The voice behind Carina's Wholesome House

Hello and welcome to Carina's Wholesome House blog. A blog about all things motherhood, parenting, womanhood, faith, homeschooling, budgeting, beauty, fashion and being a valuable partner. Come along with me on my journey!

I wanted to start this blog as I found myself looking up to a lot of influencers and bloggers that had an overall personality of being a wholesome housewife and mother (a proverbs 31 woman - IYKYK). And to be honest, I was spending so much of my time consuming SO much content that it lead me to a point that I had had enough with the comparing and the consuming that I wanted to put that time into creating instead. Over the years, in the back of my mind I always knew that creating is always better than consuming when it comes to spending time on social media. I always wanted to create a personal brand for myself doing social media, YouTube or blogging as a side hustle-type career alongside being a stay at home mum. Since I am always at home, I felt that starting this blog would be valuable to me, and a good place to start, so that I can start creating in my time and documenting my self-evolution journey.

In this new season of my life, learning and evolving into a well-rounded woman is extremely valuable to me. I began this journey into motherhood by becoming a mother at 21. And to clarify, I am 25 now starting this blog. I came into becoming a mother completely blind and naive on what motherhood was actually like. At 21, I had barely any skills or prior knowledge on what it took to run a household, support my partner, mother a newborn child and help them evolve and grow into their later years. My mental health suffered majority of the time and I was so confused about who I was and what I was supposed to be doing with my time. The questions would always arise in my head like, "What am I meant to be doing with myself?", "Aren't I supposed to be contributing financially to the family?", "Am I even a good mother?" and "How am I meant to be a good mother or partner?".

I felt so lost until I found God.

And I mean, truely found God. "Saved" as some Christians call it. And this only happened around July 2023 so it took me 3 years into being a mother to finally find peace and clarity about life. To give God some of my worries and He gave me answers.

All of my life I knew I was Christian. Was baptised Lutheran, went to Christian schools, went to church on the odd occasion and at special times of the year. I even went to Church camps in my teens but truely never actually devoted my life to my faith like I have now. Life has truely changed since and I will never look back.

I have gone through many trials in my life. To give you a bit of a view on who I am and my story, I have listed a few significant moments that you may or may not relate to below.

• I lost my younger brother when I was 6 years old. He was only 2 days old when he had to be taken off life support after a complicated birth.

• Left my small-town country home in my late teens to move to the big city and pursue a career in fashion design which I later never finished knowing that the industry just wasn't for me.

• Whilst living out of home in my late teens my parents split which left me feeling I had no real "home" to return to if I needed to.

• I became a mother in early 2020 to my beautiful son, Atlas. Unfortunately, in the beginning of COVID just as all the restrictions began.

• Post birth we went through some really tough times that really shaped us as parents. COVID restrictions, family issues, child protection/dhhs wrongfully stepping in and in the midst of the chaos learning to become new parents for the first time! I unfortunately came out of all of this with postpartum depression which was a big struggle to get through but one I am proud to be out on the other side of and super grateful for the support I had going through it all. (I am not afraid to talk about my experience with child protection/DHHS. They dropped the claim within two weeks after making the conclusion that they had no reason to be looking into our situation. It was extremely traumatising but now I have no fear and feel strong enough to talk about my experience so that other mothers and fathers don't feel alone like myself and my partner felt at the time. I am always here if anyone needs to reach out and talk if they've gone through a similar situation. It is unspoken about most of the time but is actually quite common...)

• In early 2021, myself and my partner split for a period of time as the pressures of being a young couple with many issues caused us to walk away from our relationship. Since then, we have come together again after a considerable amount of personal growth, to give it another try for the sake of our son and so that we can have a happy, loving and fulfilling relationship and a united family.

• In 2021, when my son was 1.5 years old, I developed a neurological disorder called Functional Neurological Disorder (FND). FND is caused by the "software" of the brain rewiring itself and creating new pathways. It is a very diverse condition and many people have different experiences. But with mine, high sensory overload, anxiety and stress would cause me to get ticks, tremors or lead to conscious seizures. I went from being in a wheelchair full-time, to using a walker, to where I thankfully am now. Able to control my seizures with mindfullness, lowering stress/anxiety where possible and steering clear of flashing lights, loud noises and high sensory situations. Probably one of the hardest mountains I have ever had to climb but proud of how strong it has made me today. I learnt a lot of personal lessons during this time.

And now to today, I am working on becoming a well-rounded, family-focused woman. One that is Christ-led, pouring peace and love into my family. My neurological disorder is as good as it has ever been. I feel I no longer need to rely on my partner to care for me (still working on driving for longer distances). I am working on self development daily, dabbling in creative outlets and maintaining a consistent effort in the home to make sure my family are safe, well looked after and loved.

I hope you enjoy reading and gain something from this blog. If it only be relating to a life-experience I've had or gaining new knowledge about motherhood, womanhood, homeschooling, living a Christ-led life or any of the other topics I will speak on in the future.

Thank you for joining this journey of mine and I will see you in the next post.

Carina xx