’t need to change your hair. Maybe you just need to give your brain a minute to catch up with the person you’ve already started becoming.

Although, for the record, I still really like my highlights.

The instinct is to do something immediately: exfoliate it, dry it out, squeeze it, or throw three acne products on top of it.

Trust me when I say, I’ve been there.

I’ve been there so many times that I became an esthetician.

I know how tempting it is to believe that if you can just find the right product, squeeze the right spot, or exfoliate hard enough, you can fix it by tomorrow. A huge part of learning to manage my own acne was actually learning when to intervene and when my skin needed me to leave it alone.

If I can give you anything in this article, it’s the ability to look at a breakout and know what it actually needs before you touch it. Because treating every breakout the same is usually where we get ourselves into trouble.

If I woke up tomorrow with a breakout and couldn’t get in for a facial, this is exactly what I’d do from the moment I noticed it through the next few days of healing.

Before we touch the breakout...

My first instinct isn’t to attack it. I like to start with a few minutes of gentle lymphatic work.

Your lymphatic system helps move fluid throughout the body and I use gentle lymphatic work here as a way to support my detox pathways & increase fluid movement.

Here’s the quick “Big 6” routine I use before moving on to the skin itself.

*if you are currently having any type of infection like a sinus or tooth infection, skip the lymphatic work*

Now comes the most important part: figuring out what you’re actually looking at.

Because a red, inflamed bump with no visible head needs something very different from a superficial whitehead that’s ready to release.

Before you touch it, figure out which camp your breakout falls into:

• Red + inflamed with no visible head

• Visible whitehead/pustule

• Small clogged bumps without inflammation

• Deep, tender, under-the-skin breakout

Below, I’m walking you through exactly how I’d treat each of these breakouts at home. What I’d use, what I’d leave alone, when I would (and absolutely wouldn’t) extract, plus the 48-hour routine I’d follow to give my skin the best chance to heal.

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With my current business I can share my expertise without sharing my ambition. I can grow my business without ever fully naming what I ultimately want it to become.

Because as long as I never fully name what I want, I never have to risk being seen wanting it and not getting it.

Lately, I’ve realized the only way out of the constant loop of being visible but not

being seen is learning how to see myself first.

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Motherhood changed the way I had always operated. I could no longer hustle my way through uncertainty anymore and the simple answer of “do more, achieve more” no longer worked for me.

My business slowed down and I felt like I wasn’t doing enough when it came to my career. If I wasn’t sleeping or taking care of my baby I was working. I remember countless contact naps where I would be texting clients and editing videos just trying to be as consistent as possible.

This slower season of motherhood made me feel out of control when it came to my job, and I’ll be honest, my worth. Before having a baby I put a lot of my self worth on my career’s success (or failure). More work equaled more success which equaled more evidence of my worth.

Motherhood didn’t change how much time I had each day, but it made my old pattern of work unsustainable. I couldn’t constantly add more hours so I was being forced to ask myself,

“If working harder isn’t the answer, what do I actually want to be working towards?”

And I tried to fight it.

My brain didn’t want to let go of an unsustainable present for an unknown future.

But the uncomfortable truth I’ve come to realize is that you can’t move into something new without letting go of the old. And I knew I wanted a new chapter filled with more depth…

Back in 2021 I had this vision of what I wanted Find how you Fleurish to become. In a time where I was getting curious and figuring out my personal beliefs, I knew that I wanted my business to go deeper than just the surface of the skin. I envisioned a platform where beauty felt playful and instead of fear mongering it became a place to strengthen our intuition and for deeper conversations. In so many ways my esthetics business has been a gateway into this world.

Building an esthetics business felt safe because I had seen it done before. There was a general roadmap I could follow. Admitting that I want to build something more creative and something bigger than just the treatment room feels scary,

Over the past 5 years there has been an underlying sense of embarrassment I’ve felt in having this bigger creative ambition. Not because there is anything embarrassing about wanting it, but because failing at something you’ve openly admitted you want feels a lot more personal.

I don’t want growing this new side of Find How You Fleurish to replace the treatment room. I want it to expand what already happens there. The questions, the conversations, the curiosity, the self-care and everything about beauty that goes deeper than what product you should buy next.

Which brings me back to the question I’ve been asking myself:

Stepping into this next version of my business has required me to see and validate what I want before asking anyone else to validate it. It has also required me to admit what I actually want to build without first needing proof that it will work.

I don’t think being seen has much to do with how much you share.

I think it’s about learning how to be honest with yourself. Seeing the good, the bad, the desires and the ambition, and not feeling like you need to run from any of it.

Maybe being seen isn’t about revealing more of yourself to everyone else. Maybe it’s about hiding less from yourself.

I have no idea what my career will look like in five years, but I’ve finally realized that I don’t need to know in order to take the next step.

And right now, that next step looks like opening up and sharing a dream I’ve kept to myself for far too long.

Maybe being honest about what you want, and why you’ve been scared to say it out loud, is one of the most radical ways we can learn to see ourselves.

So even though I’m slightly unsure how this next chapter will unfold, I’m willing to take the leap and let myself find out.

March tends to be the time where I regain motivation to set my mind to something and accomplish it.  But my brain is permanently altered from living in a time like ours so I need a plan that’s a little more fun than checklists, daily to do’s and depriving myself.  

Anything I have accomplished has come from being consistent and just showing up….and then showing up again and again.  

Whether it was building my business, learning my craft, or even just getting through a hard season of life. 

When making goals I think we focus too much on how we think it will look instead of what we would feel like if we embodied the version of ourselves that we want to become. So lately, instead of trying to force consistency, I’ve been asking:

How do I make it feel better? Softer? Even… desirable?

Here’s a few ways I’ve been making consistency feel like something I actually want to do. 

Create a character 

I like to imagine that I’m playing a role in a movie, what would she dress like? What would her mornings look like? What does she do in her free time? I like to imagine my character as a 90’s butter mom who loves to cook and host the best dinner parties. This instantly puts in you a position of BEING the person you want to be instead of feeling like she's some distant version that is only attainable after a long time of accomplishing your daily checklist.  Instead you’re doing this “checklist” because that's what SHE would do on a normal day.  (SHE being the person you want to be) The routine isn’t something I have to earn. It’s something that naturally belongs to the version of me I’m playing.  

Simplify 

In a world full of constantly shifting attention spans don't forget it's incredibly chic to only focus on one thing at a time.  Dare I say it's even sexy! I say this as someone who loves to come up with 20 new things I want to be good at, all at once and then inevitably burns out by day three. Sticking to one goal is better than overwhelming yourself and giving up on the other 20.  Consistency is only attainable if it isn’t overwhelming.  In other words, you don't need more goals, you need more devotion to the goals you’ve already made.  

It doesn’t need to be so serious 

I think this might be where we lose ourselves the most. We take something we want… and turn it into something we dread.We default to the most extreme, least enjoyable version of growth thinking making it harder will make it more effective—but most of the time it just makes it unsustainable.

For example if your goal is to eat healthier, you could go the route of only eating grilled chicken and baked sweet potato OR you could once a week spend time learning a new recipe that focuses on whole foods.  Turn on a fun playlist, light a candle and ENJOY what you're actually working towards. Consistency isn’t a punishment, it's supposed to be active participation in the life you want to live.  

Consistency has never really been the problem. We know how to show up. We just don’t always like the way it feels when we do.

And maybe that’s the shift: not forcing yourself to be more disciplined— but creating a life that feels good enough to return to.

Again and again.

Because of that, I’ve been thinking a lot about how our mind can contribute to our own suffering. As helpful as it can be, our mind tries to make a problem out of everything. That’s part of its job, to keep us alive and to solve problems. But when there isn’t a real problem to solve, it likes to spice things up and create a few.

I’m not trying to say that our problems aren’t real, but over the past few weeks I’ve found myself asking, Is this actually a problem, or am I just making it one?

A lot of my “problems” recently have come from spending too much time in my head and not enough time in my body. I’ve talked about this before, but for a long time I’ve thought of my brain and my body as separate things. My body felt like the enemy, the thing standing between me and the life I wanted to live.

On Sunday I was having a hard body image day. No matter how much I tried to rationally talk myself out of it, my body just wasn’t having it. I felt sad, overwhelmed, and like I could cry at any moment.

I held it together for a while, but during a nap with my son the weight of it all finally caught up with me. As I lay there I started having a conversation with my body, and before long I found myself apologizing.

I apologized for hating my body.

For seeing it as the enemy all these years.

For not caring for it as well as I could have.

My body has carried me through every experience I’ve ever lived in this life, and in that moment I felt sad that I hadn’t treated it more kindly considering it allows me to live and experience my life.

I have PCOS, and while that diagnosis was incredibly helpful when I finally got answers, sometimes it adds extra layers to the story I tell myself about my body.

As I was venting to my husband I said, “I’m just so tired of feeling like my body is working against me.”And honestly, it has felt that way for as long as I can remember.

That statement can be partially true. From a scientific and biological perspective, there are aspects of PCOS that can make it harder for my body to function optimally.

But it isn’t just my body.

It’s also me.

I work against my body when I view it as the enemy instead of supporting it. I work against it when I spend too much time in my mind and not enough time listening to my body, my intuition, and what it’s trying to tell me.

Maybe it hasn’t only been my body working against me. Maybe I’ve also played a role in that distancing too.

While I do believe that sometimes you’re simply going through a hard season, I also think there are a few things we can do to minimize the discomfort. So today I wanted to share a few things that have been helping me get out of my head and back into my body.

Give shape to your emotions

When I start to feel overwhelmed, I close my eyes and try to feel where the emotion is sitting in my body. I try to describe it — does it have a shape? A color? A texture?

Sometimes making our emotions feel tangible and something we can visualize can help us move through them.

Once I’ve defined it, I talk to it. Does it want to be let go? Or does it still want to be apart of me? Whatever the answer I thank it for everything it’s done for me, because ultimately our brains are just trying to keep us safe.

Solidify a morning and evening routine

This doesn’t need to be complicated or take two hours. When something new enters our life, our brain is constantly trying to determine if we can survive in this new reality. It sounds dramatic, but it’s true.

Even positive changes like a new job, a new house, or higher income can make our brain feel uncertain.

Having a simple morning and evening routine helps remind your brain that not everything is changing and that you’re safe.

Here’s my routine if you need some ideas.

Morning

• Take medicine

• Tongue scrape & brush teeth

• Put in contacts

Evening

• Brush teeth

• Wash face

• Red light therapy

• Finish skincare

Legs up the wall

Not only are you getting lymphatic and circulation benefits, but it’s also not the most comfortable position to scroll on your phone. It creates a little bit of time to just be present

Move

This one isn’t groundbreaking, but move your body in any way you can. Stretch, walk, laugh, dance, or do an actual workout.

Sometimes the best thing we can do for our mind is simply get out of it.

I’m slowly realizing that feeling at home in my body isn’t a one time realization, it’s a practice.   Some days I’ll do better at it than others But when I pause long enough to listen, my body is usually trying to help me, not hurt me. It’s trying to bring me back to the present moment, back to what’s actually real instead of what my mind has imagined.

So I’d love to hear what are some of your favorite ways to get out of your head and back into your body?

Thanks to my new current obsession, “Love story: John F. Kennedy Jr. & Carolyn Bessette” I, like many others, have found myself reminiscing on the 90’s.  

Matte skin, overplucked brows, low rise jeans, ultra thin silhouettes and lip gloss that smelled like warm vanilla.

Beauty in the 90’s was full of extremes. You had the grunge era, the glam era and somewhere in the middle you had that very particular energy of CBK. It was effortless but intentional. Hair slightly undone, matte skin but fresh, & brows barely there. 

No matter which side of the beauty spectrum you fell on, one thing was always in… clear, beautiful skin.  

And what was the answer to clear skin? In the 90’s, the harsher skincare felt, the more we assumed it was working.

What 90’s beauty got right:

Simple routines: Most people had three products at most. A cleanser, a toner that probably stung a little, and a moisturizer.

The beauty industry hadn’t yet convinced us we needed an entire shelf of products to have good skin.

Natural textures: Skin showed through makeup. Freckles weren’t something you tried to erase and foundation wasn’t expected to look airbrushed. Beauty felt more individual in this way 

Beauty was playful: Glitter, body shimmer, frosted eyeshadow, flavored lip gloss. Beauty felt experimental and fun.

Our world was newly digital

It’s funny to imagine what celebrities' pre–red carpet beauty routines looked like back then.  I assume a lot of people were using St, Ives apricot scrub, Astringent toners and lots of benzoyl peroxide.  Can you picture a 90’s style “Get ready with me” Vogue segment? 

The 90’s was a period where it was believed, If it's burning it must be working. The philosophy behind skincare in the 90’s was simple: oil was the enemy.

Acne? Dry it out. Shiny skin? Strip it away. Texture? Scrub it smooth.

And to be fair, protecting our skin barrier was not common knowledge so what else are you going to do when you see a big breakout pop up that wasn’t there the night before? Attack duh! 

What we’ve learned: 

Over the last few decades, our understanding of the skin has changed dramatically. Instead of fighting against our skin, we’ve started learning how to support it. We now know that our skin barrier plays a huge role in everything from acne to sensitivity to overall skin health. We’ve learned that consistency is key and you don't have to use the harshest, most aggressive product to see results. You just need to stick with it.  

Ingredients like ceramides, glycerin and hyaluronic acid help reinforce the barrier instead of disrupting it.

When it comes to exfoliation, I’m here to tell you there is an exfoliant for everybody.You don’t need to go straight for a retinol. Instead, if you’re new to exfoliation consider something like mandelic acid. Mandelic has a larger molecular size, which means it absorbs more slowly into the skin.

You still get consistent exfoliation just without the intensity that often comes with stronger actives.

Beauty in the 90’s didn’t just apply to our faces.It also came with a very specific body attached to it. Ultra thin silhouettes, low rise jeans and the “heroin chic” aesthetic created an incredibly narrow definition of beauty.

This was a stark shift from to 80’s and for some it was showcasing new unique beauty and giving space to new talent. For many others it was the first time people thought about their bodies as something that needed to be managed. Looking back, there’s an interesting parallel between how the skin was treated and the way we treated our bodies. (and honestly, how many of us still treat our skin and bodies today)

Both were something to control. Something to discipline. Something to perfect.

What we’re leaving behind: 

With everything we now know, skincare no longer has to be harsh to be effective. Clear skin doesn’t have to come from stripping your barrier or picking away at every clogged pore.  

And beauty as a whole doesn’t have to come from controlling every detail of how we look.

The 90’s gave us some iconic beauty moments and taught us how to be more playful with fashion and beauty. It also started the shift of how society viewed beauty and gave many of us the first quiet lessons about how we thought we were supposed to look.

The beauty of growing up is realizing we don’t have to keep every lesson we were given.

We can keep the lip gloss, the minimal makeup and the effortless aesthetic. But the harsh skincare and impossible expectations? Those are things we can finally leave behind.

Xx 

Rylli 

While postpartum adds another layer of complexity, it has also added a surprising amount of compassion. I remember the first time I looked in the mirror after delivery and feeling so swollen & puffy wondering if the swelling would ever go down and also feeling so empowered that we made it through and that I now had this perfect baby.  

Lately I’ve been wondering when I started pitting myself against my body. Because that’s what it is, isn’t it? We treat our body like the enemy. Like it’s the reason we don’t have the attention we want, or the confidence we think we’d finally feel if things just looked different.

I don’t remember the exact moment it happened. I just know one day my body stopped being something I lived in and became something I micro-managed.

There’s a reason we don’t feel good when we’re not healthy,  but it’s not because we are any less worthy. It’s a signal that something is off. The tricky part is how easy it is to pendulum swing: from obsessing over how we look to ignoring signals entirely because we’re trying to “love our body no matter what.”

When I feel myself teetering between those extremes, I ask:

What would help my body feel a little better in an hour?

Is it rest?

Is it walking?

Maybe it’s a good cry.

That question has helped me shift out of punishment and into support. 

Women have been stretching, changing, & shrinking themselves for centuries. Through media and our environment, we’ve learned that our body is the problem — instead of a teammate trying to tell us what isn’t working anymore.

So in the process of relearning that my body is actually on my team, here’s what I’ve been practicing:

Chewing my food longer — I’m trying to experience this while I’m eating

Walking — not to burn calories, but to soften my nervous system and let ideas land.

Dancing — eyes closed, no mirror, remembering that movement is expression, not performance.

Looking at my baby’s tiny fingers and remembering mine once looked the same.

Getting off my phone.

Drawing.

Baking something for the experience — and the taste.

Romanticizing my body care - favorites linked here!

Being five months postpartum feels tricky. It’s only been five months, and yet I have such strict expectations for myself at five months. Five months feels like no time at all  and somehow like I should already be “back.”

But I don’t believe in bouncing back. I don’t want to go backwards. I believe pregnancy and postpartum are meant to change us. I will never be who I was before I got pregnant and that’s a good thing.

When those strict expectations creep in, I remind myself I’m not returning to a former version of me. I’m becoming a new one. And becoming doesn’t happen overnight.

I wouldn’t say my body and I are the best teammates yet. But here’s to another week of relearning that my body is not the enemy. It’s where I live. And I don’t need to fight my own home anymore.  

I’d love to hear what you like to do when you’re trying to get out of your mind and back into your body!

Xx

Rylli

All natural

Botox & filler

Aging “gracefully”

“Clean”

“Medical grade” 

The message is subtle but constant: choose your side.

And to be honest, choosing a side sounds really boring.  

One benefit of being a people pleaser for most of my life is the ability I have to see both sides.  I like living in the gray area and I think there's a lot we can learn in the in-between.  Our modern world pushes extremes; our algorithms reward bold, polarizing takes and divisive marketing makes us feel like we have to choose a side.  It feels like aging is either sacred or a constant problem to be solved.   

Obviously we all have our preferences and that's great if you’ve found what works for you.  However, the reality is, skincare is individual, not something that can be streamlined.  There can be a lot of buzz around specific products but those products may not be incredible for your skin in particular.  

Acne-prone skin may need more exfoliation & barrier support.  Someone who struggles with rosacea will most likely need gentle, anti-inflammatory products. 

There is no grand hierarchy when it comes to ingredients, just compatibility.    

Now if you’re finding yourself questioning, “why do I even care about this?”. I’ll tell you exactly why you care. We live in a world where appearances matter, and as much as we have evolved as a society it’s still something that affects us in our day to day.  Most of the time I don’t even notice when I’m thinking about how others view me, it starts with me adjusting my clothing, fixing my hair, and then the intrusive thoughts come in. 

* Cue the mental spiral* 

Very quickly beauty can become fear based and our egos can take the lead.  When our ego is in charge…

We feel like there's not enough to go around 

We feel like we're behind and that we’ll never catch up

Our beauty becomes our identity, it stops being playful and starts being our survival

The quickest way I get neutral when these feelings arise is by getting curious.

Instead of thinking, “They’re just lucky,” or “They must have endless money to spend on their skin,” I shift the lens: “Wow, their skin is beautiful and I’m noticing it. That must mean I want that for myself too.”

One of my favorite reframes when the green-eyed monster comes to visit is: If they have it, it must be possible for me too.  

I don’t believe in putting our fate in other people’s hands, acting as if there’s no way out of our current circumstances. Sometimes it can feel validating to see things as “happening to you” but that gets old quickly.  

Everything is a mirror. The jealousy you feel when you see someone with the car, the house, or the skin you want? What if instead of viewing those things as proof you’re behind, you view it as proof that it’s available? Maybe it’s the universe, God, or the divine showing you what’s possible.

When you shift from comparison to curiosity, envy softens into possibility. And possibility feels attainable.

Aging is not the enemy and neither are you for wanting to slow it down.

We put a lot of  “shoulds” on ourselves, for really no good reason other than it’s what those around us think we should do.  Neutrality doesn’t mean indifference,  it means having freedom from shame in either direction

Life is not the same in every season so why would the support you give yourself look the same? By removing the shame you develop more autonomy and can actually feel empowered to change your mind based on what is currently happening and what support you actually need right now. 

You have the right to change your mind, again, and again, and again.  Skincare and life are meant to be FUN! We’ve become so serious about it all and I swear that is aging us way worse than the lack of any product or service.  

Maybe your happy place looks like: 

Barrier focused skincare + occasional active 

Natural oils & balms + a few scientifically studied ingredients 

Sculptra + PRF 

Gua Sha, lymphatic drainage + some lip filler 

You get to evolve. You get to change your mind. You get to choose what feels aligned in this season and then choose something different in the next.

Because in the end, skincare isn’t a moral identity. It’s support. And you are allowed to support yourself in whatever way feels honest, empowered, and true to you. And remember, you are not betraying yourself when you change, you are responding to who you’re becoming.

Xx

Rylli

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The thing I feared most during pregnancy wasn’t labor, it was postpartum.

I thought if I could control the birth, I could control how I entered motherhood

Leading up to my delivery I never in my wildest dreams thought I would have an emergency C-section (who actually thinks they will have an emergency c-section???) But in my head it just was not even a possibility, my mom never had a c-section, my sister never had a c-section and although c-sections aren’t necessarily genetic I felt like that gave me a leg up for some reason.  Another factor was I just wasn’t letting my brain go there, it wasn’t in the cards for me so much so that I didn’t really ever think about it.  

The week of my delivery I was having contractions all week, they were very mild and didn’t really progress to anything but contractions none the less.  I was doing the miles circuit, stretching, walking, anything to help get the baby into a good position and ready for delivery.  Once the contractions finally progressed and got more intense I was so ready, SO ready to embrace all of it and have a baby!! 

Once I was at the hospital my midwife checked me and I was 100% effaced and dilated to a 4; another reason why a C-section never even crossed my mind as a possibility, I was progressing! As the day continued my baby’s heartrate would drop on and off, enough that they were monitoring it closely.  

By the time I was dilated to an 8 baby boy was having a rough time and we were trying everything….and I do mean everything to help calm him down.  Turns out the little guy was face up and stuck, two things you do not want to hear when you are 8cm dilated.  And yet, I was so not even stressed about it at first, again a c-section was literally NEVER on my radar.  It just simply was not going to happen.  After some fancy positioning and a hand in places I never imagined one being in I was at a point where I could push and we decided to try and get him out since he wasn’t handling labor well.  It was time to get baby out.  

And by no surprise he did not budge and he was not doing well. I was rushed into the OR and this is where it all hit me, “Oh my gosh I’m actually going to have a C-section”, “I just want the baby here”, “I never saw this coming in my wildest dreams”, “I don’t care what my delivery looks like as long as he gets here”.  After some back and forth (forever grateful to my midwife for literally trying everything to help get him here without cutting me open) It was time.  I had my c-section, baby boy came out screaming and thankfully adjusted very well to being on the outside.  

While yes my recovery was definitely more difficult than I had hoped it would be, I was shocked at how well I have recovered so far.  I was amazed at how good I felt only 5 days post birth. And I was even more amazed at how empowered I felt as a mom.  One of the things I was most scared of happened, and I actually handled it better than I thought I could.  Things did not go according to plan because I realized I wasn’t the only one that was a part of the plan.  My baby had needs, he had been stuck for days, he needed to get out, he was stressed and no amount of stretching or walking was going to change that.  

And honestly that's motherhood sometimes, you can do all the prep in the world and try to do things in a way that would technically be better but sometimes that’s just not what your baby needs.  

So much of motherhood has been releasing my ego, putting my son and his needs first and pivoting.  On the days where things aren’t going according to plan and I feel like I'm “failing” I remember my c-section and it quickly reminds me that things don't have to go perfect to have a good experience. And maybe that’s a reminder we all need more often, life doesn’t go according to plan but that allows us to be surprised by our strength and resilience.

As I’m in my postpartum bubble, picking back up the pieces of myself I find myself giving a lot more grace to  where I’m at.  I feel more empowered to decide what pieces of the old me I still want to bring with me into this new chapter and which ones I’m okay with leaving behind.  

Because at the end of the day, we’re not in complete control and thank goodness for that. We grow so much more when we are surprised along the way