…I’m overwhelmed with self reflection.
At first, I thought to myself, “Oh my God, I barely survived this year. I just scraped by.”
I saw a meme on Facebook that said something along the lines of, “now is the time of year when everyone recaps their amazing year. If all you did was survive, that’s worth celebrating, too.” I totally agree, and I felt that someone had written that post just for me: the broken, uncomfortable, sad, and anxious woman that I have become over the past couple years.
That thought was interrupted by a video montage of posts from 2019, reminding me that we did a lot of traveling, too- Colorado, then Florida, then Colorado again, then California, then Colorado AGAIN, twice!
Traveling with Teddy is fun but crazy, especially when I’m traveling by myself.
Maybe I did more than just survive?
We made it through Teddy’s FPIES diagnosis, found him some specialists, and carefully discovered what food he could eat.
I resigned from my city council position and haven’t regretted it.
I sang the National Anthem at the D3 NCAA Hockey Championship and our family cheered the Pointers on to victory.
At this time last year, I was the heaviest I’ve ever been, and my grief felt awfully heavy, too. I lost 40 pounds this year, and through therapy and EMDR, I have more good days than bad. I’m so thankful that I’ve been making a return to running. I ran several 5K and 5 mile races, and even a half marathon- my first real postpartum distance race!
I was able to relaunch my business, heidi oberstadt media, and took on new clients and some fun new projects.
We took roses to the tenants in NaNa’s (Norma’s) building to celebrate Valentine’s Day.
I threw a beautiful first birthday party for Teddy and spent the day celebrating him. I’m so thankful that he’s here and that he’s mine.
Teddy started daycare, which was a big change for all of us, and I went back to work at the University of Wisconsin: Stevens Point, where my students called me “Professor Oberstadt” for the first time. It’s still kind of weird.
We moved into our new home, our Bukolt Estate, which is the first two story home I’ve lived in, and is just perfect for Teddy and Abbie to run around.
The interior is almost finished and I often can’t believe that this beautiful home is mine. Brian has done an incredible job.
In general, I feel like I’m just now starting to pick up the pieces. After my mom died, and worsening after Teddy’s arrival, I felt so overwhelmed by even the simplest tasks. Emails and text messages went unanswered for weeks. I forgot EVERYTHING, and I stayed in this limbo, struggling to get out, for a long time. In many ways, I am just now cleaning up the mental, physical, and emotional disaster that I was living in. It feels really good to start getting caught up on everything, and I’m so thankful that my friends/family/clients are so incredibly understanding and supportive of me on this journey.
I still have really bad days, but they are coming less and less frequently. I still cry Teddy to sleep sometimes as I rock him in my mom’s rocking chair.
I have so many hopes for 2020- if I can just keep going, and keep improving, then I’ll be in a really good place at the end of the year once again.
There is so much to be proud of and so much to be thankful for. I’m looking forward to sharing more of it with you. ❤️
artist & athlete | a glimpse into real life, Heidi style 