Hey there and welcome to my world of Momness.

I am Jen, and this is Me.

                Ever since I was a little girl, listening to my grandfathers’ stories about working on a farm in New Mexico during the great depression, I have known that I wanted to do something wit horses. I was in high school with I got my first horse, my boo bear. Luke as my horse is commonly known was a green 18 hand draft horse with as much attitude as I had and just as much fight. So, for the 5 foot 8, one hundred and twenty pound, 17-year-old me, most people were a little shock at our comparison. Luke helped to challenge me into the rider I am today, and to give me some of my most amazing competition victories. I didn’t have formal training like the equestrians that most of you probably think of when you imagine Southern California.  I had something better than that, I had a lot of experience doing things and figuring it all out. I learned to sit a horse because the only other option was falling off, and I learned that sometimes bailing out was your best bet. I grew up with a lot of wonder, my mom, brother and I drove all over the united states, I went to every state, saw historic cities and learned to enjoy the spirit of adventure that I feel has been lost by so many. In all these experiences I was shaped into the woman I am today, through adventure, and struggle. That was, until I had a kid.

                In high school I also learned that the ’in crowd’ was not where I wanted to be. I’m sorry if you were the popular kid, but that wasn’t for me at all. I have never been able to embrace superficial, vain, ideal that push so many people into dark places inside because to the pressures of society to be so much of a certain thing they lose actual identity. My friends were amazing, they had massive hearts, we loved being nerdy, and spending time cosplaying (before it was ‘cool’, and people plastered it all over Instagram) and we were unashamedly, unapologetically us. This is something that I have tried to take into my adult life, my marriage, and my parenting. In the world that we live in, everywhere we turn, there is another post or story telling us, moms, parents, women, that we need to be one thing or another. We have to be successful, sexy, beautiful, domestic, parents capable of doing everything our partners do financially and do everything that is expected, no required of us to be ‘good moms’.  Sadly, a lot of these ‘Mommy Blogs’ on the internet just perpetuate this all. They focus on who you need to be to be the perfect mom, perfect wife, and perfect employee.

                Before my son, we’ll be calling him ‘Ranch Baby’ was born, I had an accident that changed my outlook even more on life. I was working with horses, breeding my Belgian stud to a mare. Well, as so many men sometimes do, he was having the hardest time just getting it in, the mare was a maiden mare (never been bred) and she was very unsure of the whole situation, as is to be expected. Well we were at this for about thirty minutes and he was getting more and more frustrated, at this point, I am sure for decent reason. It was what happened next that changed my outlook on several things around me. Waffle (the Belgian, thank my husband for that name) had what could be simply called, a temper tantrum. However, unlike a toddler’s tantrum which can just be loud, this one was dangerous. He kicked out directly at me, and luckily, having decent reflexes I was able to turn. This mean that instead of taking a one-ton Belgian stud hoof directly to the chest, I took it directly to the ribs. My husband describes it as me being thrown for a spin in the air. Oh yea, my husband was 6 feet away when this all happened, so as you can imagine, he was super calm. All joking aside, my husband was relatively calm at this point, and throughout the whole process, this is what I imagine is a combination of clear headedness and a strong dose of stubborn that prevents him from getting flustered at much.

When I stood up after being kicked, I took a few steps and realized that I was NOT okay, and I uttered words that let my husband know just how bad I really felt, “Call an ambulance.” There is an interesting thing about living down over a mile of dirt road, in a remote location, it makes you hard to find, and even harder to help. When the ambulance arrived, I had an emergency chest tap put in because my lung was filling with fluid and collapsing. After all of that I was airlifted to a local trauma center for medical care. Three broken ribs, punctured lung (pneumothorax for you medical types), and had a Chest Tube Thoracostomy with no sedation or pain killer. (Recommendation, if it ever comes to that, pass. Get the meds, seriously.) This all happened just a month before my husband and I were set to fly to Ireland on our first overseas vacation together, and the weekend before his best friend’s wedding in southern Oregon (a 3-hour flight and a 18 hour drive away).
                It was a few weeks after I left the hospital that I found out that I was pregnant. In fact, I was pregnant when I had been kicked, and had been in the hospital.

                So here is my ground-breaking take on all of this, the only person that you need to be at the end of the day, is the you that makes you, and your baby, and your husband (I guess) happy. At the end of the day, my hair might be a mess, and I might be sweaty and tired and feel like sitting on the couch and doing nothing for an eternity, and chances are you’ve been there too. If doing your hair every day, and getting dressed up for work and juggling soccer, baseball, ballet, math tutors, and your full-time job while cooking a home cooked meal sounds like your dear day, then by all means girl, you go do you, you endless ball of energy. The rest of us will be on our couch, falling asleep to wheel of fortune and waking up halfway through the bachelor.