In October 2012 my husband was offered a job in San Francisco.  We lived in SF the previous year, knowing it was only temporary, and loved it.  But we were a newly wed couple (1.5 years of marriage) still doing what late 20-somethings do in a city.  When the temporary gig was up, we moved back to my hometown to our old life more or less.

Baby Monster was a mere 2 months old when we were faced with this second huge life change (the first being his birth).  We were still adjusting as new parents, but with the benefit of having my parents and brother, not to mention the countless of friends, there to help us along the way.  We were exhausted, happy, overwhelmed, everything new parents experience, but we had the benefit of our personal support network.

Husband also got a job offer at a company in my hometown, which pay wise was great.  But deep down we knew that the best thing for husband’s career was to pick up and move to SF.  And so he left at the end of October to embark on his new job opportunity, in addition to sort things out so that the transition for Baby Monster would be seemingly seamless.

Baby Monster and I finally made the leap in December 2012 at 4 months old.  Not only were we dealing with a huge move and 3 time zones, but the dreaded 4 month sleep regression.  Husband and I were even more exhausted, stressed, angry, sad, beaten, and without our support system.  Sure we had friends here, but we were the only ones married let alone with child.  My husband’s parents did come for Christmas, but that only provided a temporary reprieve and even then they too dreaded the sleep regression.  At our wits end, I was prepared to leave my husband and take Baby Monster back home with me.  I loved him dearly, but at the time I felt like things changed for the worse because everything was left behind on the other side of the country.

Ultimately we stuck it out and became stronger as family.  Baby Monster learned how to sleep again (thanks to sleep training).  Husband and I worked through our roles as parents to help support each other more.  We try to do things that we used to do before Baby Monster.  We began to develop a new support network here in SF.

The point of this post is to remind everyone, especially myself, that the mantra “This too shall pass” is, in fact, incredibly true.  It may seem like the end of the world and you may be desperate enough as a parent to give up, but you’ll learn from it, grow from it, and be stronger because of it (as cliché as it may be).  There is a light at the end of the tunnel.