Mammaste.

Looking back to the beginning, a new baby in your arms, the uncertainty of it all - you can see how far you have come. The work is not done. It never is. The work of a mother is eternal. But you have settled in and are more confident. You stumble to take things in stride as you continue to uncover and tackle the ever changing challenges of parenting.

For some of us, myself included, that beginning was the start of a new career: taking care of your child full time. For many, that beginning was maternity leave, allowing a few months to learn how to take care of your baby, adjust to becoming a mother, and then head back to work, learning, on the go, how to juggle it all.

The unseen, unceasing work of a mother may be the most challenging you will face in your lifetime. When motherhood began for me over a decade ago, this aspect of motherhood was and continues to be the most difficult. My continual effort, which often leaves me in a state of pure exhaustion, can go unnoticed day to day. How is work that is invisible to be appreciated? Without acknowledgement and appreciation, one's seeming self worth can dim.

The Postpartum Experience Project was born out of that unseen fire of love, struggle, connection, and isolation; of movement, exhaustion, laughter, and tears; of research, teaching, structure, and play. For me, the project was a spiritual journey of offering and self healing. It is my hope that the project can offer light in a time that can hold so much darkness.

The Postpartum Experience Project is a rite of passage - an acknowledgement and honoring of not only becoming a mother, but of what being a mother is all about. May the unseen fire within burst into a galaxy of light to shine on all the amazing things that you are and do. I see you. Mammaste.