ashleypajor

To even type those words feels so foreign to me. Taking care of me is something I barely do. I am a mom and wife 24/7. I am also a counselor 21 hours a week with a caseload of about 100 people. By the end of most days I crawl into bed and just sleep. I always talked about self care and taking care of ourselves to clients, DAILY! But I never practiced what I preached. I worked on days I shouldn’t have. I didn’t ask for help with Caleb when I really needed it. I did things that could have been handled later or by someone else but it was just “easier” if I did it myself. But ultimately where did that get me? Burned out. Even during my second pregnancy, I was doing way too much. Even my mom told me that I shouldn’t be doing things the way I was. But again, it was “easier”. When I found out I was pregnant again I started making sure I was eating more regularly, drinking more water, things that as a mom to a 9 month old, I often didn’t do. If I ate 1 meal a day that was good. During the cour...

My story started on April 22nd. It was a Thursday morning and for the last 3 weeks I had been feeling so sick and emotional. I kept telling my husband, either this is the worst PMS ever, or i’m pregnant. Not believing that I puke be pregnant. I know they say, “you're most fertile the year after you give birth.” But I still didn’t believe it.  Well that morning I dropped pee into my dollar tree pregnancy test and said, “if I really am pregnant again, please just let there be a line, even if it is the faintest line, I just need to know”. As I was watching the test I could see it. A super faint second line. I cried, gripped my belly and smiled so big. It actually happened. I have my son, Caleb who is 9 months old, it took almost 2 years to conceive him, so to be pregnant again so quickly was magical to me. I ordered a shirt for Caleb that said “I may be little but i’m going to be a big brother.” That’s how I told my husband, by showing him the new shirt I bought for him. We were both ...

As a mental health counselor, I know how emotions play a huge role in the progression of therapy. I would say at least 95% of the clients I have worked with in the past and still currently work with struggle with emotions in some way. The most common is not being able to accurately and appropriately express emotions. The biggest analogy I use with emotions is the hoover dam. I say to clients that all of our emotions are like the water being held up by this giant wall. We’ll eventually the wall cannot hold anymore behind it and it ends up overflowing or breaking.  People who talk about anger outbursts or emotional breakdowns, this is what this is.  The difference with the hoover dam is that they release water before that happens. As humans, we need pressure release valves to release some of the pressure of these emotions before we reach a boil over or breaking point.  Emotions are hard. 1000%. Nobody really wants to deal with them. But why? Mostly because of society and ou...

I cannot even tell you how many times a week I say these two words, Self Care. Between working 3 days a week and trying to remind myself to practice what I preach it’s at least 5 times a day. But what is self care? One definition is “ the practice of taking an active role in protecting one's own well-being and happiness, in particular during periods of stress.” Makes sense; so what’s so hard about that? I believe it’s the active role that needs to be taken. There’s 24 hours in a day and we live in a society where we would need 48 hour days just to accomplish our to do lists. By the time we sleep, eat, work our jobs, go to school, care for children, pets, others and meet our basic needs, is there any time left? I know that I myself struggle with time. Working part time, caring for Caleb full time, caring for the animals and managing a household, it’s a lot. I always say to people, “If I get to eat more than 1 meal a day, that’s a good day.” People laugh and so do I, but the sad real...

I want to start this by first saying that no matter what your decision, you’re right. I’ve seen so many moms battle with this decision. Do I go back to work and let someone else watch my child? Or do I just stay home full time? Either way is just fine. I know stay at home moms, and I know moms who work full time. Either way it’s hard. Being a mom is a full time job in itself, except there’s no PTO, no vacation days, no days off period. So to add another job on top of that can be even more stressful for some. For others, that other job is a break from the 24/7 role of motherhood. 8 hours of engaging with someone and something other than mom life. Yet, there’s the other side, where some moms can’t imagine being away from their babes. Cannot imagine anyone else caring for them. It’s a real fear. I know, i’ve had it myself. I see both sides of this. I’ve been that mom who was afraid and sad to leave the baby in very capable hands for work. But I also relish in having time away to focus my ...

  As I look back on 2020 it has been a year. In January, I found out the best news of my life. I was pregnant after almost two years of negative tests and heartbreak after heartbreak. I was 12 weeks along when Covid hit my area. I was immediately scared. Scared for myself, scared for my growing little bean. I put myself in lockdown mode. I was working from home. Didn’t go to stores, didn’t see anyone. It was safe, but God it was hard and really lonely. I had to attend all my pregnant appointments alone. That was the only time I left my house for months. The only other thing I did was my gender reveal. But I had to plan a social distanced gender reveal so that I could have at least some sense of a normal pregnancy experience. But that was even hard, to have everyone in cars, honking a blue smoke came out. It was so disappointing for me. Even as things got better, I was still terrified. People not wearing their masks or being out and coughing and sneezing increased my anxiety so much...