12/28/2025
2025 taught me hard lessons. It wasn’t gentle. My experience of new motherhood with two under two was not soft or supported — it was survival and adrenaline. The year flew by, and I missed moments. I didn’t take the monthly photos. I didn’t have the outfits ready. I didn’t order the cards. I was just trying to stay upright.
This year was navigating motherhood alone while managing court dates and uphill battles. It was coparenting while grieving. Postpartum pain layered with rumors flying, learning how little control we have over others’ perceptions and the narratives they form. It was doctors’ appointments, sicknesses, stress, scary unknown medical tests, hospital trips, and flying through sick days and personal days just to keep everything moving.
It was firsts that didn’t look how I imagined — the kids’ first vacation without their dad, a baby’s first Christmas without their mom. It was packing and unpacking boxes, taking down the nursery I dreamed of building and never putting the name signs back up or the Toy Story rug back down. It was both babies sleeping in one bed. It was deleting a decade of photos, losing a house full of our things, and taking a deep breath while standing back in my childhood bedroom at 33 with two babies.
It was getting my wedding dress and rings back. Signing papers to change my name again. Facing what used to be my biggest fear — the word I never thought I’d say. It was finally seeing someone for who they have always been, after years of blinders and excuses. It was understanding the difference between who someone is behind closed doors and the person the world sees on the outside — the reality of living within four walls versus the image presented beyond them.
And somehow, in the same year, it was also growth.
2025 was running again. One 5K a month and a half marathon on the calendar. It was returning to my work as a therapist and being placed in rooms with clients whose experiences mirrored my children’s and my own in ways that felt almost impossible to ignore. Parallel paths. Perfect timing.
Out of that work came Too Stuffed Teddy — a bear who goes between two homes, holding too many feelings inside until his stuffing begins to come out. A story created to give children language for emotions they aren’t ready to name. A way to safely process grief, change, confusion, and love. A reminder that healing doesn’t always come through explanations — sometimes it comes through stories.
This year gave me a deeper understanding of narcissism, difficult personalities, family systems, ADHD, the brain, and how we respond when overwhelmed. It gave me a firsthand view of the legal system and its flaws. It made me a different kind of advocate. It brought me back to social media with purpose. It brought live music, laughter, and a glass of wine without someone counting them. It brought friends back into my life, strengthened family bonds, and reminded me that love should not make you anxious, small, or afraid.
It removed people who weighed me down and brought me back to God. It pulled me away from toxic systems and protected my children from chaos, lies, and a public narrative that was never ours to carry. It broke cycles. It gave my kids safety, role models, boundaries, and a soft place to land. It showed me who was real, who stayed, and who was never meant to.
When people ask how I am or how I do it, I say I’m good. Surviving. Doing it. As a mom, I don’t have a choice. I have two babies who need me to show up. I feel the weight — I carry it — but there’s no benefit in staying down. I get back up and redirect the energy. Long, slow runs. Therapy sessions where I still get to give back. A place at work that grounds me. Smoothies and real meals instead of running on empty. Vitamins, tea, asking for help, and learning that strength doesn’t mean doing it alone.
Why do I share this? Because I know someone out there is reading this and can resonate. Because maybe it helps someone feel less alone. Because the weight doesn’t have to keep you down forever — it’s okay to shift that energy elsewhere. It’s okay to shed this year, start over, and focus on what’s in the mirror.
This experience changed me. It made me a different person, a different therapist, and gave me a new perspective. The hard days at work are no longer hard. The stress is no longer stressful. It exists, but it doesn’t rattle me the same way. It passes. Because beyond the typical day-to-day is a much bigger battle I’m learning how to navigate — and in comparison, this too shall pass.
Going into 2026, I’m not trying to make things nice. I’m trying to make them make sense. I believe everything happens for a reason — and knowing me, that reason usually pushes me toward the next goal, the next creative endeavor, the next version of myself.
2025 refined me. But out of the hardest year of my life came a story meant to help children and parents better understand the feelings we don’t always have words for — to feel a little less stuffed and a little more understood.
Cheers to closing out the last few days of 2025 — not easily, with doctor’s appointments and testing for my little man — but stepping into 2026 with grace, optimism, and hope for health.✨
