Introduction

I'm not sure exactly why I feel compelled to blog about the trials of juggling motherhood, a personal life and work, but maybe it's because I'm hoping others of you out there can relate and may even benefit from my ravings. I should preface all of my posts by saying that I will try to be fairly anonymous. I'm sure there will be time that I will go off on a rant, and wouldn't want to hurt any of my loved ones or professional acquaintances, so I will use initials when talking about people in my posts.

I am the mother of two wonderful children, J is a girl and was born in 2009 and B is a boy and was born in 2011. Currently J is almost 3 and B is 4 months old. My major issue on the home-front is with B not sleeping... like getting up at least 8+ times every night. A good night is him getting up 5 times! Not only that, I'm one of those unfortunate people who needs a LOT of sleep, so this sleep deprivation thing is pretty tough on me.

I also have suffered from depression for my entire adult (and teenage) life. Lack of sleep tends to tip the scales toward depression for me, and with my already existing history I'm already at increased risk for post partum depression. (Interestingly, I just learned that PPD tends to show up around 3 months post partum and after... which is right where I am) I feel like I'm flirting with PPD on a daily basis. My psychologist believes the antidepressants I am already on may be helping to keep me from tipping over into full blown PPD, but I definitely feel like I'm on the precipice.

I have a wonderful husband, whom I'll call DH (dear husband) in this blog. He is a wonderful man who is immensely helpful with the kids and understanding about my depression. The poor man has had to deal with my resurging depression during both pregnancies (I went off my antidepressants during my whole pregnancy with J and during the first trimester with B), and now again with the lack of sleep taking its toll.

I think that's it for now. My next several posts will likely be talking about my journey through sleep training with my 4 month old son, since that's the biggest item to be juggled on my horizon right now...