Being real...

When I first had Sophia I was seriously under the impression that most people loved nursing. I knew that people struggled with it but I still thought that maybe the first few weeks could be rough but then it was easy and enjoyable. After a month of non-stop nursing troubles I can remember saying to Mark in tears, "why does everyone else love nursing, while I hate it?" He looked at me like I was crazy and said, "they are all lying." Now I don't think everyone is lying but what I did learn was that people don't talk very openly. I felt so isolated in the struggles but as soon as I decided to talk about it, everyone else started sharing their struggles too. Everyone else started talking about how they didn't enjoy it all the time either. It was so much easier to know that I wasn't alone.

I am so much more the type of person to be open and talk about all that is hard, tough or embarrassing then to pretend things are fine and feel alone. In relationships I have found that to be the hardest thing. Sometimes I think I am too open for people and they don't want to know that much about me. Other times I'm not open enough and the friendship remains at a "surfacey" level. I often wonder why are we trying to act like we have it all together? I do it too, so no shame. What are we afraid of, really? What satisfaction does it bring to pretend and act like everything is fine even though we know it isn't and in all reality everyone else probably knows it too.

Mark and I have a passion for family and marriage. And as we have tried to figure out where we are going to take that passion we have talked about how important it is to get people to open up, ourselves included. It's healthy, it's healing and sometimes its even fun!

Let's all quit acting like we have it all together. Let's face it, WE DON'T. No need to pretend, everyone already knows anyways. Open up and feel the freedom in being REAL. You could even do a little dance because that's what being free makes you want to do. Tell someone today that you aren't as perfect as you would like people to think. JUST DO IT, I dare you! :-)