You Can Do Hard Things.

Some nights
you will watch the clock
instead of the baby.

You will count minutes.
Count ounces.
Count wet diapers.
Count the hours since you last slept
and wonder how something so small
can ask so much of you.

Your body may ache
in places no one warned you about.

You may sit in the dark
with milk on your shirt,
a baby at your breast,
and tears in your eyes
because this was supposed to be natural.

No one told you
natural could hurt.

No one told you
love could live right beside frustration.

That you could adore this baby
and still want your body back.

That you could be grateful
and tired.

Determined
and completely done.

You may search the internet
at three in the morning
for answers you wish someone
had already given you.

Is this normal?

Is my baby getting enough?

Am I doing this wrong?

And sometimes, beneath all of it:

Why is this so hard for me?

It is hard
because it is hard.

Not because you are failing.

Not because your body has betrayed you.

Not because everyone else
somehow knows how to do this
and you don’t.

You are learning a person
who is learning you.

You are feeding them
while healing yourself.

You are doing something new
on very little sleep
with a heart that suddenly lives
outside your body.

Some days will feel beautiful.

Some will simply need to end.

Both count.

So if today was one
you had to drag yourself through—

if you cried,
if you doubted yourself,
if you needed help,
if you changed the plan—

you are still here.

And maybe that is enough
for tonight.