One Year of Blogging

A year ago, today, I posted my first little blurb on my blog. I was very much pregnant and feeling very much alone as well as very much uncertain of what was to come. It is funny how something like typing away at my computer has helped me in so many ways during the last year.

For one, it got me through the rest of my pregnancy without going totally bonkers. I was able to vent and wonder and sometimes just ramble about everything that was going on before, during, and after Raegan's birth; I needed this space to sort it all out and keeping an audience in mind has always helped me organize my thoughts when writing. 

For another, blogging has helped me realize that I am not alone in this life or this journey of being a mama. By sharing my own stories and thoughts, and reading or hearing your responses to them, I've learned that so much of what I'm experiencing (good and otherwise) is universal; I take great joy and comfort in that.

So what I would really like to say to those of you reading this is a heartfelt Thank You. Thank You for making me feel like my words and my stories matter. Thank you for allowing me to brag every now and then on my beautiful babies and for giving me the space to doubt and question my role as their mama. I believe that I've become a better, more confidant parent because I've allowed myself to ask those questions and feel those doubts; you've helped me get there by withholding judgment and offering support and suggestions when I needed them.

When I started, I never thought I'd have this much to say (almost 90 posts?!) or that people would actually bother to read it (over 4,600 page views?! Seriously?!). But now I look forward to finding new stories and moments to record here. In the immediate, these writings are for me and for you. In the long term, they are for my children. I want them to know just how much thought (and joy and humor and sometimes even a bit of angst) their mama put in as they were growing. Seeing as I'm still growing too, I don't think we'll have a problem generating more blog material any time soon!