Author: Kaylin Stravalli

So This is 30

Posted on by Kaylin Stravalli

As my birthday approached, I did a lot of late-night thinking rather than sleeping. Of course, those midnight contemplations were mostly due to the tiny human who was waking up every night around 2 o’clock to nurse.

Either way, it gave me a good amount of time to take stock of my life. There have been a few seismic shifts recently, and this sort of introspection always seems necessary for me to process and move forward.

I felt – and still feel – a rising sense of urgency to get my act together.

Am I putting enough money away in savings, my 401k, and my investment accounts?

Should I pay off my car or trade it in for something new with warranty to better fit car seats and our budget?

Should we sell our house and move? Where would we even want to live? What areas have the best schools? Could we find an even more budget-friendly house and still have the things we want and need in a home?

How can I write more, make more money, and contribute more to our household? How can I do all of this and be the kind of woman, mama, and wife I want and strive to be?

The list of questions went (okay, goes) on and on as I tried to figure out at least some of these things in order to put my family and myself in a better position now and in the future.

My twenties were a decade of heartbreak, fun, growth, fresh starts, new opportunities, self-improvement, and self-discovery. I met some of my very best friends, learned a lot about life, love, and myself. I traveled, met the man who became my husband, changed jobs, moved, got married, and had my first baby.

There were bumps along the way that often felt like roadblocks. They forced me to turn corners and take a few detours I never anticipated; yet they eventually brought me to a better place. Come to find out, turning a corner (or two or three) in the “wrong” direction only to find more of the unexpected actually led me to the life I’d always dreamed of and made it all worth it.

Of course, hindsight is 20/20.

Now I find myself – ten years later – married with a baby, a dog, and a house, living in the city I’d always wanted. I’m dreaming more, bigger, deeper.

Is my life perfect? Hardly. I’m worrying over a whole new set of issues.

Am I truly lucky and blessed to have the life I have? Absolutely. I’m working extremely hard to remember that every day.

Do I still grieve (and maybe even throw myself a pity party) when something doesn’t turn out the way I had always planned, hoped, and dreamed? You bet your sweet little tooshie.

However, I don’t grieve the end of my twenties. I am looking forward to what the next ten years have in store for me and for my family. No doubt, it will be a decade of immense growth and change that will leave me staggered by how different my life looks from what it is today.

But today? Today I find myself saying, “So this is thirty” and taking a look at what that means.

It’s smiles and snuggles first thing in the morning.

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It’s a topknot, a cozy robe, and jammies that I realized were backwards and inside out only after I took the picture. Then I laughed and thought, “Whoops! Oh well. That just about sums my life up in one picture,” and started mentally drafting this post.

It’s asking for a nap for my birthday and truly wanting it more than anything else.

It’s career moves and all kinds of hustling.

It’s trying to find a work-life balance – whatever that means.

It’s knowing I’m a kid only at heart.

It’s a lot of things; but if nothing else, it is the beginning of a new stage of life.

I am looking out at the next ten years and can only imagine the joys and heartaches they will bring. I can also only hope and pray that the joy far outweighs the pain.

Bring it on, 30. Let’s see what you and your 9 other friends have in store for me.

 

I Think of You: A Note from a New Mama

Posted on by Kaylin Stravalli

In the past three months, my life has forever changed. It has been a dream come true … and it has also been one of the most difficult times – mentally and emotionally – of my life.

While I am typically pretty good at keeping in touch with friends and family, in these past weeks, people have probably wondered what world I’ve been living in because it certainly wasn’t my usual one.

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They’d be right. I’m living in a whole new world in the white house at 6729. It consists of my husband, our dog Frank, one tiny human whom I love more than life itself, and me.

We have all been adjusting to our new life, and, for the most part, it has been an easy adjustment to make.

I have always wanted to be a mama. I’ve spent my whole life dreaming of it, watching and learning from other mamas before me, and figuring out what kind of mama I wanted to be when – God willing – the time came.

So when we found out I was pregnant, my heart was overjoyed. My prayers had been answered. My dream was coming true. When our daughter was born, it was like one giant puzzle piece in my life and in my heart fell into place. I slipped into my new role like a new dress tailor made for me. It fit perfectly and felt wonderful, powerful, and joyful.

But as my husband and I say, “It’s not all puppy dogs and rainbows.” First, labor and delivery is no joke. Second, recovery is no picnic either. It hurts. You’re sore. You’re tired (read: even more likely, you’re flat out exhausted). Not to mention, there’s a tiny human who is completely dependent on you for love and survival.

There are no breaks.

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Motherhood is diaper changes and nonstop nursing and a nap here and there – if you’re lucky. It’s learning her cues, so when feeding time comes, she’s not already ticked and starving.

It’s figuring out which diapers give the most coverage and the least likelihood of a blowout or diaper rash.

It’s tummy time – an activity she didn’t mind it in the beginning and now hates. That means you now have to find creative ways of getting that time in to build her muscles, so she can hit that next milestone and prevent a flat head.

It’s waking up at all hours of the night, then truly waking up sometimes and realizing you’d picked up and nursed your baby in your sleep. You know this because you’re holding her and your breast is out and near her little mouth like she’d passed out after she got her fill. It’s both amazing and a bit scary.

It’s learning that my body was built for this. I can survive on little to no sleep; finally, all those years of having trouble sleeping are paying off! My body can produce enough milk to feed my baby (something I know not everyone can do, which makes me extra grateful that I can), and I love being able to breastfeed her. My body handled pregnancy, labor, and delivery like a champ and has recovered quickly and well. For all of this, I am forever thankful.

It’s watching for signs of postpartum depression, so I monitored my mental and emotional state.

I also sat up thinking and praying and planning. I multitasked and kept the house (decently) clean. I took care of and made sure to give Frank love. I navigated my relationship and the changes that come with now being a wife and a mother. I racked my brain for any and everything that could be done from home to bring in money for the household, so I could stay home and be with my daughter because the thought of someone else watching her makes me cry and feel physically ill.

Through all of this, I have thought of my friends and family with whom I am typically good at keeping in touch. Lately, I haven’t been so good.

You may have wondered where I went. You may have been gracious enough to know that I was busy trying to learn how to be a mama and take care of a tiny human and just needed time to figure it all out.

You may have been worried about me, about how I was doing, about how I was dealing with everything, about how I’d do when maternity leave ended. (In fairness, I was asking myself all of these same questions.)

You may have thought I was too busy to think of you.

Well … some of all of that is true and warranted.

You may have asked yourself these questions but kept them in your heart; or you may have let it go long enough and checked in on me and asked – even if I didn’t always give you the full truth in return.

Know this, though, I did and do think of you. It’s just that:

  • It was at 2 a.m., I was up to nurse, and it wasn’t an appropriate time to call or text.
  • I got a free minute and a free hand, got ready to call you, and the dog needed to go out, the baby woke up again and needed fed, and/or I needed to go to the bathroom, brush my teeth and hair, and shower – or it was never going to happen.
  • I had just enough time to get a couple of house chores done and they were all loud. A noisy call would be hard and rude; and texting would interrupt the workflow too much, so I wouldn’t finish what I needed to get done.
  • I wanted to talk to you but knew I’d break down if I heard your voice.
  • Or you’d ask about my return to work, and I couldn’t bear thinking about it or giving an answer that wasn’t even true just to cut off that line of dialogue.
  • I wanted to see you but knew you’d take one look at me and know I was struggling. I couldn’t handle the pity or an offer to help when I knew you already had a full plate of your own. Plus, other people trying to care for my baby stressed me out more than it helped.
  • I also couldn’t bear breaking down and spilling my struggles because they were things I needed to work out for myself and with my husband; and it felt like a betrayal of my relationship to talk to anyone else about them. The guilt of that was one more thing I could not add to my load.
  • I thought of you, but it was 2 a.m. again and not an appropriate time to call or text.

In the past three months, my life has forever changed. It has been a dream come true, and it has also been one of the most difficult times of my life. I may have been busy navigating my new norm but know I thought of you often. I just wasn’t always able to reach out like I would have before – for a number of reasons, none of which were really about you.

Thank you to those who have given me the grace of space and understanding and to those who have broken through with a message you couldn’t have known was so perfectly timed.