• I’m Not Cold, I’m Processing

    Hello. My name is Jen, and I suffer from resting bitch face. I didn’t realize it for a long time. I also didn’t know there was a name for it. I was in my mid-30s when I first heard the phrase—and honestly, it felt both offensive and accurate. Sure, I could try to soften my…

  • The Energy It Takes to Be ‘On’

    For 17 years of my young adult life, I worked in retail. Women’s and men’s apparel, accessories, shoes, luxury, juniors, fast fashion — you name it, I was most likely there. Retail taught me a lot about people. Some of it was good. A lot of it was… not. The hardest part wasn’t the long…

  • The Things I Convince Myself I’ll Do Tomorrow

    How I start my Mondays usually determines how the rest of my week goes. My weekends are typically filled with family outings, time with friends, or a date with my husband. I look forward to Mondays — getting back into my routine. Unless I decide, for a week and a half, to completely rebel against…

  • The Version of Me Before Liam

    Young Jen would probably be surprised how I turned out. I’d say the 42-year-old version of me — married for almost nine years, raising a four-year-old — has found her joy. Jen BC came from the IDGAF era, but with a lot of teen anguish mixed in. A lot of that came from childhood and…

  • The People Who Think Before They Speak (and the Ones Who Don’t)

    I’ve always believed there are two types of people in the world: people who speak before they think and people who think before they speak. But there’s also a strange gray space where some of us live — people who somehow manage to do both, usually at the worst possible time. I am one of…

  • The Quiet Grief of Outgrowing a Church

    Matt and I found a church we loved in 2018. The messages were funny and easy to follow. The worship team made every Sunday feel like a concert, and I felt genuinely welcomed by everyone. At the time, I had recently been diagnosed with depression and was working through PTSD from past trauma. When I…

  • People I’ve Had Full Arguments With… In My Head

    The car is where I settle fights. Sometimes the shower too. Jenessa is my alter ego, and she settles my scores — just on a delay. There’s usually a gap between when someone says something offensive and when I think of what I should’ve said. Thanks to her, it can take me five to ten…

  • The Weight of Feeling Everything

    The car seat is Liam’s arch nemesis. Getting him into it can set him off. It doesn’t matter if we’ve had a wonderful day or if school went well. If he doesn’t want to sit in that seat, the entire moment unravels. I hate pinning him down. He’s strong. The screaming builds, and it turns…

  • Finding Faith in the Ordinary Moments I Used to Rush Through

    Small wins are BIG wins.” The kind of life mantra that probably needs to be tattooed on my forehead. I’ve heard it for years. Liam is four years old. He has Down syndrome and autism. Liam was born in October of 2017. He had complications with breathing that required oxygen support, and he spent the…

  • The Five Conversations I Have With Myself Before Getting Out of Bed

    It’s been a nightly ritual for me to prepare my day right before bed. I’m a planner. Over the last few years, I’ve learned that I’m easily overstimulated—mostly because of motherhood and the constant motion that comes with it. I’m four years into being a mom, but it feels like it’s been forty. Sometimes it…