Category: Personal Essay

Next Generation Worry

I’ve spent a lifetime understanding, coming to terms with and managing my own anxiety. Though it continues to flare up at times — after the death of my father, after I suffered a bleed in my brain, after the births of my children, and during all of 2020 — I’ve grown far better at learning […]

Good Mommy

For as long as I can remember, I wanted to be a mom. As a kid, I was obsessed with my dolls — I used to pretend they were each my child, and I would spend hours carefully deliberating over their names, their style of clothes, and how to best take care of them. I […]

Getting off the Train

When I was a kid, there was a rule in my house: when I came home from school, before I could play or call my friends on the phone to chat, I needed to get my homework done first. A total rule-follower, this never bothered me. In fact, over time, I grew to quite like […]

Surviving Dad – 13 Years Later

13 years ago today, at about 9 in the morning, I received what would be my very last email from my dad. It wasn’t a profound email or anything; if memory serves me correctly, it was just a forward of some silly joke passed onto him by his golf pals. But for years, I saved […]

2020’s Lesson: How to Pivot and Shift Gears

As you may have learned from my blog, going with the flow is not my strong suit. That said, 2020 has forced me (and all of us, really) to practice “rolling with the punches” over and over and over again. I really love knowing what’s going to happen, planning, sticking with a familiar and consistent […]

Strong and Worthy

Something happened, gradually at first, like tiny pinpricks I wasn’t even sure were real. Then, over time, the pricks got stronger and more painful — so much so that the anguish began to impede my life in all the big and small ways; the debilitating anxiety that I’d worked so hard to quell (and had […]

Shine a Light in the Darkness

My dad was truly the most optimistic person I’ve ever known. Not in a cheesy, Pollyanna way — as someone who was a kid during WW2, a history buff and a current events aficionado, he was keenly aware of all the problems in the world. It’s just that, despite the evils and darkness, he chose […]

The Frazzled Mom

I’m completely amazed when I see parents of multiple children who are not frazzled. The ones who at least seem to have their sh*t together – you know who they are; they ooze this enviable sense of calm in the midst of complete chaos. While also managing to keep their children alive. It’s truly amazing. […]

Strong

A little over a week and a half ago I underwent surgery to correct an umbilical hernia (read: belly button hernia) and diastasis recti (read: separated abdominal muscles). My muscles separated slightly after the birth of my firstborn 5.5 years ago, and just kept on widening during and after the birth of my twins. And […]

Handling Life as it Comes

Living life off the cuff — that’s what this entire blog is about;  being able to go with the flow, take life as it comes, handle whatever comes my way. As I write those terribly cliche phrases, I can’t help but feel my anxiety rise up from the tips of my toes straight up my […]