6 to 10 inches

Watching movies and television shows always induces thoughts. 

They meet by chance years ago when they are both young. Hes a musician following his heart. Shes in corporate America lost in her own thoughts. 

To him ... the first date was that night at the local college campus. They went for a drive. Listened to some of his original music and then some of his inspiration. He opened his heart to this girl. He showed her some of the most intimate parts of him and they never had physical contact.  Thats what passion does. When you share that with someone you become vulnerable. Thats what he did. He had no reservations. No fear. Just faith and optimism.
They finished their date. He took her home and said goodbye. He did not kiss her. He respected her. He was a gentleman. 

To her ... this wasnt a date. They are going to hang out and grab some food. She heard this crazy music for the first time. The loudness. The deep bass. The windows bowing in sync with the beat. It wasnt rap. What was this? And then the beat dropped ... She fell in love with the music. She didnt know it at the time, but she fell in love with him. 

She ended up driving hours to another state with a girlfriend to go see this boy and his friends on a business trip. The girls decided last minute. Had to get babysitters for the weekend for their kids. Off they went. That trip was too short but the memories will last her a lifetime. One of the absolute best memories this girl will have.  

Its not common to hear stories about a girl and a boy sharing a hotel room alone without physical contact. They were one of those stories. She did not know this was the last time they would have this opportunity. 

         Fast forward a few years.  Fast forward through some silly heart breaks. Some bad choices. Some consequences. He ended up moving away. She ended up driving very often to see him. There were some tears. Some smiles. He wrote her letters. He wrote her letters on paper. Who does that? A gentleman. Thats who. He was consistent. Always consistent. He went away for a while and she thought he was gone forever. She thought maybe he had died. Why else would someone just fall off the planet? Why else would someone go radio silent for so long? Then the tears came ... how did he die and she didnt know?
He came back. 

They picked right back up as if no time had passed. The laughing. The chemistry. The passion. He was still so kind. He was still caring. He still loved her. She still didnt know it, but she loved him back. 

One day he told her "I have had a feeling that it would work out one day. I always held out hope. I knew it would happen eventually. I figured you would see eventually."  THAT was something that she always needed to hear. See, her whole life every one always left her. No one held out. No one came back. People always leave. He even left her.  But he came back ... he never gave up on her. He never stopped trying. This man is who she needs. This is the man. 

He later said "I just need 6 to 10 inches"  and like a moth to flame, she was done and they haven't even kissed.

Their love story isnt over...

5 Months and heartache.

For the last several years, I have experienced a lot of obstacles. Yesterday was no different. 

When you are calling around to establish new services, you get a lot of no's. I have had zero luck this month. I hear "sorry" more than not. Actually, I have only heard "sorry, we aren't taking new patients" from every office I have called except for one.

What comes to mind when you hear "walk-in" ?  
When I call for an appointment and am told "You have to walk in for your intake. We dont do appointments." That is what I think. I think that I have to walk in to your office during the hours you told me and proceed with the intake. 

I do not expect to pick up my neurologically challenged son early from school to come to a walk-in only office to be told "sorry we dont have any appointments today."  He slumped down on the floor.

I almost broke down in tears right there. My son was on the floor. 

But then they added to the fire. "We don't have any openings for the psychiatrist for 5 months." 

 I wanted to collapse. My son was still on the floor. 

When medications are controlled, you only get a script once a month. When your brain is wired so differently that this medication is the biggest reason you arent in the hospital, you take your medication. When the doctors office tells you it will 5 months before you can even get seen - what are you supposed to do with that? 
What? No medication for 5 months? 
I bet the homeless clinic would get their patients in today.
Will he end up going to the hospital again? 
Will his anger become so out of control again? 
Will the psychosis come back? 
Will he end up going to the hospital again? 
Will the light in his eyes disappear again? 
All I can see ... is another emergency .. and they just see me as another mom with a situation. They dont see the emergency. 
The hospital, again? 

Is that how our providers are? When prevention is not a priority, when emergency care is put first. This is absurd! I have been in the field. I know what its like. But that is in a red state. Where mental health needs are the last thing on everyones agenda. 

When we care more about the problems created rather than the prevention, we have failed. 
When we are bothered about the presence of those problems but we dont want to provide any methods of prevention, we have failed. 

                                              
Five months.

Can I collapse yet? My heart is broken because of the system. My heart is broken because of the struggles we have to endure. My heart is broke because THIS SUCKS.

I am my sons advocate. I cant collapse. 
I am my sons advocate. I cant stop. I cant give up. 

Take the side roads!

Something that happened to me today: 

After I picked up my son from school, he and I were driving to a local diner to grab a burger. Before we ate, he wanted to go to a nature center in our neighborhood. I love his heart. He can have such a rough day and be so angry, you can see it in his eyes. But when he gets in his element, you can see that in his eyes. The happiness. The passion. The blissful innocence. Nothing else matters than that moment. 
When did we lose that? As adults, when did we get so caught up in the hustle and bustle of life that we stopped enjoying those moments? we no longer went that extra mile because the view was better. 
I am so thankful for my son for many reasons. 
But mostly, he changed my life. 
I was a type-A personality until very recently. 

I was very detail orientated and had to control every aspect of the day. Otherwise, I would have a panic attack. I would be so pissed if something did not go as planned. I had my day scheduled. I had my appointments planned. I have our activities planned. I was very productive. I was very stressed. I was unpleasant to be around sometimes and frankly I was not happy. I thought I was most of the time. I knew the increased level of stress that this put on my heart and my life. I felt the emotional toll every day. But it didn't matter.

When my son began exhibiting signs of his neurological differences, I had no idea. I was a young first-time mom to a boy. So my mom couldnt even help (she didnt raise a boy). After a few years of evaluations, suspensions, doctors, loss of employment ... I took a look at myself and realized that I had to change. I never thought it was possible, but I changed. It was as if one day the light switched and I was different. My son has a list of alphabet soup that follows him around: TBI, SPD, ASD, Adhd... but all I see is an incredible brain that takes the side roads. Which is much like our life. We prefer to take the side roads and avoid the freeways! 
I knew that because his brain was different, there was absolutely no way HE would learn to conform to my personality. I had to change to fit his needs. It was easy for me. I knew I was changing for my son. To help him be more successful. 
Looking back, I wish that more people in our world would have done that. I wish that more people would have atleast changed a couple things about their life. The closest people to us are just as selfish as ever, if not more so. It is heartbreaking when you think about it. On the other hand I am thankful they stay true. Its easy when we know that a person is a certain way. We can plan around it. And often times we just avoid them altogether! 

During the time period when I was changing, some of my "friends" thought it was funny to joke about how flighty I appeared. How much I changed and was not reliable. How I move a lot and cant just be normal. At the time, I didn't think much of it. But after a few years, it really started to get to me. These are people that I had valued. They were friends of mine. 

How could they not see the WHY behind my choices? 

And that time period is where the pattern of loss continued. I lost jobs. I lost friends. I lost love. I lost faith in others. Granted, I did make these choices. I am responsible. I have no regrets in my choices. I made these choices in support of my son. I made these choices because I am a mom. The last 9 years of my life has been a lot of loss. There has been a lot of depression and anxiety. There has been a lot of growing and learning. Maybe from an outsiders view I appear flighty and unreliable. From the insiders view, I make the choice to avoid certain situations. I make moves to better our situation or atleast in attempt to prevent it from becoming worse. 

Can someone really change their Personality?  Not completely. 
I am a lot more laid back and relaxed than I was. The last two years of my life have been so strange for me. I went on vacations with NO PLAN! I went on road trips with no bags packed. I drove hours and miles with no schedule. I just went. I LIVED. I had adventures. My son got to enjoy little things because we could. There was no rush to be there by 6. We just did whatever we wanted. 
I still am structured and organized and live by a schedule, but I have redirected those traits to help my son. Because his brain needs that structure. He loves fun. He loves last minute road trips to the river. But by golly, if his schedule gets messed up we all pay for it! He has taught me so much in his 9 years. 

My son has taught me patience: I am told often that I have more patience than most people. The special needs families have an abundance of patience. The "neurotypical"  (NT) families do not. Its not something worthy of praise. Its something that is just done. You dont choose to be patient for your kids or not. You do it because its what is needed. 

My son has taught me to be easy going. He taught me to go with the flow. I dont know how to explain this .. it will have its own blog post! But I shall try. Parents of NT kids traditionally dont change their personalities. They teach their kids their way. Whereas parents of non-NT kids do not always have that luxury. My sons brain works in a way that there is not a lot of successful traditional methods. HE has to have the schedule and the structure and the organization. If I were still so Type-A, this would not work well for us! I have to be able to change in a moments notice. I have to be flexible because my son is not.

My son has taught me to stop and enjoy the little things. Quite literally too. We joke and call it his Adhd. For the past 7 years, he has been rather consistent! We will be going about our business and he jump off of whatever he is on (bike, scooter, shoulders) to smell a flower, watch a rolly polly crawl, save a spider, catch a snake. He will stop going fast to lay on the concrete to watch life up close. 

Which leads me back to ... what happened today.

He wanted to go to the nature center and watch nature. He wanted to be slow and focus on the little things. The struggles of the day. The stress of school. The amount of excessive sensory input that his brain and body received over the day. He did not have a meltdown today.
He was so excited when we pulled into the parking lot. 
He ran to the door. Went straight in to the dinosaurs. Usually he would have ran up the stairs. To hurry and get to the top. But imagine a bride walking down the aisle. That slow march that seems to take forever. 
That was my son. 
Holy Moly. 
But his face while we climbed the stairs.. every step was deliberate. 
He was so happy. He was relaxed. He was calm. He was innocent. 

We can walk negative snail speed any day! 
These are the days we live for ... 

... and then we had burgers!  

What...

Next question ... What.

What will I tell you? 

What will I share? 

What will you learn?

What will you take away from this blog? 

I will fail. I will try again. Repeat until success.
I aim to share information with you. I aim to shed light on challenges. If I can help one person with my words then I have not failed. 

I will tell you about my day. Not every day, I dont think I will be living on the computer! Ha!  But the little stuff that matters. The eventful things that stress us out. The song that I heard while driving that impacted my day. That picture message I get from a friend or a loved one that brings a smile to my face.

I will tell you about the challenges I have as a single mother. A single mother of a boy with no father. A boy with special needs. The challenges we have from moving out of state with no support network. But I will also tell you about the wonderful things that we experience in spite of these challenges. 

I will share lyrics and quotes and movie lines ... because anyone that knows me, knows that is where I live. In an alternate reality. Because verbal communication is a weakness I have.

I will share my heart. I have a lot of mistakes in my past. No, I have a lot of learning opportunities in my past. I will share my heart breaks and my loves. Not the personal specifics, but the point of it all. Who knows... maybe i have learned enough and this time will be different! 

In my house, we love God. I will not shove anything or try to persuade one religion or another ... however God does get me through the day and I will share that. I read books every now and again. Take challenges. And I will share that. 

I will share our journeys. The random road trips because we adore being. Just being. Driving 10 miles or 100 miles to just BE. To go for a hike, to watch the sun set, to find a magpie. The weekend getaways we taketo get back to us. The out of state vacations for new adventures. Life is too short to wait. Life is too short to save up for that trip. So just go. 

In the past, I was very active and fit. I worked out at least once daily. I trained for fitness competitions, marathons, and that cute bikini. 
I am getting back to that ... I will share why I stopped and why I am starting again. I will share my food, my meal plans, products I love, fitness tips and complaints. The real stuff. I take fitness challenges and fall short sometimes. I will share that. And use this for personal accountability! 

The what ... the what is me. I will be sharing me. 

Not for approval. Not for validation. Not for bravos. But to help someone else. And, to help myself. 

Instagram for daily pictures.
Pinterest for, well, everything in my head and heart.

Why...

This is always the good question..

Why...?

One of the first things we learn as kids is "Why" 
Why are going to the store? Why is the sky blue? Why does mommy like wine? 
Why are people hateful?  Why are people funny? Why are we here? 

Why? 

So, why am I here? 
Most specifically, I am writing this blog to speak. I am here to to share things, to ask questions, to offer insight in to my experiences. 
I have always been better at writing than verbally speaking. Lately I have had been asked a lot of questions, I have been an advocate, I have a loud voice. But what I am actually saying? Am I using my voice to be productive or am I just making noise?  
A friend recommended a blog for multiple reasons ... I have so many things going on this is a good space to keep it altogether! 
A quilt of my life ... 

I attended a training about 5 years ago where the big question they presented was "Why."  Why are you here?  What is your WHY?  When you wake up every day, why are you waking up? What is your purpose?  What makes you keep going when everything seems to me mounting against you?  
The answer I had then is the same answer I have now. My son.  

Through this blog you will learn about me. You will learn about my son and our special challenges that we face together every single day. You will see that I am a mess of chaos but I have the best intentions. I make a lot of mistakes. I make dumb decisions. But I also make really great choices every day. I try to learn from everything. 
I hope through this blog I can hold myself accountable as well as possibly help someone else. That is why we speak, right? To help someone else ... to build them up rather than tear them down. 

What is YOUR why? 

#1

... a lifestyle blog about yours truly ... 

My experiences. My journeys. 
Music and Movies. 
My loves and heartbreaks. 
The Special Needs road, the beautiful journey and the bumps along the way .. 
Life of a single Mom. 
Some crafts I love. 
The laughs. The cries. 
Personality types.
Fitness and Nutrition: an active and healthy lifestyle. 
Traveling and enjoying life.