This is Monica Packer from About Progress and you are listening to The Messy Middle, a monthly

series where I share some of my own messy middle so you can see what progress looks like

for a real woman in real time.

Hello my friends, I hope that you are buckled up and ready for probably the messiest of messy

middle episodes because the last six weeks since my baby is born, today he turns six weeks

old, has been full of very messy times, high highs and low lows and it's been very humbling.

I have definitely been, you know, extremely in love with our baby and happy and grateful.

I've also felt a surprising amount of anxiety for myself and an overwhelm and of course

exhaustion.

That just comes with the territory, with the newborn.

It's like I said earlier, it's been humbling to say the least with my fifth kid, I thought

I knew what to expect and in many ways I did and I logically knew what a transition

it would be but it turns out after a nearly five year gap between kids, it's been one

of those times you're like, oh wow, no this is really overwhelming, this is all encompassing,

this is exhausting and it's given me a nice challenge to really practice what I preach

that small wins building over time and coming back to the idea of, you know, the small

ways that I can prioritize myself and work on supporting myself and seeking for support

from those in my life will make a difference over time.

And just the whole idea, you know, that the small ways that I try to help my baby get into

good sleeping habits and to get in patterns as a family, the small ways that we're trying

to adjust will over time pan out to us being, being, you know, back to our semblance of normal

around here and and it feeling like it's not such a train wreck all the time.

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