Guys.. it's. been. a. month.  In more than one way.  It's been a month since I posted.  But I kind of did it in a way to give people the chance to get into some sort of new normal.  In February when the COVID-19 outbreak kind of became bigger and bigger, things started to change.  Unfortunately, as a small business that also meant it changes for me.  I haven't shut down my business of course, but in a sense, I have.  

What I do, involves the smallest people on earth.  Involves some of the most fragile.  yes, this is newborns.  But you think about the family sessions that I have that are with grandparents.  Or when grandparents come to my studio to pick up the big siblings while the newborn session continues.   During the unknown, this wasn't really something I was willing to risk.  Sessions had to be cancelled and moved.  As of right now, no sessions are taking place until at least April.  Will that change? Right now, I don't know. Is the virus a hit to everyone? yes of course.  But I didn't realize how much photographing your new babies and your families gave me such a sense of peace and happiness.

It's been quite a few weeks since I've edited a session, and let me tell you.. I'm in a funk.  I miss snuggling babies.  I miss meeting new families.  I miss seeing families I've met already.  I cannot wait until this virus is over and life can kind of get back to normal.

Now that I've kind of put it out there what's going on with Krystal Cline Photography, in an effort to sort of get back into it, I'm posting a mommy blog.  They may not be every Tuesday for quite some time, as I think there are definitely more important things going on in the world right now over my blog posts lol, but maybe this post itself will give the new mamas who haven't had the opportunity to take newborn photos, a chance to see that though the world seems to be falling apart, they just created and brought into the world such a miracle.  And any hard times they're having in this world of unknown, can be related to someone else. 

With that, I introduce to you, my next mommy Brittany.  We hit it off right from the start and I have seen her quite a few times since her newborn session and every time it's amazing.  It's people like her, that bring me SUCH pleasure and joy doing this. 

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"I want to share the struggles, all the struggles no one wants to discuss. I had a pretty average pregnancy. It wasn't horrible but it wasn't stress-free, it was just typical nausea, carpel tunnel and RLS lol but despite my physical symptoms my baby was healthy and growing like a weed. Then came my due date which passed day by day. Finally 9 days overdue i was induced! THANK GOD!

nope I spoke too soon, 2 different inductions and neither of them worked so 3 days later, in i went for the dreaded IV drip. The one everyone speaks about on how awful it is and how intense your contractions will be. 12 hours later, contractions pretty strong but i was feeling good. The nurses offered an epidural before the doctor went into a surgery so i thought sure let's get that started. In it went and the better I felt. Until 1 hour later I could feel horrible pain, constant pain, excrutiating pain. They readjusted my epidural; nothing. They took it out and re-did it; nothing. Everything got worse and i couldn't sit still, i couldn't lay down, i couldnt get up, i was screaming, i was done, i couldn't do this anymore.

After 4 hours stuck at 6 cm, screaming and crying i was rushed for an emergency C-section. I had to get 8 more needles down my spine to numb me. I was terrified, I was exhausted and I just wanted to be done.

And then there it was, that cry that made all of this worth it and made me forget everything I was going through. "9.8lbs and huge" they announced (no wonder he wouldn't come out lol). I was sewn back up and pushed to my room. My husband went to walk my step mom to her car and i was alone in the room holding my son, so in love. The nurse came in and pressed on my stomach then immediately pressed my "need help" button on my bed.

In came a second nurse, then yelling, then a doctor, then a surgeon, then the anesthesiologist and all I heard was "she's going to die we're moving her now".  They took my son from my arms, wheeled me into that white room again, stuck a needle in my arm and the next i remember i was waking up in a strange room, alone with a blood transfusion.

Turns out I had some giant blood clots stuck and during surgery I had lost 1.5 litres of blood (crazy I know). Fast forward a week. I'm home, I'm engorged and in pain lol and I'm changing my son. But wait...my shirt is wet? Did he pee on me? Why's there blood? My incision ripped open! Back to the hospital I went.

More blood transfusions for 24 hours and finally sent home only to have a nurse come to my house every day for 4 months to pack my wound and watch for infection. At the same time all this was happening I also lost a best friend who was furious at me for not attending her birthday party with my IV bag attached to me lol (ya, I know).

I felt lost, i felt hopeless and here's the part no mother wants to admit....I think i blamed my son. I felt distant. I felt like I was babysitting someone else's baby. I can't even describe the disconnect I felt but I knew eventually it was PPD and it wasn't me. I got help, I got a therapist and I worked through it and it wasn't easy by any means.

There IS a light at the end of the tunnel. No matter how hard it gets, no matter the physical and emotional pain you endure, your child still idolizes you and thinks you're perfect (this is something you have to remind yourself as a parent). That unconditional love is something that's unexplainable. You will be physically and emotionally beat down whether it be what I went through, or the sleepless nights, or the anxiety you feel from the non-stop crying and you can't figure out what's wrong, the first colds and flus....but Every. Single. Dark. Moment is worth it when you see the first smile, see the first crawl and steps, receive the first hug (actually they're all pretty great), hear the first I love you! BE unapologetic to the judgers, be strong when you feel like giving up and just do whatever works for YOU!"
 

We're now at post three! In case some of you don't know, my website shows me how many visitors I've had on each blog post.  I am SO happy to say, that each post, is getting more and more visits/views than the last.  

Knowing that there are THIS many people who are reading these posts and reading another mommy's story and life and how motherhood has been for her, makes me soooo happy! I'm a couple days late this week because, well.. life haha The next blog post is actually from a model call that I did.  I wanted a baby girl in the studio sooo badly, because i had just gotten in some new props and items.  However, I was SO tired of pinks, purples, and whites, or creams, for girls.  This mama came in knowing the colours would be a little bit different.  We went with brown and blue and heck did I fall in love.  Blue on girls is just so soft, and pretty, and different!  Anyways - that's a different blog post all in its own :). 

Readers, meet story number 3, Ashley :)

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"I'm not ready to have kids yet." - that's what people say. I hear that ALL the time. I'm here to say, I fact checked that, and it's false. You can read every book, have every resource and have all the money in the world but if your baby wants to cry and puke and eat all night long - it will cry and puke and eat all. night. long. No amount of money will buy back your sanity after staying up with a baby for hours on end. I'm not even speaking from experience because my baby (THANKFULLY) slept very good at birth, ate on a pretty consistent schedule and is an overall pretty chill person. She is also the glaring opposite of me, her anxious and constantly over thinking mother. 

I thought I was pretty emotional before having a baby - WRONG. In the past year I have never felt so emotionally out of control. Mentally fatigued. Physically exhausted. And again - she's easy. Even when everything is going so so so right, I can't help but think of what could go wrong wrong wrong. 

I've gotten a lot better at controlling and tapering off those thoughts. I've learned alot about myself as a person since becoming a mother and it's only helped me for the better. 

My advice to new mothers is simply this: have zero expectations. Trust yourself. You're the MOM, you know best. It's okay to ask for help. And it's okay to not ask for help. 

Motherhood is the most exciting, saddest, happiest, isolating, exhausting, exhilarating, maddening ride of your life. Period. 

And I wouldn't change anything for a minute of pre-baby life because knowing me, I would miss her too much."

Guess what day it is! Time for the next mommy blog post! I had SO many mamas reach out to me.  Ones that were past clients and ones that weren't! The amount of support that each mom wanted to give other moms was absolutely the reason why I wanted to start this little "blog entry" diary sort of thing. 

It made me SO happy to have soooooo many people message me on Instagram or Facebook saying "I love this and want to participate".  There's something so special about having so many different people come together on things they can relate to each other on. So, thank you to each and every one of you who shared your stories.  I cannot wait to post them all.  But with that, here is mommy number 2's story - Jessica ♥

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"Everyone generally prepares you for pregnancy and delivery by sharing their stories and experiences but very few people give you a realistic idea of your post-delivery process. My pregnancy had its challenges with high blood pressure and excess edema which led to me being induced three weeks early. My delivery went well and I gave birth to a beautifully healthy baby girl. Now, what I was not expecting were the challenges that followed in my own healing and recovery afterwards. I had expected to not be back to my normal self right away, but I could not have imagined still recovering almost 3 months after giving birth. As painful, and at times frustrating, as the recovery process was, I would do it all over again because having a daughter has been life changing. 

To say that motherhood has changed me would be an understatement because the changes that have taken place I did not even expect. Yes, the amount of love I have for this tiny little person is beyond words and I would do anything and everything for her but almost more importantly, she has made me a stronger, more confident and more understanding woman. This little girl who wakes up everyday taking on the world with excitement and enthusiasm has shown me that I am a lot stronger than I ever thought I was. Now, to say that every day is amazing, would also be a lie because there are definitely days where I wish I could sleep in, have a few minutes to myself, not have to worry about poo, just to name a few. I think as a new mom it has been important that I remind myself everyday that I am going to make mistakes, that things are not always going to go right, that there will be tough days but all those things are okay because I know that everything I do for my daughter is done out of love and what is the best for her and that’s all that matters. 

Motherhood is the most exclusive club in the world and every single experience shows such strength and courage. Women can literally do anything and everything and rarely (if ever) do we ask for recognition or praise. Well, as a daughter and now a mother, I am saying thank you to every single mother."

To connect with Jessica on social media please click here.