Joseph turns eight tomorrow. Just writing that sentence makes my chest ache in the most bittersweet way.
Looking back on the years of his life, all the versions of him I’ve gotten to witness, brings up this flood of emotion that’s hard to explain. I don’t just see a little boy in old videos, excitedly telling me about something that lit up his world. I see me too. The version of me that stood behind the camera. The one listening. The one learning how to be a mother in real time.
And sometimes that’s where the ache really lives.
Because I feel so much more prepared to be a mother now. More healed. More aware. More capable of slowing down and showing up the way I want to. And yet, he had to have the unhealed, unsure, overwhelmed version of me for a while. The one who didn’t fully understand herself yet. The one who was still carrying so much and didn’t know how to put it down.
When I found out I was pregnant with Joseph, Josh and I had already gone through a miscarriage. So when that positive test came, I was elated. Hopeful. This was the next step. The life I thought I was supposed to live. Get a job. Get married. Have kids. That was the plan. That was going to make my life perfect.
But I didn’t think about what came after the baby came home. I didn’t think about actually being a mother, about shaping another human’s life while still trying to figure out my own.
I thought I was ready. I don’t even know why. I wasn’t scared. But I probably should’ve been.
After Joseph was born, the hits started coming. Those early weeks were filled with support and visitors and people offering help. But then, like it always does, life moved on for everyone else. And I was left in the quiet, just me and this tiny baby who needed everything from me.
That’s when things got hard.
I struggled with postpartum depression. I barely left the house. Everything felt heavy. It was a lonely time, even though I had this beautiful baby in my arms. There were days (almost all of them) I didn’t recognize myself. And truthfully, I’m not sure I knew myself well enough yet to feel lost. I just knew something was missing.
As the years went by, I noticed things about Joseph. He was different. He reminded me a lot of myself as a kid, the way he experienced the world, the way he responded to certain things. He didn’t hit milestones like other kids. And I started doing research. Trying to understand what I was seeing.
We had him evaluated when he was six. And he was diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder. It confirmed what I had suspected all along. But it did more than that.
As I started diving deeper into what autism meant for him, how to support him, what tools might help, what his unique experience of the world looked like, I started recognizing things I hadn’t named in myself.
The overwhelm. The sensory overload. The need for routine. The way some things felt too much and others felt not enough. The struggle to explain emotions I didn’t fully understand. It all felt familiar in a way that was both comforting and heartbreaking.
It was like watching puzzle pieces slowly click into place, not just for him, but for me too. Like we were unraveling something together. Like he was unknowingly handing me a mirror and saying, “Look. It’s okay. You make sense.”
Joseph didn’t just lead me to understand him better. He led me to understand myself.
And in doing that, he taught me how to be softer. Kinder. Not just toward him, but toward the little version of me who had gone so long without that same grace.
He’s shown me that you can’t always see someone’s struggle. That even the tiniest decision can feel impossible when you don’t have the right support. That love, real unconditional love, isn’t always loud or flashy. It’s steady. It’s patient. It’s choosing each other, again and again, even on the hard days. Especially on the hard days.
Now, eight years later, I recognize myself when I look in the mirror. Slowly, and I mean slowly, I’ve become the version of me that was buried so deep under fear, confusion, and old survival strategies.
It all started when I became his mom. But I’m still growing. Still becoming. I know motherhood will keep reshaping me for as long as I’m lucky enough to live it.
So today, on the edge of Joseph’s eighth birthday, I’m honoring both of us. The little boy who came into the world and changed mine forever. And the version of me who kept showing up, even when she didn’t know how. He’s been becoming too, in his own beautiful, brilliant way. And I’ve had the privilege of watching every step of it.
I wouldn’t be who I am today without him.
With love & light,
Jessica ♡
PS — Joseph, if you ever read this:
You are so smart, kind, loving, and creative. You see the world in ways I never could until you showed me how. You’ve helped me see myself, and I will never be able to repay you for that. I love you more than I could ever express, and as hard as it is sometimes, I love watching you grow into the person you’re becoming. You are magic, and you always have been.
Unraveling the Self 
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