There are things I thought I’d feel in motherhood: joy, awe, deep love.
And I do feel those things—so deeply it aches.
But there’s another side of the story that doesn’t get told as often.
The part where joy gets tangled in exhaustion.
Where love is fierce but fear is louder.
Where the version of myself I expected to be seems just out of reach.
I’m talking about postpartum depression.
Postpartum anxiety.
Postpartum rage.
They don’t show up with signs around their necks. They slip in quietly, disguised as guilt, fear, irritability, or numbness. They don’t mean we aren’t good mothers. They mean we’re human ones.
Postpartum depression feels like grieving in a season meant for celebration. Like feeling hollow while holding everything you’ve ever wanted. Like crying and not knowing why—and then feeling ashamed for crying at all.
Postpartum anxiety is the invisible hum under every thought. The need to check everything twice. The racing heart, the spiraling “what ifs,” the constant fight to stay in control when everything feels too fragile.
Postpartum rage—the most taboo of all—feels like fire. It’s snapping over spilled milk. It’s wanting to scream into a pillow because the noise and need never stop. It’s feeling unrecognizable to yourself, and wondering how you’ll ever explain it.
These are not weaknesses.
They are signals.
Signals that we are carrying too much without enough care, enough rest, enough holding.
I find myself here more often than I expected. I’ve longed for this role—motherhood—my whole life. And yet there are days I feel broken, like I’m walking through fog with weights tied to my feet.
But I’m learning something: this too is part of healing.
Feeling the hard doesn’t mean we’ve failed.
It means we’re moving through.
If you’re in this season too, I want you to know:
You’re not alone.
You’re loved.
You’re enough.
Let the emotion come.
Acknowledge it.
Then let it pass, like a wave.
One breath at a time.
We’re finding our way back to ourselves.
To home.
To hiraeth.
the journey to hiraeth 
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