This is an excerpt from Mother Letters: Sharing the Mess & the Glory.

Earlier this week I talked to a new friend. She’s expecting her first baby in a few months, and she’d just had a terrible day full of hormones and emotions. She was wondering if she’s crazy, because this being pregnant thing? It’s not her favorite.

“No way,” I reassured her. “You are not crazy.”

She protested. Every mother she knows claims to have loved being pregnant, so surely there’s something wrong with her. I promised her that nobody loves every second of her pregnancy, and some of us are miserable for a full nine months.

Isn’t that just the way of motherhood, though? Thinking, “I must be crazy. Everyone else has it together. I’m the only one . . .”

• I can’t believe I fed my children cereal for breakfast, lunch, and dinner today.
• Surely I’m the only mom who prays for her children to sleep past 7 am.
• I bet nobody else loses their temper eight times before school starts.
• It might be overkill, but I’m going to make sure she’s still breathing. Again.
• I just know the other moms have never screamed at their kids in the church parking lot.
• The website said it could be chicken pox . . . or cancer. I’m just not sure.

I must be crazy.

You’re not crazy. Well, you might be, but not for any of the reasons I mentioned above.

Something happens the moment you become a mother. The world becomes both more magical and more dangerous. Your body and your mind seem to be overtaken or, at the least, temporarily occupied by someone else—and you forget the last time you went an hour without being grabbed, pulled, pushed or poked. And completing a conversation or train of thought becomes as elusive as a winning lottery ticket or long bath.

It’s no wonder you feel a little crazy. But you’re not. Not really. You’ve just joined the ranks of the sane but sleepy, rational but emotional, steady but sensitive women who—no matter their different life situations or brand of crazy-but-not-crazy—call themselves mothers. These women know that motherhood is hard and stressful and thankless and scary. It’s almost enough to drive you crazy.

But it won’t.

You’re not crazy. You’re not alone. You’re not the only one. You’re. Not. Crazy.

For an entire book full of encouraging, inspiring letters written to every kind of mother, read Mother Letters: Sharing the Mess & the Glory.

Photos from last week’s vacation. Because what’s a vacation without S’mores?!