Chaos = Love

Kyden - mom, I really like your hair. It makes you look fierce. Like a... like a cougar!  Me - like a cougar huh?  K - yeah a cougar! Fierce, strong and kind! M - Wait. Kind? What cougars you think are kind? K - *stares at me with playful frustration* what do you want woman?! Would you rather be a freaking penguin?! 🤣 Yes I'm aware. He's pretty fantastic 😉 This child teaches me so much every day. He also makes me strongly aware of the flaws within myself. Like being really mean to myself.  This silly little moment is nothing new in our household but sometimes the thoughts I have afterwards are new and not always exciting.  Oh my gosh. I suck at taking compliments. Those were the words that rang through my head this morning. Now this is not a new piece of knowledge for me at all, but this morning I suddenly had a realization.  My kids are mean to themselves too... and some of the very words that come out of their mouths about themselves have come out of mine ab...

 Nobody. Not a single soul on this planet, has their life completely together.  That's right, I called you out.  Wait.  Or did I just call myself out? 🤣 I had big plans for myself when I was younger. Had no real clue what they were just some ideas, but I knew I wanted it to be big. Well my definition of big. I wanted to help people, or make people smile, or travel and help people. But mostly I knew I wanted to be a mom. If I did nothing else I was going to do that, and be the best mom on the planet. "bomb single mom" is how I described it then while I was in my very strong anti relationship phase at the age of 20.  If you'd asked me at that naive age of 20 where I would be at 35? My answer would be simple and much like anyone else's my age. Successful, financially stable, kids, nice house. Pretty standard American dream right? Well, that's the thing about dreams. There is no one size fits all. I tried many different ones. I got married, had babies, worked to ...

 Today I'm going to take a moment to talk about something that I'm struggling with that I know people other than me struggle with.  Managing ADHD.  Or in other words.. not managing it.  I am an individual with ADHD. Two of my three children have ADHD. I was diagnosed in 2003, my son in 2018, my daughter 2023. Quick peak at math, that would be 20 long years after her mother was diagnosed (hold on for a sec that's important for a reason.) Did you know that there is a cap on ADHD medications that can leave a pharmacy per month? And as more kids are being born and more people are being diagnosed that cap isn't added to?  ADHD is one of the most common issues you hear about these days and many kids (and adults) get very unlucky and aren't able to get their medications filled in this type of "first come first served" sort of thing.  On top of that, I know my prescription gets fought by my insurance company constantly and it's $558 updated price out of pocket...

 We definitely aren't considered normal.  Hell, I'd really question whether we are even considered human sometimes.  Sure, we are what's called stereotypes these days. You know the story, single mom with three kids blah blah blah.  Now, those three kids deal with not only their own messed up junk from parents who brought them into the world with no choice of their own, but... also their own, ya know, messed up junk..  And let's not get started on their ADHD mom who misplaces her keys more than anyone you've probably ever met. (If you want to argue, I guarantee I'm at least a close second) and who has so many issues from her past she's might as well be the subject of a text book. But somehow, through the chaos, the pain and the ridiculous amount of frozen foods I'm shoving down their throats trying to get them in bed before 10PM we seem to be pretty well rounded.  We are goofy and sometimes sad. We are loud but love silent snuggles. We mess up a lot and h...