I admittedly had a very distorted view of all things special needs related before becoming a participant in the journey. When I saw someone with a visible disability, I felt sad. No one taught me that pity shouldn’t be one of the emotions to flow from me in that situation…until I met my children. Becoming… Continue reading From Pity To Passion
“Amy, you’ve been living in trauma for so many years that it’s reprogrammed your body. You likely can’t overcome this without medication.” …I cried in the doctor’s office. I don’t cry in front of people I barely know. That’s not how I operate. But there was something about this situation that made me feel completely… Continue reading When Getting Help Feels Like Giving Up
I am achingly lonely. A kind of lonely many special needs mamas come to know all too well. What was thought to be just a phase in my daughter’s journey with Autism is proving to be…not a phase. The behaviors we experience with her at home are very different than what the rest of the… Continue reading Getting Uncomfortable: Community & Suffering
I joke a lot about being in survival mode; about living life from one coffee to the next. I join in conversations with friends about the annoyance of toddler tantrums and picky eaters; laugh it all off like I’m just a typical mom with typical kids…but I’m not. I’m not laughing along with everyone else.… Continue reading Hidden Truths Of An Autism Mama
I’ve heard the terms “Super Mom” and “Wonder Woman” an uncomfortable amount of times over the past year or two. The more I’ve shared about our journey through Autism, homeschooling and life with four children in general, the more I heard them and the more I grew to dislike them…until yesterday. I’ve been wrestling with… Continue reading Being “Super Mom”
In this life, it rarely rains. It’s either a sunny, beautiful day…or it’s pouring, and I can hardly bring myself to get out of bed. It’s been pouring for over a week, one tough situation after another, and I’m finding it harder and harder to get past this suffocating feeling; this pressure in my chest. Her… Continue reading Never Alone: Whispers Of Grace
Sweet Girl, I know that the things the other kids at the playground said to you today were hurtful. They hurt me too. I try to be strong for you but the truth is, sometimes Mommy cries tears that no one but God can see. Sometimes my heart breaks into a million pieces for you,… Continue reading To My Daughter, When Words Hurt…
After I dropped the older kids off at VBS this morning (THANK YOU, volunteers!), I sat in my strangely quiet living room, listening to the rain with the baby on my lap. I unpacked my heavy heart before God. I know He’s always there. I see it in His mercies, moment-by-moment, in the middle of… Continue reading A Dry And Weary Season
His 2nd birthday party came and went. It was nothing like I’d imagined or secretly hoped for. There was no singing of “Happy Birthday”. Being surrounded and focused on by a group of people scares him and, to have them all start singing at him…there would only be tears. The candles scared him too, and… Continue reading Tradition Redefined
We’re back here again, living in a deep valley that no one around us seems to understand. Both my daughter and my son have been in meltdown mode day in and day out for weeks. Life did that thing again that sends them over the edge: it changed. My daughter lost her favorite therapist to another… Continue reading The Gift Of Acknowledgment
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