Joy In The Midst of Struggles

A couple of weeks ago I was in Target and I needed to walk past a mom and son (he was about 5 years old). I said, "excuse me" and they moved over. Then I heard the boy say..  "She has a funny voice"...(this is often how children refer to me when they know I am different they say funny). Now it is not what the little boy said that bugged me. It was what the mom responded with "Don't say that" Boy responded: "Why?" Mom: "Because it is not nice to say" You may be thinking well what is wrong with the mother's response? Let me tell you. How are children supposed to learn how to be around and treat others with disabilities with love if they are taught to ignore them and not learn from them. You see that mom indirectly just taught that boy that it is inappropriate to ask questions about people who are different from them. The boy just gave a natural curious statement and instead of learning why it is that I talk funny he ...

Hello all! It's been a while! But as many of you that follow me on Instagram or Facebook may have recently saw my latest post about my shaky hands and I wanted to pop on here and describe more in detail so here we go! I have talked before about the therapies I went through as a kid and one thing I have not mentioned is I got Occupational and Physical therapy through the state called CCS and the way the state works is they provide you services until you are 21 and then you are kind of left to "adulting" with CP where you have to find new doctors and therapies to work for your body. Roughly 6 months ago maybe even longer I started noticing that my hands were more shaky than usual. When reaching for a glass or cup my hands are having a difficult time grabbing the cup or I spill the contents of the cup more easily. Now I take two kinds of medications Baclofen and Artane that are to help with my shakiness. I started these medications in high school and have had several adj...

Do you ever have days, a week, or weeks where you notice the same thing popping up. Over the past two weeks I have been in conversations with 3 different sets of people and the same topic has popped up. What is this topic you may ask? It's the fact that this person typing this blog right now is so different from the girl back in high school or the girl from 4 years ago. You see the first person I had this conversation with I have known for 6 months, the next was my best friend I met in college, and the third was a group of girls I have known for two years. The two that have known me the shortest amount of time were shocked when I described myself from a while ago and the one from college completely agreed with me. You see when I think about my high school self and college self I see a shy girl that didn't want to look anyone in the eye for fear that they would see  my disability and immediately not like me. Or fear that if I look them in the eye then they will want to ask que...

Hi all. Sorry it has been a while but with the holidays and everything I just got swept away. But lately my schedule has been a little more relaxed and since I lost my voice last week I have spent a lot of solitary time and one thing that kept popping up in my mind lately is how much things have changed in a year. In just over a month and a half it will be the year anniversary of me moving out on my own (how crazy is that?!). But it was around this time that was one of the hardest times of my life. I would drive home everyday just crying out of tiredness out of hurt out of frustration or stress. I was beyond overwhelmed with relationships changing, stress from doing my masters, and a job that was taking a lot out of me both physically and mentally. When I look at pictures of myself a year ago I see a girl with a fake smile because I was trying to do everything and be everything I thought everybody needed me to be. So then I began thinking how did I go from this very dark place to whe...

In the recent months I have noticed a shift on social media about how some individuals do not like the word "special needs" to label someone who has a "disability". They tend to argue why do we even have to label and my kids/own needs are not exactly special. I remember bringing this up to my mom when I first heard of the backlash and my mom said she argued that there is nothing wrong with that label because individuals with "disabilities" DO have special needs, which I agree. I see nothing wrong with the label "special needs" because we are truly special people. So what shall we call you?????? We certainly have come a long way as far as the label goes. I mean come on people used to call us retarded. So I am proud of the shift but here is my view of what I preferred to be called and what I call my students. We are DIFFERENTLY ABLED. Do you want to know why I prefer this term so much better than "special needs" or "individua...

Hey There! I know it has been a while since I have chatted with all of you on here but between wedding season and holidays life has been rather chaotic. But I wanted to come on here and write about how my life has change since last Thanksgiving and all the goodness the Lord has showered me with. This year has been filled with A LOT of new so here we go... 1. A new adventure of moving out by myself! This one I think is the biggest because I knew I wanted to move out but I didn't know how it would happen and of course the Lord always lays out the perfect path and I am so in love with my little apartment and the person it has made me become. There is so much you learn about yourself when you are alone. I have learned to cook (let's be real very simple meals). I have learned how to pay bills and to never stop trying because you better keep working until you are able to open that bag of cheese because no one is around to help you open it. This new change has made me more com...

Alright friends we all know I am very real on here so let me tell you about my real life and things I sometimes forget to talk about. This last weekend I was in Colorado for my best friend's bachelorette. I think I have told you all before that I take medication for my shakiness. I have to take pills three times a day (morning, afternoon, and night). Now let's be real sometimes I forget to take my afternoon pill and the last weekend I had forgotten to take my afternoon and night time medication. So here are the side effects...I become really shaky. So the following day the girls and I hit the downtown and got some coffee to warm us up. Well I think that I have already told you that carrying open drinks is not good. aka beware it will spill so if you combine that with not taking my meds...hot mess alert. The girls started walking and I tried to catch up but I was just spilling my coffee all over me (yeah these are my hot mess moments). But what was different about this one i...