What does the primary 12 months of motherhood appear like?

What does the first year of motherhood look like?

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In the weeks after photographer Rachel Papo gave birth to her son, Ilan, in the summer of 2013, she monitored herself. She watched for signs of anxiety, insomnia or loneliness, for the fog that had blanketed her brain for months after the birth of her daughter, Zohar, three years prior, making it difficult for her to function day to day.

I’m doing OK, I’m doing OK, I’m doing OK, Papo recalled thinking as the days passed in Berlin, where she had moved from New York with her musician husband, Micah, and Zohar, while pregnant. After Ilan’s birth, Papo took photos of her surroundings, as she always did, of the lightning-lit skyline, rain-saturated yellow leaves and her newborn sleeping in striped pajamas, his small features awash in moonlight. But unease crept into her text exchanges with family and friends overseas — her hard-earned sense of stability felt fragile.

“Then there was this little stumble,” Papo recalled during an interview at a café in Brooklyn. “All of the sudden, I…

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