For the past three years, life has felt like a roller coaster.

Before pregnancy, I was already dealing with chronic health issues that had begun changing the way I moved through the world. My energy, my routines, my ability to work, create, and simply do the things I was used to doing were no longer as predictable as they once were.

Then came pregnancy.

And pregnancy can ask so much of a woman before you even begin to account for complications.

There are so many things that can happen during pregnancy and postpartum that we often do not fully understand until we are living through them. Hyperemesis. Preeclampsia. Gestational diabetes. Anemia. Pelvic pain. Sciatica. Carpal tunnel. Placental or umbilical cord complications. Surgery. Bed rest. Difficult labor. Unexpected birth experiences. Postpartum complications. Hormonal changes. Depression. Anxiety. Chronic pain. New diagnoses. Existing health conditions becoming more difficult to manage.

Every woman's experience is different, but pregnancy, birth, and postpartum have the ability to change nearly every part of your life.

Your body.

Your mind.

Your relationships.

Your routines.

Your energy.

Your priorities.

And sometimes, your sense of who you are.

When I look back at the last two years in particular, there are moments when they almost feel like a gap in my life.

Of course, so much happened during that time. I carried and gave birth to my daughter. I watched my son continue growing. I experienced love, fear, gratitude, exhaustion, pain, uncertainty, and some of the biggest changes of my life.

But there was also so much of me that had to become still. It felt like everything that could happen did.

Before all of this, I was an incredibly active and creative person.

I was always making something, building something, photographing something, designing something, planning the next idea, working on a project, or following whatever had captured my curiosity.

Creativity was not something I occasionally did.

It was woven into the way I lived.

Then my world became much smaller.

There were long stretches when my health determined what I could and could not do. During pregnancy, I had surgery on top of a chronic illness. I spent time on bed rest and reached a point where I physically could not live the active life I had known before. I could not walk, I could not stand, I could not sit for too long. I had never worked so little in my life and still had no energy.

My focus shifted from creating and doing to simply getting through what was in front of me.

And when you spend enough time surviving, you can forget what it feels like to simply be.

That is something I am learning again.

How to be without always needing to accomplish something.

How to let a moment be enough.

How to dance just because a song makes me want to move.

How to be whimsical again.

How to laugh loudly.

How to be silly.

How to follow an idea simply because it sounds fun.

How to notice something beautiful without immediately thinking about what needs to happen next.

How to enjoy my life while I am actually living it.

Those things sound so simple, but after years of your mind and body constantly preparing for the next problem, joy can almost feel unfamiliar.

Survival teaches you to pay attention to what hurts, what needs fixing, what could go wrong, what appointment is next, what your body is doing, and what you need to make it through another day.

I am learning to pay attention to what feels good again.

There is so much attention placed on getting through pregnancy safely and bringing a healthy baby into the world, as there should be. But I think we sometimes underestimate how deeply the entire experience can change the woman who went through it.

You do not simply walk out of childbirth, or chronic illness and return to the life you paused.

Life has continued moving.

Your body has changed.

Your responsibilities have changed.

Your perspective has changed.

And sometimes you have changed so much that the person you are trying to “get back to” no longer completely exists.

For a while, I kept thinking about getting back to myself.

Getting back to work.

Getting back to creating.

Getting back to being productive.

Getting back to the version of me who always had another idea and enough energy to chase it.

But lately I have been asking myself a different question.

What if I am not supposed to go back?

What if this season is about discovering who I am now?

That question has given me permission to approach creativity differently.

I do not want to force inspiration because I feel like I need to make up for lost time.

I do not want to measure myself against a version of me who was living in a completely different body, season, and set of circumstances.

And I do not want to treat the last few years as if they were simply time that disappeared.

They changed me.

They taught me.

They slowed me down enough to see things I may never have noticed otherwise.

And they gave me an entirely different appreciation for being here.

I am thankful to be alive.

I am thankful for both of my babies.

I am thankful that after everything my body has experienced, I am still here to watch them grow.

And I am thankful that little pieces of my creativity, joy, and curiosity are beginning to find their way back to me.

An idea I cannot stop thinking about.

A page I want to design.

Something I want to write.

A photograph I want to take.

A project that makes me excited instead of exhausted.

A song that makes me dance around the room.

A ridiculous moment that makes me laugh until my stomach hurts.

A day where I do not need anything extraordinary to happen to feel grateful that I am here.

Those moments may seem small, but they do not feel small to me anymore.

After spending so much time unable to be the active, creative person I once was, they feel like little pieces of life returning.

They remind me that this part of me never disappeared.

Maybe it was resting.

Maybe it was waiting.

Maybe it was changing right along with me.

And maybe finding my spark is not only about making things again.

Maybe it is about feeling alive enough to want to.

I am learning that finding myself again does not mean recreating the life I had before chronic illness, pregnancy, bed rest, birth, postpartum, and motherhood changed it.

It means allowing myself to live from where I am now.

To create.

To rest.

To dance.

To laugh.

To play.

To be curious.

To be a little more whimsical.

To take up space in my own life again.

And to stop believing that every moment has to be productive to matter.

There is grief in recognizing how much time feels missing.

But there is also something beautiful about realizing that my story did not end during those years. It was simply being written differently.

Now, I feel myself becoming curious again.

Creating again.

Dreaming again.

Laughing again.

Living again.

Not so I can return to who I was. But so I can discover who I am when life is no longer only about surviving it.

I do not know exactly what this next version of me will look like yet.

I am still learning her. Still learning what she needs, what brings her joy, what makes her curious, and what she wants to create. But I know I do not want to spend the next chapter of my life only surviving.

I want to be here for it.

I want to laugh more. Dance more. Create more. Rest without guilt. Follow what makes me curious. Be present with my babies. Notice the small things. Let myself be whimsical.

I want to enjoy the life I am so grateful to still have.

Maybe that is what finding my spark really means.

Not becoming who I used to be.

Becoming more present in who I am now.

One idea.

One dance.

One laugh.

One curious thought.

One creative spark at a time.