Hi Friends! My name is Jenna, I am fun-loving anxious mess who loves to calm the nerves with good friends and a cold cocktail. I have two kids, my son is 7 years old and my daughter is 4, she was born in 2020 just two weeks after lockdown. After a stressful and anxiety-filled maternity leave, I decided to leave my job in Corporate America, to stay home with my “littles”. I was excited and relieved to be leaving my 9-5, and focus more on my family and the adorable hugs and smiles I missed every day while at work. Little did I know, that behind the scenes of all that amazing and fierce maternal love, I was feeling so overstimulated and a whole lot of anxiety!
While I was pregnant with my first, a coworker approached me to check in and wish me good luck. Before we parted ways, she said to me “it will be crazy sometimes, but just remember, you WILL survive this.” At the time, it felt dramatic and we both laughed as we walked back to our desks, but this became a mantra in some of my darkest days as a new mom. The sleepless nights, the struggles with nursing, the loneliness, the screaming cries that were so difficult to diagnose, the illnesses and the strained relationships – I told myself, “I will survive this!”. And that is how “Mama Will Survive” was born.
It took me a while to find myself as a stay-at-home mom, and quite frankly, I think I am still looking! BUT after a couple years of loneliness and craving relationships, I found amazing friendships and comradery. My kids introduced me to a whole world of anxious moms, just hoping to vent, connect and lift each other up! I want to share my experiences, I want to lift you all up, and I want to be a light for moms struggling with all the anxieties that come along with motherhood. I will share what got me through the toughest times, the struggles I still face as the tides of being a mom are always changing, and show you that you are not alone in this beautiful community of anxious moms!
My Top 5 Anxiety Triggers
This blog will focus primarily on anxiety and the triggers that will set mom’s on fire, and how we cope and make the most of those moments. With that being said, I find it only appropriate that I share what triggers my anxiety and hopefully some of you can relate. Anxiety is a big part of who I am, the stem of a lot of my jokes, and also at the center of all of my struggles. I take medication and go to therapy regularly, but there are some things that really set me over the edge and test my strength – I go through my top 5 below.
- Illness: This is probably my biggest trigger as a mom! When I was working (pre-covid times), illness would cause me so much stress because I felt extremely consumed with what I was going to miss at work, how I would juggle having my son at home and work, and how sick was my son going to get? It is just as bad as a SAHM, but the concerns don’t include an outside work agenda. Every scenario would run through my head…
- When do I take him to the doctor?
- Should I give him motrin?
- Will he wake up in the middle of the night?
- Should I reschedule my meetings? Do I need to take the day off? How many days is this going to cause me to miss?
- Does he have a fever? Does my thermometer even work?
- The list goes on…and on…
- Playgrounds: This is a two-fold trigger: the germs and the fear of injury. Being afraid of heights, I sometimes fear them falling from the slide, or missing a step, or falling straight down the rock wall. But additionally, they get SO DIRTY and I get consumed with all of the hands that have touched those railings and the shoes that have landed on those grips of the rock wall. Am I nuts? Or do you feel me?
- Germs: As you can probably tell by my first two items, GERMS have become a big issue for me. The very IMPORTANT piece of this, I believe, is living through the pandemic. I do not remember being a “germa-phobe” at any point in my life, but I feel like after covid – this particular anxiety skyrocketed! I think we just thought too much about how germs are passed, for far too long. Having a baby during that, didnt help! Their fingers are always in their mouths, and it just became so consuming.
- Sleep: This is a trigger that was an issue when my kids were babies and still holds true now, but in different ways. When we had babies in our house, none of us were sleeping. I was super anxious because everything is magnified when you are sleep deprived, AND I was so concerned with sleep training and schedules and making sure they got just the right amount of sleep! Now, bedtime is one of the most difficult times of the day for us and I constantly worry that we are doing our children a disservice by pushing them too much, putting them to bed too late, or not having enough structure in our bedtime routines. This is definitely something I will explore more in my blog, but it is a big one!
- Nursing/Feeding: This was more of a trigger when I had babies, as I am not nursing anymore – however, what my kids eat, is still an issue. When I was nursing, I was a total freak about schedules for eating, pumping, storing, etc. It really was not healthy. Once we moved to solids, I was terrified of choking, allergies, and weight gain. Now, I struggle with what to make for dinner and how to keep them healthy – so they don’t get sick! It is a viscious cycle and extremely stressful!
I share all of these anxieties with you, not to trigger you, but to hopefully help you relate to me as a mom with anxiety. My goal is to show you that your anxieties may be the same or different from mine, but we all feel them! Mama Will Survive will touch upon all of these anxieties and how I cope, what gets me through each day, and hopefully open up a community to support each other – myself included!
