Blindsided by Emotion

Earlier this week, I had an emotional meltdown triggered by a three-word sentence I overheard. My response felt too intense, until I realized grief had been building for weeks with no outlet. It wasn’t that I avoided an expression of emotion, or was it? How often do we tamp down emotion so we can wait […]

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Uncovering Blessings in Hard Things

In recent months, I have spent lots of time sorting, cleaning out, and throwing away at my maternal grandparents’ home, where two of my aunts also lived. It’s been an arduous task going through the remnants of multiple lives. Sifting through photos and other memorabilia has also been emotionally overwhelming at times. But as I’ve […]

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Healing

In the time since my foot surgery, I’ve realized the surgery was the easy part. The healing process is much harder. I have mobility limitations and directives to aid healing, but as is often the case when you suddenly can’t do certain things, all you want is to do those very activities. Healing is not […]

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Serving as a Caregiver

Caregiving comes in various forms and different levels. Perhaps you provide care for a friend, spouse, sibling, child, or aging family member. Your support role may last a few weeks or years. Your ascent to caregiving may involve a slow climb or be thrust upon you suddenly via an emergent situation. Regardless of how caregiving […]

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4 Keys to Resilience

Early in February 2020, before the pandemic shut down our lives, a tornado ripped through our town, demolishing homes and businesses, and leaving other destruction in its wake. Several trees toppled in our backyard. A huge limb, severed from a tree in the front yard, landed in the middle of one of our largest limelight […]

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Ignoring the Obvious

When I was a child, my father had a gunite swimming pool built in our back yard. That pool is still in use today. In places, the coping is cracked, some tiles have a few chips, and the diving board is gone, but overall, our “cement pond” is in good shape for a 52-year-old. Growing […]

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5 Ways to Dial Down Wide-Open

At a recent family gathering, as the grandchildren zoomed through the room, our two-year-old granddaughter stopped in mid-run and announced, “I’m wide-open” before resuming her full-tilt forward motion. Not long after, she was clutching a blanket and staring, fighting the exhaustion that was steadily overtaking her. Often, we know we are over-extending ourselves, but do […]

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