A Difficult Fall

Part of the reason I stopped blogging was that I was experiencing a difficult fall.  In the past, I likely would have blogged more as a way to sort through all the difficulties.  This past fall a lot was happening, a lot changing.  I actually stopped writing for a while.  There was too much to process.  Writing didn't help, as it usually does, so I stopped.  I turned inward and relied on some good friends to help me sort everything out.  I focused as much as I could on my family and kept moving.  I'd like to say that the difficult things I was experiencing--or more accurately, that my family was experiencing--have passed.  In some ways, they have.  In other ways, we're still sorting through these experiences.  I'm finally in a place in which I feel better prepared to write, in which I feel that writing will help.  That is, primarily, why I'm back. 

I also feel as though my reasons for blogging have changed.  I'm less interested in finding a community than I once was.  I will likely continue to tag my posts as I write them, more out of habit than anything else, but I'm not as concerned with how others will respond to my thoughts.  That begs the question: why blog, as it is, ostensibly, public?  The answer is that blogging is a form of journalling for me, although I recognize it is a public journal.  I could easily just write in a journal, even one I create on my computer, which I occasionally do.  I have returned to blogging because the kind of writing I do here feels different.  I'm not sure I can explain it in more depth than that, and I'm not sure I want to.  The writing, this time, is more out of necessity, out of my need to put things down in a tangible way, as I process my thoughts and experiences. 

A Return, of Sorts

I haven't written here in almost four months.  I haven't felt the need to write for a variety of reasons.  For the last few days I have been thinking about this blog and the space it gave me to journal about certain aspects of my life.  I often still feel the need to journal, but I haven't felt the need to journal publicly for a while.  I started this blog almost eight years ago, when I was pregnant with my first child.  I wanted a space in which I could explore all the changes I was experiencing, and this space was very, very useful for that.  In fact, this space helped to keep me sane during three pregnancies, writing and defending a dissertation, an international move, and many family issues, among other things.  I discovered some good friends through this blog, and I maintained strong connections with others because of this blog.  For the past year or so, blogging started to feel like a chore.  I was blogging out of obligation rather than out of a desire to write or to connect with people.  I didn't want to write out of obligation--I already do quite a lot of writing out of obligation.  I wanted this space to be a positive space, even if I used it to rant occasionally.  This is all to explain why I stopped blogging.

I am going to start blogging again, I think.  I may be changing some things, including the blog's name.  I'm no longer as interested in recording my experiences of being an "academic mother," which is not to say that I won't be using this space to write about those experiences.  I just no longer see that as the primary thing I want to write about here.  For now, I think my posts will be more personal, more about my journey as a parent and as a person.  At least that is how I feel right now.