I’m PREGNANT!!!
I am so very happy to announce that my amazing fiance and I are expecting our first child!
With this extremely happy news, comes an equal amount of fear.
While it would be easy to share all the very exciting things about being pregnant (like the tiny little cowboy boots I found at a thrift store for a STEAL!) I want to talk about the tough things. There are many mom blogs and resources that share the beauty that is motherhood. (As I come across them, I will share them in the comments.)
For now though, I want to talk about the number one concern I have with being pregnant and still working through my depression.
That fear is…
The fear that I will pass on my depression to my children.
(stay tuned for a post about my second fear of how my depression may affect my children)
I am absolutely petrified that any type of negative emotion I feel while I am pregnant, or my brain chemistry in general will affect my growing baby. BUT, I am not living in that fear. I’ll say that again for the moms in the back!
I AM NOT LIVING IN MY FEAR!
and neither should you!
Fear has a purpose. That purpose is to alert us to the dangers or obstacles that we may face up ahead. Fear is a very useful and practical thing if we let it be.
It is not useful once we start to let the fear control us.
Now I could have run away from being a mom. I could be curled in a mental ball imagining all the struggles I’ve felt with regards to my depression.
OR
I could recognize that this may be an obstacle in the future and look at my life (an honest look) and use this opportunity to not only prepare for this possibility, but also take measures to prevent it or prevent the worst outcomes (the one your brain loves to cook up). I can take a renewed sense of vigor for working on my mental health and become an even stronger version of myself.
I think often, people think of fear as this entity that can’t be tamed. And they feed this little warning sign until it becomes the monster they thought it was in the beginning. The secret, is that if you took that fuel and used it to grow yourself instead of the fear monster, you would be big enough to stop that monster from being in existence and affecting you or your life.
So take back control from your fears and let’s continue to grow.