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NMM8
This post is part of the New Mom Monday series! A series about moms and their advice to new moms! Books and videos can only teach us so much, but there’s something special about hearing from real life moms. Honest, true, and always beautifully inspiring!!
What’s your Name?

Alisha Parker

Tell us a little about yourself!

I’m a former elementary school teacher turned stay at home mom! I’ve been married to my wonderful husband Adrian for almost 5 years and we have two wonderful children.  I was born and raised in Fort Worth, Texas and I love it here! I love the Lord and hope that the life I live will be a testament to His grace and mercy and an encouragement to others.

How many kids do you have? What are their names and ages?

Caleb 2 years,  Chloe  7 months

How do you find your “me time”?

I get up at 5am every morning during the week to work out and have quiet time while I do my devotional. I also have my husband watch the kids from time to time so I can go get a pedicure or get my hair done.

What’s the most useful baby product you have? Why do you love it?

My Ergo 360! It makes it so easy to grocery shop & chase around my two year when we’re out and do other things all while having my hands free.

If you could say something to yourself when you first brought home your first baby, what would you say?

Let go of all of your expectations and just enjoy the ride. Parenthood is a journey with lots of bumps in the road but it will all be worth it!

How much planning did you do before your baby was born, and how do you think that it helped or didn’t help?

I’m a type A personality so I did a lot of planning before. I had in my head how I thought everything would go and how I would do his nighttime routine and naps, etc. NONE of it went according to plan! It was good to think through the process but it stressed me out that none of my planning “worked.”

 

What do you believe are the top three pieces of advice a new mom or someone trying to conceive should know?
  1. Every baby is different! Don’t play the comparison game or you will drive yourself crazy.
  2. Do what works for you! Forget what the books say, or what your mom says (gasp) or what your best friend says and trust your instincts and do what works for you. If you need to co-sleep for your sanity, then do it! If you don’t want to breast feed, then don’t!
  3. “This too shall pass.” In those difficult moments remember it’s just a phase and it will pass! They grow so fast and you’ll look back and wish you hadn’t let the little things frustrate you!

 

What is your best memory so far of being a mom?

Holding my baby for the first time. You wait 9 months and wonder what he or she will look like and then you finally meet them for the first time. It’s the best!

Give us the short form version of your birth story.
I went to the doctor’s office for my regularly scheduled weekly appointment. I was less than a week from my due date. My blood pressure was up so they admitted me for observation and blood work. My liver enzyme was elevated and my doctor was worried about eclampsia sitting in over the weekend. So she decided to induce me the next morning. I spent the night in the hospital and the next morning the Pitocin began. My son would never drop down and engage so I never dilated on my own. They used a balloon catheter to try to open my cervix. That got me to a 4 and then they broke my water thinking it might help things progress. It didn’t! I got an epidural and continued to labor for another couple of hours but I made zero progress. I had been in labor for about 10 hours. My son started to go into distress during contractions so they decided a c-section was the best route to go. I had my son via c-section at 6:21 pm on May 31st!
Because of this, my daughter was born via a planned c-section 19 1/2 months later. 🙂
Lastly, for fun, define motherhood!

Motherhood is a journey! You carry, nurture and protect this little being for 9 months in your womb and then you spend the rest of your life trying to find the balance between raising them and letting them grow into their own little person.

To hear more from Alisha be sure to visit her blog My Mommy Stuff and follow her on Instagram

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If you would like to participate in New Mom Mondays please feel free to message me by using my contact form! I would love to not only feature you on my blog but learn from your answers, as I’m sure many readers would too! 

 

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steps-to-success

My corporate job is very giving. They provide free snacks all day every day. The majority of the time they are healthy, but some days, they aren’t. Today as I walked into the office, I went straight to the kitchen to fill up my water bottle. I don’t drink nearly enough water and it’s constantly something I’m trying to work on. Filling up my water, I waited for the machine to finish as I glanced about and my eyes spotted something awesome. Pretzles. The ones with the little chunks of salt on them, I mindlessly took a handful, grabbed my water and went to my desk. It wasn’t until I was on the last of the salty snack that I caught myself thinking: 1. Why did I grab these in the first place? I ate breakfast, I’m not hungry – and 2. How is this the last one? Did I already eat the rest of them? Surely someone else must have taken them, because I do not remember eating all of them!! Does this sound familiar? If it doesn’t, maybe your mindless autopilot activities relate to something other than food. Ever bought a shirt because it was on sale and it looked cute, only to get home to put it in your closet to find you have to push clothes strategically to get it to fit and then you’re thinking… Why did I buy this, I don’t even truly need it. Or maybe you say “How are you?” to someone only to catch yourself mid conversation realizing you’re actually not listening? A lot of us function in many ways, on autopilot!

I didn’t make a CONSCIOUS choice to grab the pretzels, I just did, because I wasn’t THINKING. Autopilot isn’t always a bad thing, for example, when you get into a car do you consciously think, “Ok, now I need to grab the seatbelt and pull it across my body, and find the other end, and click it together, and adjust it so it doesn’t bother my neck and ok I’m ready.” No! You just pull the seat belt and lock it in place without really thinking about it! This is good, because the choices we made when we started putting the seatbelt on ourselves (once mom and dad started letting us do it!) created a HABIT. When we were young, we likely did think, ok time to put my seatbelt on, and go through the whole process, because it was new to us, but eventually a HABIT was created and has then turned our mind off of that particular event that most of us do a couple times a day. This is a GOOD habit, it’s when we let habits get created that sabotage our ultimate goals that we run into some trouble because now we’re on ‘sabotaging autopilot mode’ and that is not going to get you anywhere near success.

I am currently reading The Compound Effect, which I highly recommend! It talks about how creating healthy habits, not just healthy as in food and fitness related but even saving money or spending more quality time with your family, can lead you to a life of great success in different areas of your life!

  • You first need to decide what success means to you, think small to begin with so you can get the feel for it. For me, I would achieve success with my hydration if for an entire month I drank my daily requirement of 2.5 liters of water. This seemed easy enough to say out loud, but I found myself ignoring water and sometimes would go a full day without a single DROP. Yikes!!
  • Once you have decided what it is you want to do- you NEED to track it. I used a notepad application on my phone, though you are also welcome to use a REAL notebook and pen to track yourself. Every time I drank water, I would write it down on the notebook. No matter if it was a sip, or a whole glass at once, I would track how much water I drank throughout the day. At the end of the first week I looked at my numbers and was pretty surprised. During the first four days I drank less than a liter a day. Nowhere near my goal. Later in the week, I wanted to be able to write down on my notepad that I drank water so I would purposely CHOOSE to go drink some.
  • Next, continue tracking for THREE more weeks. I know, seems tedious, but you need to develop a HABIT of consciously CHOOSING to do something or not do something, depending on what you are tracking. They say it takes 21 days to form a habit, and that’s what we’re trying to do.
  • At the end you will have noticed a pattern, I now CHOOSE to drink water. I still track it, but I am more conscious of my decision to drink it now rather than my autopilot lack of a choice, to ignore it. I’ve lost some water weight because of this! I was always dehydrated, just chose to ignore the signs, now I feel more awake, and drinking water makes me feel like I’m making a choice in the best direction.
Now you try.
  • Come up with a goal. (Losing weight, Saving money, Being better at your job)
  • Track your behaviour and choices for 1 week. (Track everything you put in your mouth, track every dollar you spend, track how long you spend on Personal Development a day)
  • Look at your results, be conscious of your choices and track for THREE more weeks.
  • You’ve developed a new habit!! Congratulations!

Feel free to comment below what you’re going to be tracking to hold yourself accountable! Be successful, in every area of your life.

 

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