Losing sight of yourself when you're a mom

This is a problem that many mom's have. As I frequent an LDS forum for moms, this has come up a lot. Many moms feel like they don't know who they are anymore.
I definitely feel this way sometimes. I remember the person I was when I was in high school and college and I feel so different now!

So of course, this called for an analysis!

Lucky for all of you who know me now, but not then, I'm sure this will be a real treat for you!

Here are some high school pictures to start things out...

These are my yearbook pictures. Dazzling, aren't they?

and some dance pictures. Gotta love those!

and just some general pictures that I had floating around

So me in high school... I was in choir and hung out with the major players in choir. You know, the ones that were above and beyond and were in show choirs and musicals and took oodles of AP classes. I was in photography (took all the classes I could!) and on the yearbook staff. I was pretty shy and had a hard time really reaching out and talking to people who didn't make an effort to do so with me first.
In my group of close girl friends I was definitely one of the sillier ones. That was the real me. Silly and funny and very carefree. However, not a lot of people got to see that.


On to college!

That first picture of me is famous, I'm sure, on the internet. Well at least on LDSmingle. ;)
I love that picture of myself. It was taken in my first week down at Snow College. The second picture was taken in my 2nd year of college. My cute roommate on the far right of the picture, Kristin totally changed me for the better. It was probably more of an evolution than a change. That silly carefree person that I was with only my close friends came out more when I was with Kristin in groups of people.

I was social and would do more crazy things in public than I ever thought I would do. Example, I wanted to learn to skateboard and so I did. I skateboarded every day to my job at Western Watts. I would even skateboard to school. It was awesome. For an institute activity I actually walked into the quiet computer lab and asked random guys (loudly and with fully convincing desperation) if they were my husband. I actually invited guys I liked over for dinner. I bid for a date with another guy I liked. And wasn't nervous at all while on it! I could actually carry on a conversation with a boy without worrying about what to say! (seriously. In high school I used to think for a while of what to say before calling a guy).

I love my college self. That is someone I look back to frequently and try to be more like that... in a less crazy more grown up version.

Here are a couple more of my favorite pictures from when I was about 21.

Here is my engaged and newly married self. (excuse the crappy cell phone pics!)

I liked the secure and settled version of myself here. I liked feeling more grown up and having a job that I loved in the industry I went to school for. Everything felt like a big accomplishment (granted, there were a lot of major accomplishments going on at that point in time!). But I feel that I lost some of my social life. Meeting others and being social didn't really matter anymore.



And then we had a baby and a little boy and my life has really been consumed with that for the last 2 years.
Last week Jon made the comment that he didn't even know that I could sew or liked it so much when we got married.
And yesterday I found my mp3 player and remembered that I used to listen to some really cool music. I had such a fun time taking my "me time" and sewing while jamming to all of my music. Every song that came on was like, OH! I LOVE this song! It was so enjoyable and made feel happier than I have in a long time. It was different than the normal and it felt good to remember that part of me that has been absent for a while.

From both of those things happening in the last week and a recent comment from my friend Amy who said her husband recently asked her when she went on a crafting frenzy what happened to the hard-A he married, I got to thinking about how I was and how I am now and if I'm happy with the person I am now. What do I miss about who I was then and what am I doing to be the kind of person I want to be in the end?

Some new things I love about myself that I didn't have "then":
1-actually passionate and opinionated about political issues.
2-confidence in my creativity and craftiness
3-a desire to keep my bed made :) (my mom is probably gawking right now)
4-my environmental self. (I actually used my reusable bags today at the grocery store!)
5-wanting to wear classic and "grown up" clothing. You know... the pearl necklaces and high heels and all. I actually never owned a pair of heels besides a lone pair of heeled sandals until last year.
6-enjoying and being able to cook a wider variety of meals. I used to thrive on pot pies, pasta roni, and totino's pizza.
7-did I mention that I love my new passion for craftiness? It seriously makes me so happy to come up with new things to make and then actually make them.


So point of this blog post (and hopefully you've made it through at least some of it!) is that it's important to evolve and grow up, but it's also important to hold on to those good traits and talents that you've picked up along the way. Try to remember things that made you happy then and incorporate them into your life now. I think it makes for a much happier mom which is always good for everyone around.