Content note: This post includes discussion of pregnancy loss, fertility treatment and surgery, and grief.

As the title has indicated, I took a break from writing for a little while because I did something (in my mind) pretty amazing, I graduated with my first master’s on May 10th. Before that, I took a break to recover from surgery. The surgery I had was the same one I had before we had our baby girl. Polyps regrew and unfortunately, I lost multiple pregnancies in the past year. So now that I have caught you up on the major events of my life that led to a break, I’ am now back. So, I have learned to lean on God in different ways in this time of life. I have noticed that being one degree down and working on another is chaotic in my season. Our baby girl turned three the end of last month, our son is eighteen months, and in between the running back and forth with them, doing schoolwork, and attending important meetings I feel drained sometimes. I feel like I am not able to give as much as I should sometimes or that I am letting people down. I am a recovering people pleaser and see all the needs that I should be meeting that I will literally keep going and find a way to make it work. I am not great at taking a step back, terrible at picking up and being determined I can do it all my own. In fact, I try to take God’s power as my own with the mistaken belief that I know best. I go to bed every night feeling like God is disappointed in how I failed through the day, but I wake up with so much hope in the morning. Somewhere in between these two times of the day, I attempt to take control and chaos ensues. I manage to lose my temper, become frustrated, feel overwhelmed, and try so hard to be perfect. I try to be the perfect mom, wife, and person overall. It’s almost like I look for praise for what I do everywhere that I shouldn’t and the only place I can find it I don’t go there. If that makes any sense do any of you, I apologize if it doesn’t. I’m committing to look every day for God’s grace, love, and beauty in the moments that feel the hardest. I’d like to challenge you to do the same. I’m so glad to be back!