Category: Lifestyle

Getting Through School During a Pandemic

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Hearing the word pandemic seems so surreal. It sounds like something you only hear happening in a movie or on a TV series but who would have ever thought a pandemic would become our reality.
It’s only been a year but it is been one rough and tough year. Even though we have made major progress, the pandemic is still ongoing and not completely over. ( So please stay safe and healthy). One month before the pandemic began I had just started my dietetic internship for the nutrition and dietetic technician program. This would be the second associate’s degree that I would be receiving from this school and I was so glad I had the opportunity to return to complete the program five years later!

I had also just given birth to my son in October 2019 so by the time the pandemic was officially declared my son was 5 months. So while in school I was also in the stages of being a new mom. Just like everyone else when this pandemic began I was scared and I didn’t know how I could get through school when I all I could do was watch the news of everything going on.

Mentally it was a lot but I knew I had to pull myself together. Some of you are still in the process of getting through school right now and went through it last year as well.

Here are some tips that helped me through school during the pandemic:

  1. Remember your end goal: For me this was my second shot at getting through the program I was in. Even though the pandemic was happening life is still going and I didn’t want to lose sight of the goal I was trying to reach.

2. Remove all distractions : During the time the pandemic began it was kind of hard for to stop looking at my phone and getting news alerts which I had on notifications, eventually I decided to remove the notifications from my phone to try to not think about everything that was happening at the time.

3. Prayer and Meditation: I love meditation especially bible meditations. This is something that I had routinely started during my pregnancy and this still helps me to the day to start my day and end my day

4. Listen to your favorite audiobooks or podcasts: my husband and I would listen to audiobooks and podcast when our son was asleep and we were done with our schoolwork (he also was in school and graduated this year 2021!) this helped us calm our minds down and focus on positive things. 

5. Write down your goals for the day: This helped me a lot when it comes to doing schoolwork.  I remembered things better when I write them down

6. Talk to family and friends: One thing that I truly learned through this pandemic is to value your loved ones. They can help you get through the toughest of times 

7. Play light music in the background while doing your school: This can put you in a good mood especially when you listen to music that motivates you.

These were some of the tips that helped me to get through school during the pandemic and lockdown

Remember you can get through it!

Motherhood Challenges

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Me and my little one

Today makes 19 months of me being a mother and I can’t believe how quickly it has gone by. A year and a half later I can definitely say there are challenges with motherhood or being a parent. I won’t talk about all of those challenges in this blog post but I will focus on one that I’ve struggled with probably since the beginning and that is time management. As much as I want to make plans for my day, do things for myself or create content or study that doesn’t quite go as planned. Some days I can barely get to it at all if I’m lucky!

So the question is how do you manage your time or make time for yourself. Good question lol . To start nap time is your best friend. During a nap you can do one of two things. You can take a nap yourself or you can use that time to get EVERYTHING done! . Just kidding, do not do that and try to cram everything into that nap time because believe or not that nap time goes by quickly at least when your little one is past one year old. When babies are first born and in the newborn stages that is when they sleep more. My son used to sleep for 2-3hours and sometimes longer. So you have more time to work with when they are newborns but once they are a little older the nap times become shorter and shorter so do what you can with the time that you have. 

One thing that got really bad after I gave birth was the pregnancy brain. Pregnancy brain turned into mom brain and mom brain is much tougher for me and I forget things easily so when I have ideas for content I have to make sure I jot them down right away or I will forget. So always write down your ideas. Always plan ahead if you can and have either a notepad or use a notepad app on your phone. Even if you can’t get to what you need to do, you know that you have everything written down.

So when it comes to time management when you have children no matter their age we have to adjust and that is one thing I’m learning on this journey of parenthood.

Written By: Vanessa J

The New Normal Exercising at Home Part 2

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Photo by Karolina Grabowska on Pexels.com

I absolutely love what the photo above says wake up and workout and ever since the pandemic started for some of us working out at home has become a part of our new normal routine. Last year I wrote part 1 to this blog post and it received some pretty good traction and so today since that blog post did so well I want to follow up with part 2 which is an at home workout video! Now I’m not saying I’m an expert when it comes to working out but I wanted to visually show you all some of the exercises I enjoy doing at home.

Join along with me! 14 minute video

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Prepartum Depression and Postpartum Depression

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Photo by Kristina Paukshtite on Pexels.com

Prepartum and Postpartum Depression

This blog post is for all my mama’s out there and mama’s to be. Let’s get real and let us talk about postpartum depression but only not postpartum but prepartum depression which is something I experienced the first few months of my pregnancy.

It is said that the cause for postpartum depression is unknown but can be linked to rise and drop in hormone levels after giving birth. After a woman gives birth they given six weeks before coming back for their first postpartum checkup. In my opinion that first visit just goes by really fast and because postpartum depression is such a big topic of discussion in motherhood and pregnancy one screening for postpartum depression is not enough. Thats exactly how it went for me and several mama’s out there. During your six week check up you are given a questionnaire to fill basically asking you questions in relation to how you are feeling at that time. If you score above a certain number on that questionnaire it may mean you might have postpartum depression.

After my six week visit everything was good and my doctor said to come back in a year. I was thinking to myself a year? Thats it? That is all? This is where I feel things go wrong screening for postpartum depression should not just be after the first six weeks but should continue throughout that first year of being postpartum. 

As for my experience with prepartum depression which I am not sure is really a term but that’s what I would call it, I experienced this between my 2nd to 4th month pregnancy.  I just remember feeling really down and like I didn’t feel like myself, I didn’t want to get out of bed. Throughout most of my pregnancy I did feel very sick and was nauseated and dry heaving almost everyday so some of those things could have played a factor to making me feel more depressed but it just a different feeling that I never felt before.

It is very important that we know the signs and symptoms of postpartum depression which are:

  • Depressed mood or severe mood swings
  • Excessive crying
  • Difficulty bonding with your baby
  • Withdrawing from family and friends
  • Loss of appetite or eating much more than usual
  • Inability to sleep (insomnia) or sleeping too much
  • Overwhelming fatigue or loss of energy
  • Reduced interest and pleasure in activities you used to enjoy
  • Intense irritability and anger
  • Fear that you’re not a good mother
  • Hopelessness

If you feel that you may be exhibiting any signs of postpartum depression please reach out to your primary care provider

Written By: Vanessa J

Check Out My Youtube Video on Postpartum Depression

Listen to my Blogcast!

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Photo by cottonbro on Pexels.com

Hey Everybody,

This blog post is to simply announce that I have officially turned my blogpost into podcast! You can now listen to my blog post if you don’t feel like reading it. (Only if you don’t lol)

My Podcast is currently available on six platforms: