Coming back to me

      My favorite thing about blogging is that sometimes, people rock you.  Their words stop you in your tracks.  That happened last week.  Most days I just pour out my heart, share a little bit of my world, and sometimes I think, it's a lonely place to be.  Then I get a comment like this, and it reminds me that I'm not alone, and the feelings I have, the sometimes heavy ache in my heart isn't just me.  So with that post in mind, and this comment, I write about what it was like when I lost myself.  When I just knew that person had left me, right along with my  swollen pregnant belly and my pre mommy sanity.  However she never left, she was still in there,  fighting, and on her return better than ever.   I don't remember when it happened.  I don't remember the day, or even the month, but at some point in my early mothering days, I looked in the mirror and saw a stranger.  The girl with zest, moxie and motivation was long gone.  In her place just a shell.  A fat, exhausted, sad, angry, and ashamed shell.  Where did Megan go?  And why did she runaway and leave me here, alone and struggling?   What I didn't realize was that she was still there.  Under the layers of post partum depression, baby weight, sleepless nights, and 3 day old unwashed hair was that person formerly known as Megan.  She was just different.  She wanted different things.  She needed different things.  She now lead an entirely different life.  What I didn't know was that all of these things were ok.  The struggle with motherhood, the struggle with being a wife, the struggle to just be me.  It was all ok, and normal.  A sleepless baby, boobs that just wouldn't make milk, showers long forgotten, it was all ok.  But at the time it wasn't ok with me.    So with every glance into my own brown eyes, I saw failure, I saw ugly, I saw pathetic.    And I sure as hell didn't see me.   I'd like to tell you that I snapped out of it.  That I found myself again, quickly and lovingly, but that would be a lie.  Because it took months.  With every victory, I peeled back a layer.   Six hours of sleep, peel.  A baby on formula exclusively, peel.  Jeans that fit again, peel.  Layers peeled to lighten the load.  My friend who lovingly understood my despair, her kind words of reassurance, her admittance that motherhood was indeed a hard and sometimes thankless job, peeled back more layers.  A night out with the Hubbs, turning 30, laughing at myself and my missteps in motherhood, peel.   Then, having another baby peeled back the final layer.  Because the mistakes I made, they were rectified.  The fumbles of the previous years were now laughable.  The sleepless nights were cherished because I knew they wouldn't last forever, they wouldn't even last a moment.    What I know now is that I was always there.  Hiding, fighting, and finally making my way back to me.  The layers were now just scars, quickly fading, of a battle fought.  I was stronger, in body and spirit.  I was happier.  I was wiser.  And I was finally in a place to admit I was a good mother.  Hell, I was a great mother.  Just not perfect, because life is not perfect.  Life is life, and it's good, and blessed, and happy and loving.  Just like motherhood.   So no matter your battle.  Weight loss, grief, motherhood, divorce.  You are still you.  Under all the layers.  Even when you feel you are losing the battle, you are not.  Some days are harder than others, some days are over before they start.  You've got to crawl through it, walk through it, run through it, and eventually you will get to the other side.  You'll be stronger, you'll stand taller, and you will look at yourself and say,   Hello old friend, welcome back.