Life after the Storm

On May 19th, I gave this speech to fellow survivors, walkers, mamas, and papas, at the Preeclampsia Promise Walk in Dallas.  My speech: I’m Leila Tualla, a believer, a wife, mama to two feisty kiddos. I’m an anxious writer and a terrible speaker. I was in the fun phase of my second trimester where maternity photo shoots would be scheduled, hospital tours were coming up, and so were the endless supply of baby shower treats. My first child would be born in a sea of pink and polka dots. I was in bliss. And then I one day, I wasn’t. In January 2012, about 26 weeks in, I was diagnosed w Preeclampsia. At 31 weeks, I entered motherhood w a baby that needed to be life lighted to a hospital that had a NICU an hour and a half away. It would be her home for six weeks. Those weeks blurred into each other, and I only remember the highs and lows. There were plenty of highs, including her first bath, our first kangaroo care, meeting the grandparents….. I r...

Mother's Day 2016 I was told on Mother's Day two years ago, that the NICU was gearing up to discharge us. I spent a majority of that day doing Infant CPR and infant care and then doing a car seat challenge. There was no "celebration of mom" at our house, but a celebration of the IDEA that my family would be whole soon. On Feliz dia de las Madres (Mexican Mother's Day), I was holding onto my little man's hand on our way home. I didn't have breakfast in bed or have a slice of cake. I didn't have any time carved out for "me-time."  What I did have were little toes and fingers to kiss lovingly....for however long I wish. I didn't have wires I had to worry about or had to explain to my five year old why and what the alarms that sounded meant. What I did have was a big helper who knew where the diapers and wipes were kept; who kept kissing on baby brother and who wanted so badly for him to "get bigger so we can play barbies....

I've been doing a creatives workshop for the past few weeks. We're actually on week 7 now. This workshop is specifically for mothers and the experience has been interesting, to say the least. I'm learning about myself as a mother, my identity, how to carve time for both my writings and for my kids and my sanity.....I've been to a few creative groups and almost all the ones I've been to, there isn't a young writer mama in the mix. Or at least a mama with littles. These groups usually have older, retired creatives who towards the later seasons of their lives, picking up their dream/hobby/passion. They don't have to worry about feeding toddlers and doing homework with kindergarteners. The pressure of keeping house tidy and getting everyone bathed and tucked in, are gone. My season of writing has coincided with the early years of motherhood. While I wrote Love, Defined in 2003/04, it wasn't until 2015 that it was published.....when my daughter was 3. As I...

Hey there!  Thanks for stopping by! WHY I WRITE: Pregnancy is supposed to be this beautiful and wondrous thing. If you're like me, you have had the perfect "textbook" pregnancy up until the words, "you have Preeclampsia," were uttered. Suddenly, you're not so sure what's going on with your body, with your pregnancy, and to some extent, with your life.  I've been there.  I've researched more than I care to admit about Preeclampsia, "life after preeclampsia," subsequent pregnancies, etc.  I thought I was done with babies when I still have to pick up broken pieces of my heart and this idealization of what motherhood is supposed to look like when my girl was born.  I endured. I AM enduring. There's really nothing you can do except putting one foot in front of the other and hoping for the best. My journey with Preeclampsia began in 2012. Our story begins here: Do two positives make a baby? My First prenatal appo...

Starting from Scratch (again) I miss blogging. It's been almost 2 months since I left this site. 2 months and I've decided I don't like the look of my author website....and how as much as I wanted to integrate the two. I just can't. This space is under construction. In the future, I will post only on Mondays and all about Motherhood. My motherhood monday series will begin in TWO WEEKS(eek!!) starting on April 1st. I will also post my author news here once a month...which will also be on my website. Third time's the charm, right?!

The thing about trauma is that the further removed you are in time from it, the less painful it becomes. Yes, there may be some triggers that will bring you to your knees or force you to hide and breathe in the tears that threaten. But for the most part, years of separation from those events lessen the emotional weight you carry. *Though, I realize this may not be true for all traumas. ...what happens when it's associated with your children? You can't shove the feelings. You can't hide from the tears. You can only hold onto the moments of pain and in one breath, try as hard as you can to let it go. Every year, I remember the smells and sounds of the NICU. I remember their little incubators and only being allowed to touch and not hold my babies in my arms. Every year, I have tears for all that what-ifs. And every day of that year, I hug my children as tightly as I can. The memories are us. We are who we are today because of them.  Our beginnings start at the pa...

If you follow me on my author page - www.leilatualla.com or on my social media, you would know that yesterday, I did my very first poetry reading along with different writers at an event in my hometown called, "Get Lit at the Main Pecan." I read through my piece a few days before and choose the two poems that I wanted to read. I was ready but nerves would surface the closer I got to Saturday. When it was my turn to speak, I COULD NOT get through the entire reading without breaking down. In hindsight, I should have read my words out loud. I sat down and calmed my beating heart and closed my mind off of the negative thoughts. I was convinced that there is no way I was going to do this again. And then in that room of almost thirty people, I had three different mamas walk up to me and share their stories. 3 women, 4 including myself, talked about our own preeclampsia journeys and the mental and emotional damage it did to us. This journey - my book - was a way for me to ...