14. Valerie: A First Year of Amazement, Vigilance, and Control | Episode 14
Today's podcast guest is Valerie Probstfeld, MSN, FNP-BC. Valerie is a writer, nurse practitioner, and mother of three. Valerie shares in this episode about the amazement she found in her first year, along with the vigilance and control she felt she needed to hold on to during and after her baby's NICU stay - "within the first 10 minutes of my child’s birth, the illusion of control was ripped away from me."
Valerie talks about:
• Studying for the "motherhood exam like I was going to get an A+"
• Learning to cope with fear and anxiety to be present in the moment
• The unique challenges of navigating a NICU stay as a mother AND a medical provider
• Advice to mothers to take photos to preserve memories
• Cultivating and practicing self-compassion
• Shifting ambition in motherhood and following her passion for supporting moms
"At the end of the day, I’m an imperfect mom who loves - and that’s really all that matters."
About Valerie:
Valerie Probstfeld, MSN, FNP-BC is a nurse practitioner who received her bachelor's degrees from Bradley University in nursing and music. Valerie also holds a master's degree from Yale University. Valerie has experience in pediatric neurology as well as primary care.
Valerie encourages moms to love as an action while living life more authentically. You can check her out at her website: tomomistolove.com and social media: @valerie_probstfeld. Valerie also has a podcast available on Spotify, Apple, and Google called "To Mom with Valerie Probstfeld, NP"
Resources:
How We Get Thru Course : Having a Baby in the NICU
(Get a free month of How We Get Thru with this link!)
Photographing the First Year: Expert Interview with Miranda Hayek
Transcript:
Molly Vasa Bertolucci:
Valerie, thanks so much for joining us. Tell us a little bit about yourself and your family.
Valerie Probstfeld:
Thank you so much for having me, Molly, I am so excited to be a guest on your podcast. My name is Valerie Probstfeld and I'm a writer, nurse practitioner, and a mom of 3 young children, ages seven, five, and three years old. We moved a few years ago from Texas, we now live in the Chicago suburbs and I'm originally from Chicago but my husband's a Texan. So we've been kind of navigating the changes up here and it's been great, we've been enjoying it. a=And that's a little bit about me.
Molly Vasa Bertolucci:
Yeah, I was going to say I think you've already got the Chicago accent like, you picked that up quick!
Valerie Probstfeld:
I have a combination, I say you guys and y'all and it's like a bizarre mix, I would say. 2 of my kids were born in Texas and 1 was born here in the Chicago area and, fun fact - apparently you can put Texas dirt under your bed to have like Texas soil being born on. We did not do that. But the nurse did offer us that option and my husband's like oh my gosh can we like Fedex this, can we get this in time? But so unfortunately my third did not. Isn't that wild?
Molly Vasa Bertolucci:
I feel like that is the most Texas thing, like only Texans would think of that.
Valerie Probstfeld:
Yes, yes, for sure. But yeah, we really we love Texas. We love it here. So we've had a lot of changes but good changes.
Molly Vasa Bertolucci:
Yeah. So thinking back to your first kiddo, your 7 year old, what 3 words would you use to describe your first year of motherhood?
Valerie Probstfeld:
I would say my first 3 words are amazement, vigilance, and control.
And you know, with amazement, I was struggling to find the right word because there's so many words, there's so many synonyms that I can use: amazement, wonder, joy, just it truly is just a beautiful, unexplainable… I just don't know if there's words for it. So amazement was the one that when I looked at her and her face it was just inexplicable. I would say the vigilance and control are so much easier to say because I know I experienced that so so much and unfortunately a lot of times it would take over that amazement part.
I think as moms, it's so hard. Like when I was pregnant, and as a child growing up, I'm a nurse practitioner. So I worked in pediatrics, I studied, and I'm so type A - I studied for the motherhood exam like I was going to get an A+ in it. So like I very much wanted to and I knew I was going to be a different mom than what I experienced growing up. So as much as I could I wanted to know exactly how I was going to be. I had control over everything. But you know unfortunately, within the first ten minutes of my first child's birth the illusion of control was ripped away from me, because she went to the NICU. They told me that she couldn't breathe very well and I was able to hold her for a second and they took her away. So it was just like wow, this is not what I expected at all. And I think as a nurse practitioner, it was hard because I did have a lot of that vigilance, like as a healthcare provider you know, worst case scenarios. Like we could be advocates for our children but at the same time we're always thinking. Okay I know what this could be, what issue is there. So I think I was constantly like watching her like a hawk during that time and it was challenging.
But as the years passed, I have 2 others, and I feel like I realized through it all that I'm an imperfect mom. And I wanted so much to be a perfect mom but time and time again life showed me that I'm imperfect. I yell sometimes. I get frustrated. I worry. I do all of these things, but at the end of the day, I'm an imperfect mom who loves and that's really all that matters. And if I continue to just act in love, that's all I can do and that's all the control that I truly do have.
So I looked up in the dictionary, what is mother, you know what is mom? And it means to give birth, a rise, or to care for and protect. And really if you think about it, that's what love does. Love gives birth, love gives rise and cares and protects. So to mom, and I write about this and talk about this, it's a verb. So much in the NICU and in the hospital people called me “mom”. My name changed from Valerie to mom. Which is a beautiful name, I love it. But at the same time, there's so much to us and I'd rather think of myself as how can I to mom as opposed to just be my noun or my title.
Molly Vasa Bertolucci:
Yeah, you do go so quickly from all the things you are straight to mom. And it's such a big shift and we've talked about on this podcast before - I used to think when I first started working with moms, like wow a lot of the women who are coming in to see me are these type A moms, like I just must attract this kind of client and turns out, like all of us who are type A struggle because it is like the first time in your life where input doesn't equal output. Like you can't do XYZ to get the result that you want - it's so much more nuanced and so much more out of your control to your point.
So that’s just beautifully said: amazement, vigilance, and control. You mentioned you wanted to be a different kind of mom. What was the model in your head of motherhood and what did you think that that first year would be like?
Valerie Probstfeld:
So I think the model in my head of a perfect mom was that I wasn't going to yell, I was gonna not be frustrated, or not worried. I was just going to have all the answers because I was not going to be like how we grew up in our childhood. And my mom and dad, like they all they had - they did the best they could with the tools they had. But I write about that the house that I grew up in was infected and it wasn't with like a virus or bacteria, it was infected with worry and frustration and anxiety. And that infection is so contagious, you don't even know you're spreading it. You don't even know you're experiencing it sometimes and it passes over generations. And I think once I became a mom and my oldest, she's so verbose, she will tell me like if I'm yelling “mom, you're yelling too much I thought you said you were going to work on this yelling”. It's like, okay, I didn't think I was but I am so glad that she's like telling me that because I am doing the same thing, I am passing on this infection to the next generation. I mean, we all yell, we all get frustrated. But at the same time, I want to try and use different ways of thinking as opposed to the highway of frustration or worry or anxiety. So, let me try and build back roads in my brain. Let me try to be mindful in the moment or show gratitude or compassion. So I really feel like motherhood has changed me so much and my children teach me more then I feel like I could ever teach them because it's just, every day I'm working on that. I'm working on all of those things and just trying to love more in my life and my children's life and my family's life.
Molly Vasa Bertolucci:
Yeah, creating those back roads, that's such a good way to put it and we've actually been having a similar conversation in my household, about how moms tend to be the emotional center of the household like the way that you are feeling really is infectious, it really does spread to the rest of your family and in my family, we've been talking a lot about anger and frustration, which you mentioned, and how that feels when one of us, my partner or I, is really frustrated or angry and how the kids pick up on it and how it just kind of like becomes the air we're breathing. And how do we shift that and it sounds like that's been a big part of your journey, trying to like clear out that infection and start in a new way to mom.
Valerie Probstfeld:
Absolutely yeah. And with a lot of my background as a nurse practitioner, I used to work in neurology and so I love the brain. And I looked at how your fear center with yelling and being frustrated or worried, like the amygdala part of it, which is the primitive part of our brains, that fight, flight, or freeze response. And it's normal, that's a normal response, we all have it. It's part of living, but if I have a highway all the time - you know, if we're late and I have this highway to the fear of “what if we're late” as opposed to going to a back road, back to my prefrontal cortex or like, my more human side, the response as opposed to the reaction, I can be like oh okay, do I really need to be doing that? Kind of like observing it from the outside, you know, as an observer if that makes sense. So I work on it every day. No one's perfect and I feel like you know, I'm constantly telling my kids, okay mom's working on it again. But with practice I feel like I'm strengthening those back roads. And that's all we can do. is just continue to practice exercising - like I ran a half marathon last year, and I'm like okay well I'm just going to keep practicing it every day.
Molly Vasa Bertolucci:
Yeah, it's a skill. It's a journey. Absolutely.
So your baby was in the NICU and that was not what you expected. All your planning, all your preparing out the window.
Tell me a little bit about that experience and what was that like for you.
Valerie Probstfeld:
Yeah, the NICU was a big stressor for me. It was very much not what I expected, you know throughout pregnancy. We kind of knew that there may be some issues, but we didn't really know what to expect. But I think it was just all the emotions. It was a lot harder than I thought it would be. So I was not able to be with her for the first 24 hours. It was my husband and then when I first met her, you know, I had all those feelings of amazement of oh my gosh, this is my baby. But also at the same time, she's in a hospital bed like with the monitors that I'm so used to seeing like on the other side as a provider but here it is on what was dubbed “baby girl”. It wasn't her name, it was baby girl. Um, so you know baby girl had all these IVs and like all these protocols that we were doing. Which I understood from like a medical aspect, like okay I understand why you're doing this, but at the same time, it just feels so so different when you're a mom and this is your baby.
It reminds me of like when I was in college, I was bitten by a german shepherd on a walk one time, and the moment, it was very fast, like it didn't last for very long. But during the time it felt like it lasted for forever and all I wanted to do was escape. I wanted to leave the situation. And the NICU very much for me felt like that. It was that fight, flight, or freeze that was kicked in but on overdrive and I feel like as NICU parents, in the NICU we do experience some of this trauma. And I am so passionate about getting that out in the open and saying, you know, it is okay to talk about because it is traumatic. And so for me, I wanted to flee sometimes. Like I wanted to leave. I just want to go, like I don't want to do this anymore. I want to bring my baby home. It was during the holiday season and all I want to do is watch Christmas movies with my baby. But then sometimes I just wanted to, like… I became that german shepherd, that dog, like I wanted to argue, I wanted to defend my baby. Like that was what was important to me. And that was the only way I felt like I could do it and other times like I wanted to just collapse because of the lack of control, like when the doctors would come rounding on baby girl and you know here we're going to do x y and z for all these protocols and we're going to do this and it was challenging and I think that's where all the vigilance came in to play because it was this feeling like I need to be watching her all the time and reporting these things. I think probably that line of me being a provider and being a mom. It was confusing for the staff, too, because they would talk to me sometimes as a nurse practitioner and say all these medical terms and let me be in the rounds and sit in the rounds and talk about all this stuff, which I appreciate they did. But it's just so different and it's hard to hear as a mom people talk medically about your baby. So ever since then I've been very much an advocate for patients and families, like I saw so much on the other side as a provider but gosh that window into what it's like to be on that side is just so important that I really feel like I I want to help families and patients experience like what are the resources or resources out there, what can we do to bring this out more in the open?
Molly Vasa Bertolucci:
Yeah, yeah, totally. Such a unique perspective to be both the mom and and a provider. And I've heard NICU moms who are in the medical field say like, I wish I knew less like it's a stressor to have all this information and that sounds like what went on with you with the vigilance.
What was it like when your baby got to come home?
Valerie Probstfeld:
Yes, so it was amazing. I mean I finally was able to watch my Christmas movies with her. I remember the first one was Home Alone, that was like my favorite movie growing up. So I’m like okay, let me watch Home Alone with my baby.
I tried to live in the moment as much as I could and that process was challenging because, I mean she is doing so well now but we had procedures from the NICU that we had to do and I think that was what was hard because I could never stop the vigilance because there was a procedure that we had to do or monitor for something or to make sure that she isn't sick or anything like that so you can't take her anywhere for a certain amount of weeks because of that and I think that is really when I had to face my control issue because giving her to doctors for procedures was one of the hardest things I've ever had to do and I hated how she had to do that. But at the same time like we did learn a lot. Like I learned a lot from the fact that… it's almost like comparing it to flying on an airplane. Like sometimes we have to board the plane to get to that destination and we have to give our trust to the pilot - or the surgeon and or you know the doctor - we have to give our trust to them and it is so so hard sometimes to do that. But if we want to get to that destination, we just have to kind of like go and I think the first time I did not want to. I remember, they gave me a buzzing pager that they sometimes do at restaurants like the one that like lights up and then buzzes. And I just remember walking around the halls at Christmas time and I remember when I was holding that pager, thinking of safety and how um, thinking of just moments in my childhood that made me feel safe. So like my grandma in Christmas time like she had you know ornaments that were similar - she used to have one of those 1970s like oil lamps that would rain, like rain oil. And I called her Rain Grandma- and I truly do feel like Rain Grandma was with me in that moment because I needed that. I needed to give my control to someone else. Whether that be you know, Rain Grandma who's not here anymore, she is you know, looking down. Giving my control to God, or giving my control to whatever it is. I can't carry this burden alone. So I feel like throughout the years, you know, I've worked on that and that's a back road that I continue to work on and I think that through time and through writing and through those experiences, I've learned coping mechanisms for that and sometimes our bodies produce internal thunderstorms and it's just not visible to other people, but it's just as strong, just as damaging. Sometimes a storm causes damage to a town and when there is so much damage, we do have to essentially seek help when there's a storm and damage, but also an internal storm. So with my second, I did see a perinatal counselor and it was very helpful because that's when my OCD started more, with my second because I had all these experiences with my first and I think with my first it was just so shocking and I was dealing with everything in the moment and just kind of rolling with it. But with my second, it was like okay, I'm just waiting for it to rain and I'm gonna I need to bring this umbrella with me. It's gonna rain and don't tell me, it's not going to. It definitely became an OCD thing because I was just convinced and the rumination and… I just could not get out of my head. So I remember my counselor had validated those feelings, but also said you know when you get into these loops just think to yourself, “hat's the next right thing” and if that's just brushing your teeth then do that and then just keep doing that next right thing. Like if that's putting the toothbrush down and then you know, going over to the kitchen to do that. That was helpful for me and I learned throughout the years, I mean, this was absolutely a process that took a long time. And I'm still working on it, but just labeling thoughts as just thoughts and that they aren't necessarily true - like, a thought is a thought and letting that go down the river of thoughts. And so with my third, I felt like I still had all of those concerns, but at the same time I think the coping mechanisms I knew a little bit better. But then there was COVID, so like well you know, lockdown stuff and everything. But I'm just so empowered to help other moms to know that they're not alone. Because it is so lonely. I feel like I was time traveling all the time. Like I was either thinking of worst case scenarios, or was ruminating on the past. But I can't take my children with me in that time machine. I can't take my husband with me in that time machine or anyone else - it's just me and the only place I can meet them is the present.
So it's been a journey but I feel like I'm so I really want to teach and just be with other moms as we mom or to mom on our journeys together of living in the present moment and having that village and that community.
Molly Vasa Bertolucci:
Yeah, yeah, that's beautifully said and every time we share our stories, we let other moms know they're not alone. And I can relate too, so much personally, to what you're sharing in my parenthood experience as well with the NICU and that vigilance - especially when you've been a NICU parent. It doesn't leave. Like, it's always there and I remember really grieving the loss of like an innocence of hopefulness and so similar to what you shared, with my second I was just ready for things to go wrong and I just felt like that hopefulness, that kind of like blind optimism that I had with my first, before the NICU, before the birth trauma, I just… it could never go back to there and so you do, you kind of like have this shift in the way you think, but you learn how to cope with it.
What was that like for you to go back to work?
Valerie Probstfeld:
Um, so to be honest I feel like it changed me as a health care provider and part of it was just the trauma of that being in the NICU. I needed to work through feelings of being in a hospital again. But also I just had a new passion and a new purpose for helping moms and helping families and I just wanted to do something different. And logistically, I wanted to stay with my baby during the first year. We had a lot going on that I felt like I needed to be there for. So I gradually returned back to work probably like eighteen months afterwards, but it was more preventative care at that point, which I really loved, helping patients with change that they want to experience whether that be like eating better or exercising more, doing those type of things. But I just didn't feel the same about health care. So now I really just want to empower other moms and that may be me returning back to the bedside and doing that at some point, or maybe it's doing something else or writing or whatever that might be but not necessarily following this preconceived notion that, as nurses or whatever profession we're in, if we have to do X Y and Z and it's like well we don't necessarily have to always do that. I just need to see what happens with time and see what I'm called to do.
Molly Vasa Bertolucci:
Yeah, definitely. One thing I see and I work with with clients who have become parents, is shifting ambition. And it can be so destabilizing because. you've worked your whole life to get where you are in your career and then all of a sudden it feels different. And it's hard to let go of the path that you maybe pictured and it does, it shifts. And I experienced that after my daughter's NICU stay. I was working in a really high crisis environment and I could not go back to crisis after going through my own crisis. I just could not. I did not have the ability to do that and so things had to shift for me and it can be so tough, especially for us type A folks. But it's, it is. It's a journey and it's ever-changing and as your values and your experiences change your ambition might look different and your career path and the way you want your life and work to fit together can look so different.
Speaking of shifts. How did the idea of self-care shift for you as a parent?
Valerie Probstfeld:
I would say that you know for me I really needed to work on my own self-compassion. I think that in being so type A I I had all this internal dialogue of am I doing this right? Or just being too hard on myself and I know you touch based on that in your episodes as well, which is just so important. It’s okay not to be perfect.
Molly Vasa Bertolucci:
Yes. What makes you feel proud about your first year as a mother?
Valerie Probstfeld:
I feel like that's such a great question. I really never thought about it that way. I don't think I've ever thought of what am I proud of as being a mom. I think that it’s pushing through hard times and pushing through every day and at the end of the day, we do our best and we love our kids and I'm so proud of raising these 3 beautiful humans that are going to go out into the world and do amazing things. I'm proud that I can be their mom, I can be their number 1 cheerleader and their supporter and I got through those hard times and we're gonna get through anything that we need to get through together as a team.
I love that mind shift. I want to think about that more of what are we proud of as a family, as a mom. I don't think we give ourselves as moms as much credit as we deserve. Like, we are doing amazing jobs and we're just entirely too hard on ourselves sometimes. It reminds me of John Gottman he's a marriage a researcher and he talks about like the 5 to 1 ratio of 5 positives to to 1 negative, we need to give 5 positives to overcome 1 negative. So we talk about that with our marriages and sometimes we talk about it with our families as well. But what I feel like I need to work on is that with my self-talk and my self-compassion. For every negative self-talk I give, I have to give myself those 5 positives because I am proud of what I'm doing as a mother and I'm proud of what all of us are doing as moms. I think we can all do that exercise with ourselves - what are 5 things that we're proud of today and truly thinking about that every day or trying to make that habit or writing it down or whatever helps you think that.
Molly Vasa Bertolucci
Yeah, like that idea that our brains are like velcro for negative thoughts and teflon for positive thoughts. So truly the negative thoughts are so much more heavy, right? I love that idea of cultivating a practice of intentionally letting the positive outweigh the negative and identifying the positive things. And there is so much to be proud of and this is kind of something I’m seeing more and more on social media and in just like the cultural discussion, about how parenting is hard. And that's great that it's out there because it is hard and we do want to recognize that, particularly because women's experiences have not been recognized in the past and parenting has not been recognized as work and I think something that's missing from like “this is hard” is also and you're doing it. And you're doing a great job and so when you like there's been a lot of hard things, I hope we can teach ourselves to connect to that, “and this is what I'm proud of about getting through those hard things”. They go together.
Valerie Probstfeld:
Absolutely, absolutely.
Molly Vasa Bertolucci:
Tell us about the decision to have more kids after your experience with your first daughter.
Valerie Probstfeld:
I always knew that I wanted more than 1 kid if that's what God wanted for me. It was something that I knew I was going to do or at least we were gonna try again. I think that I was very concerned about the pregnancy and postpartum time just with how it went with my first and can I mentally handle another NICU stay or whatever it might be, can I do that? I think that ultimately we prayed about it and said like whatever is meant to be, whatever we're supposed to have, then we will do that and when I found out I was pregnant with my third I remember looking at that positive sign on the pregnancy test and just panicking for a second like, oh my gosh. There's all this NICU stuff, this stuff that I may have to do again, and like thoughts were swirling and I remember in my bathroom there's a sign that says “have more faith and less worry” and I remember I looked up at that sign at that moment and I was just like okay God I'm going to do this, like I am going to give my control to you and I'm so scared but I'm just gonna take it - like the perinatal counselor said with my second - like I'm just going to do the next right thing and we're just going to keep on going and we're just going to get through it.
Then there was Covid and all of that which was, you know, everyone has their own pandemic story. I was later on in the pregnancy when everything locked down and actually that was kind of therapeutic though too because that was during the times that we weren't able to have our spouse in ultrasound rooms I remember that, and I don't necessarily care for those, just because with all the things that I know could go wrong. There’s just such heightened alert during them and I really do like having that support there, but the doctor I remember had to call me and because of COVID to come in and I just was crying. Like it was It was fine, but it was just like with COVID, all of that just kind of like, gosh, like, we just don't have control over anything.
I don't remember who actually said this quote but during the pandemic there was someone who said “motherhood is so much of marching into the unknown”. And we just continue to march, in the name of love. We just keep on marching and that's all we can do. And I think that's so beautiful and so unique about motherhood and it’s just something that really should be honored and and cherished, that we are so brave and we just we have such courage and strength.
Molly Vasa Bertolucci.
Yeah. Yeah. What words of encouragement or wisdom do you have for moms who are in it right now?
Valerie Probstfeld:
You know I was thinking a little bit about that as… so my oldest, the one that was in the NICU, she is now in second grade and I was going through pictures of her first year and as a baby and I just don't remember it well. Her baby face! Like I just don't. I remember, gosh, I remember clearly some of these scary things and I remember some nice, joyful things, too and how I felt but seeing that face and her blue eyes and just those memories that I thought I would clearly remember for the rest of my life. Which I do, but they're just, it's different now because I see my almost eight year old, like I see how she is now. So gosh, I was like so emotional that day, we're like oh my gosh she’s not a baby anymore and just becoming this big girl, but that reminded me. Take those pictures, because now I can look back at that time and it's not as clear, but now it can be clear again. Like I can create a new pathway in my brain of remembering. It's not as clear, but I keep reminding myself by looking at pictures or looking at photo albums. Like when we moved from Texas to Chicago, it was so clear because it was so novel. It was end of April and it snowed here and I'm like oh my gosh, like what did we get ourselves into! And it's snowing on April 27th! So I do clearly remember that, but like the mundane times like I just don't. So taking pictures of them picking dandelions or taking pictures or videos of them throwing leaves into the air. Whatever that might be - or in the first year, like, gosh, those little feet and those little hands. You'll remember them, but just not as much as time goes on. Which is beautiful that they continue to grow, there's so much at any moment in time to appreciate, but for me, I'm so glad I did take a lot of those pictures and and videos.
Molly Vasa Bertolucci:
Yeah, it's so true. It feels like things will never change and then they change so quickly and it's not the same. It's not the same. I took a lot of photos and videos of my first and not as many of my second, because, you know. So it was, it was different and now I go back to look at those, especially the videos, where I'm like “oh listen to the noises she was making!” like, I remember that, but it's not no, It's not as present just in my memory but when I.can hear it and see it. Ah I remember that. Yes.
Valerie Probstfeld:
Yeah yep, it brings you right back? Yeah, and it really does like blur together, their faces. It was like okay there was this baby like they all were so cute and it was it this one that did this or this one that did that. So yeah, going back on my phone and being like okay yeah I remember that's how my son laughed versus my daughter or something like that.
Molly Vasa Bertolucci:
Totally. I'm 1 of 6, and we'd ask my mom questions like, you know, what was this like and she'd be like I don't remember which one of you it was… and I'd be like oh I can't believe that! And now I only have two and I'm like, yeah, I can't remember which one it was. Those are early days are a blur.
So as your children are growing up, what delights you about your children right now?
Valerie Probstfeld:
Gosh, so much. I mean they are just so much fun. I mean, so my oldest is in second grade like I said, I have a kindergartner now, as well as three year old and like just the other day - just like the mundane moments and I don't know if mundane is the right word, but like just the little moment. So like we all got matching pajamas. And it was just so fun. I got matching pajamas with them and just to like, I don't know, I never really thought like I would be doing some color coordinating thing like that. But living in the moment like that and laughing together and giggling together about just such silly things. It's never a dull moment and I just, I love that. I mean, it's such chaos, but there's such love in the chaos. And with my oldest she is just growing into such a beautiful, wonderful, smart girl and my son is just so amazingly talented with climbing things and jumping on things and just being a boy but you know, living in the moment with him, building things and just seeing how his mind's working. And my younger daughter who's just, she's just the sweetest little girl. The way she hugs me is just… the way they all hug, there's nothing like being a mom and that's what I try to remember when I get frustrated, because we all do - we all yell, we all get frustrated, we all worry. But at the end of the day, like I just want to hug them and I just want to be with them more and I just want to act in love because that's all that matters at the end of the day. So just so much delight that I just have to remember that every day of what delights me today. Maybe I'll have to ask myself that, too. Like what today, at the end of the day, what did delight me today? So I can kind of like solidify that in my memory and and and start doing that more and thinking more of those positive times.
Molly Vasa Bertolucci:
Yeah, yeah. Well Valerie I just hear so much of your amazement and love and delighting in the moment while bravely marching forward into the unknown as a parent. Thank you so much for coming on the show and sharing your story.
Where can people find you to connect?
Valerie Probstfeld:
Yeah, thank you so much. Molly, I really enjoyed our time together. You can find me on my website which is tomomistolove.com as well as on my social media, valerie_probstfeld. I'm on Instagram and on Facebook and Youtube, so I'd love to chat. I have a podcast and blogs and all of that and just want to encourage other moms.
Molly Vasa Bertolucci:
Wonderful. Thank you. I know people will be wanting to learn a lot more from you just from what you shared today that is so so beautiful and powerful. So thank you again.
Valerie Probstfeld:
Thank you so much.
Molly Vasa Bertolucci:
I hope you enjoyed this conversation as much as I did. If you loved this episode, please share it with a friend, review it, and subscribe to the podcast. Be sure to check out the show notes for links and information about any resources we mentioned in this episode. Thank you for listening.
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