Well, there it is. Another year gone.  This year like all the years before I pledged to be a better me.  Turns out, there were a lot of things that made this year particularly tough. I won’t dwell on all the shitty things that happened.  It’s not worth it, they have taken way more than what is reasonable of my (and a lot of the world’s) time and energy.  We just all need to really stand up for what we think is right and raise really good little humans.

This year I’ll call the year I realized that sometimes you just are depressed.  Not sure where it comes from potentially it’s chemical.  Maybe made worse by a lack of sleep, compounded by too much anxiety and the normal life stressors.  This year I lost the ability to normalize feelings and exercise my typically hard coded self control – maybe a byproduct of depression? Who knows I’m not a psychiatrist I’m only as good as my research on doctor google. There were blips of normalcy and happiness here and there and there were some highs (that glimpse of YES!).  I just feel like with each step of success there was a sideswipe of something that felt like it wasn’t so successful.  Such is life.

The two not-so-little things that kept my feet moving and face smiling where my humans:

These guys.  What to say but holy Lord thank you for giving them to me.  Evan and Michael are just the most freaking wonderful little people and I cannot believe they are mine.  Somehow I managed to not completely F them up yet 🙂 – Somehow they are just perfect.  Curious and THEY give me hope for our future.

These kids love things I hate – like Chicago winter:

and find happiness in things that matter and are so simple – like each other and laying under a twinkling Christmas Tree:

So for 2017 my goal is just to LIVE.  To enjoy the small things and write things down that I’m grateful for at least I know that every single day I get to say family.  Both blood and not.  My work family.  My friend family.  My nuclear family.  Everything family.  The highs of my life are always surrounded by people.  By connections, relationships.  Oh and endorphins.  This girl is going really focus on giving herself the time to stay fit and healthy because that’s the root of what I am.  Mom guilt is so real.  But I need to trust that my family (friends, family, etc) knows that working out and taking time for me – makes me, me.  It makes me a better mom, friend, sister, wife.

So here is to sore muscles, epson salt and essential oils and tiny human hugs and kisses.
Cheers.

Jen.