They Have To Sleep Eventually

**this post was featured on ScaryMommy. Read it here: http://www.scarymommy.com/reality-working-breastfeeding-mom-sucks/ Medicine tells us "Breast is best." Society tells us to say "I am woman, hear me roar". So here we are - Empowered. Educated. Employed. We're making our own money. We have careers. We have husbands. We have wives. We have babies. Sometimes, we do this whole gosh darn thing ON OUR OWN as single moms. And then when we have babies we say "OK,  I want to breastfeed! But...wait...How do I breastfeed if I'm gone 8-12 hours a day away from my baby?! I can't go back to work after 6 weeks! I need more time home.We need to bond. My milk is still regulating and my baby isn't sleeping! My incision isn't healing." The United States heard our cries - loud and clear. But instead of giving us what we wish we could have - a more plausible, realistic maternity leave option - they gave us the opposite. They made it easier for us 

I have this dream. I wake up in a big, white, soft bed, alone. It's the kind of bedding you sink into. It's me- just naturally waking up - not in a panic, not by the annoying alarm on my iPhone, or the buzz of my Fitbit, or my engorged boobs. Not by Mason, or Annabelle, or Zack, or Andrew, or Caleb, or my husband. It's just my brain, well rested & refueled, waking me up. Because, well...because I've slept enough. So I open my eyes, and see the sunshine through the window, just a bit. Not too much, but enough for it to be pleasant. I stretch. And then sit up. Check my phone, no notifications. That means all my people are still alive & well. I am calm. AND RESTED. Coffee magically appears. The remote is within arms reach. I sit up, turn on the TV and flip to, oh...let's see...Bravo? Which "Real Housewives" season is on today? I will sit in that bed and drink coffee & watch Bravo for as long as I choose. Then I'll get up, change into my wo

Edited to add: This post was originally written on June 19th, 2016 I read a blog post regarding step-parents and it summed up how we feel perfectly. "Even though we don’t share blood or name or any part of our DNA, you are a dad all the same. Sometimes our dads come to us when we’re born, and sometimes they come to us later when they find us beaten down on a gravelly path and they decide we’re worth the risk so they bend down and set us right-side up, on our feet again. Thank you for deciding we were worth the risk." That risk. He took it, and the boys and I are so grateful. Parenting is the hardest thing one can do. Parenting pre-teen boys that currently haven't seen or spoke to their "dad" in 4 months and have gotten zero financial help from him in a year, is ROUGH. They're mad. And hurt. And sad. I had one of them randomly start crying in the car, just last week "I wish I had real dad...or that Rob was my real dad" (insert sobbi

So, I don't know why I'm so surprised by the outcome of this election. And I don't even mean that Trump won! ha. I mean that it's completely obliterated some of my relationships. Maybe obliterated is too strong of a word - but it's definitely taken a toll. I watched last nights events unfold in the comfort of my own insane living room. Tuesdays are my days off so I made a point of soaking it all in & really reflecting on how important this election was. I decided to run to my polling place, which is literally 4 blocks from my house - but I ran a route that ended up being 3 miles and some change. While running I heard so many good songs. Songs that I seriously thought were signs of what was to come that evening as the results rolled in. I felt all empowered as I ran. I even ran a bit faster than normal. I really felt confident in my candidate winning.  I kept asking my husband all week "What should we have for dinner on election night? What kind of food