The amazing Alyssa Smith (40 weeks + 6 days pregnant with Maddox) and Braxton (22 months).
Alyssa got pregnant with Braxton shortly after getting married. They were not trying but not preventing pregnancy at the time. Things went very well until she developed high blood pressure at 38 weeks and had to be induced. She labored for 15 hours with an epidural and Braxton was born vaginally with a second degree tear. Alyssa's recovery was painful and it took several months for her to feel like herself and be able to enjoy sex again.
She went back on birth control, not planning on having another baby until Braxton was two. When he was 9 months old Alyssa began having a lot of hormonal problems that eventually landed her in the hospital after she hadn't slept for days on end. She had been breastfeeding exclusively but lost her supply for about two weeks due to the stress on her body and hospitalizations. It took her 2-3 weeks to relactate and she was able to continue nursing until he was about 16 months old.
Alyssa had stopped taking birth control due to her hormonal fluctuations and learned when Braxton was about 14 months old that she was expecting again. She didn't feel quite ready to have another child but settled into it and she choose to see midwives this time. When she was 23 weeks 5 days, Alyssa got up to use the bathroom in the evening and there was blood everywhere. She was alone with her son at the time so called her husband and midwife and then went into the medical center an hour away. An ultrasound and vaginal exam revealed that Alyssa had a partial placental abruption. They brought in specialists and a NICU team to talk to her and she had to stay in the hospital for a week. After discharge she had weekly ultrasounds and monitoring but thankfully everything healed on it's own and at 38 weeks they couldn't even see where it had happened.
From being worried she would deliver preterm to carrying postdates, Alyssa is grateful that Maddox has remained healthy. Alyssa is going in to be induced this evening and is hoping to meet Maddox soon with as few interventions as possible.
Being a young mother, just 22, Alyssa feels that there is even more pressure to look a certain way. For her, however, she's enjoyed the entirely new person that motherhood has made her. Mentally, physically and otherwise she has changed in ways that she couldn't have anticipated but are entirely positive and she's proud of the woman and mother she's become.