The Journey of Parenthood…

A Post About Blogging…

When I got pregnant I hunted the web like crazy for help. I found lots of it but found it annoying that I was stuck reading stupid message boards a lot of the time and they were not that helpful. What really helped me was when I found Rachael’s blog.

She was a real person who explained things in normal, human terms and who I could go to for questions if I needed advice. It REALLY helped me throughout my pregnancy and made me decide to create my own blog.

I started this blog in order to basically replace journal writing. Who has time to write in a journal everyday? And when you do have the time who actually writes down everything that goes on? To me, my journal didn’t leave enough space for hardly anything! Plus journals don’t have pictures and I can type faster than I can write! The blog seemed like a natural thing to start doing in order to be able to remember my whole pregnancy for use when I get pregnant again and to allow my close family and friends to stay in touch with me.

I had no clue this blog would become even more than that! It has become my past time…my hobby! When I have free time I want to blog and it allows me to vent about my feelings, fears, and joys without boring someone to death over the phone.

What is so surprising to me is that other people follow my blog! I figured my mom and probably Katie would read it but that’s as far as I thought it’d go. I write this blog for ME more than anyone else so I’ve been SHOCKED at the number of people who read it! I posted a link to the blog on my facebook thinking a few people may find it helpful like I found Rachael’s…well it’s become more than just a few people! I have had over 20 people send me messages on facebook telling me it’s been helpful to them or just that they enjoy reading it. People who I haven’t seen since high school, people I hardly know, and people who I thought didn’t even like me much! What’s even stranger is when I run into people in public now! Practical strangers (yet all facebook “friends”) say they follow my blog! My first thought, “dang…you know how much weight I still have to lose!” haha!

After I get past the initial shock that the person standing in front of me knows all the details of my life (which leaves me NOTHING to talk about haha) while I know nothing about theirs. I start to think about how rewarding it is that my little hobby helps others and gives them something to reference. I mean even if they only read it because they are bored at work at least it helps them fill a time void!

Therefore, I want anyone (even you totally random people) to know that if you do have a question or need advice (not that I claim to be an expert) please, please let me know! Rachael and I hadn’t spoken since high school and I started bugging her to death with questions and I’m pretty sure now we both consider the other a good friend (even if it’s a pretty much internet-only relationship haha).

Thinking about my blog as a reference for things…for other people who may be needing help on a topic or for myself in the future, I decided to change up the blog a little bit. Right now it’s not very “user friendly.” For example, if I want to go back and see how much I weighed at my 32 week dr. check up I have a hard time finding it and basically have to read several posts in order to find the one that has the info I’m looking for. I noticed on other blogs I read that they label their posts and it makes it SO much easier to find things! You want to know about morning sickness? You click the label that says “morning sickness” and all the posts related to that topic pop up!

I think it’s a great idea for me to begin labeling my posts, so you’ll notice over the next several days that the labels on the bottom right hand side will start adding up! I hope this helps anyone who is following this blog and I really think it will help me too!

Emily Parker
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