MÈRE Stories: Anna Schauerman
My first daughter, Rosie, came into the world after an overall smooth and beautiful vaginal birth. It was everything I had hoped for and gave me confidence stepping into motherhood.
Between Rosie and my second daughter, Helen, I walked through two losses and a long year of waiting.
Just as we started fertility testing, I got pregnant again.
That season reminded me of how fragile, unpredictable, and humbling this journey can be.
Helen’s birth was a planned c-section because she was breech.
It was the opposite of my first birth but equally beautiful in its own way.
That contrast – two very different births, both meaningful – taught me that motherhood rarely looks like the plan we write in our heads.
You can do everything "right" and things can still go a different way. And yet, it doesn't have to be perfect to be good.
Now I’m in another season of surrender, one that feels just as vulnerable: leaving behind the career I loved and poured myself into to stay home with my daughters.
It has been both scary and freeing.
I wrestled with guilt and fear of losing myself, but my professional experience taught me to trust my instincts, and now I’m learning to honor them in motherhood too.
Listening to that quiet voice, choosing presence over performance, has been my bravest decision yet.
If you had to summarize your journey in motherhood with all its challenges, how would you describe it now? How have you found a way to reclaim your strength or identity? What have you learned?Motherhood has continually asked me to loosen my grip on my plans and my timeline.
I’ve learned that my identity isn’t rooted in my productivity or titles, but in the way I show up for my family and myself.
Trusting my gut has been the compass guiding me when logic, fear, or outside voices felt louder. That instinct is something I can strengthen with practice, and the more I do, the more grounded and confident I feel.
What advice or words of encouragement would you give another mom walking through a similar chapter? Your gut is worth listening to.
Whether it’s about how you birth, how you feed, how you work, or how you spend your days – you have an inner knowing that deserves trust.
Lean into it, even when it feels uncertain.
Don’t measure yourself by other people’s paths or opinions. Your children don’t need a perfect mom; they just need you.
Your story doesn’t have to look the way you pictured for it to be good. Your worth isn’t defined by the “how". You are enough simply because you are their mom.
Sometimes the things we resist most become the very spaces where we find peace.
How has your journey changed you, both in ways you expected and in ways you never could have imagined?
I expected motherhood to stretch me, but I didn’t know it would transform me.
I never thought I’d step away from my career, but in doing so I’ve uncovered a truer, deeper version of myself.
I see this season as one of the greatest gifts and honors of my life.
Motherhood has softened me, strengthened me, and made me more confident in my own instincts.
It has taught me that letting go isn’t weakness. It’s often the bravest way forward.
— Anna Schauerman
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