Facing Life’s Big Challenges and Coming out on Top

“Life always waits for some crisis to occur before revealing itself at its most brilliant.” ~Paul Coelho

I will never forget that day.
It is still as clear in my mind as if it were yesterday.
My son was just a little over three. He was going to a mainstream kindergarten and, well, his teacher had very gently suggested we seek a professional’s help.
You see, he didn’t understand what the teachers were saying to him. He was restless and fidgety. He also bounced form activity to activity.
This was our first ever visit to a speech pathologist, and she suspected autism. The possibility that our child has a life-long disability seemed like a death sentence.
So we did what any normal, self-respecting parent would do: we dismissed her concerns.
We were outraged. How dare she say this? What right did she have? Our son is not autistic. He just has a language delay; he’s just tad over active.
Then we did the next best thing: we put him in an early intervention center.
Although we were sure that it wasn’t this thing that was wrong, we knew something was. And we had to do something. We had to be responsible parents. Now he was getting help with his sensory issues (something I understood much later), fine motor, play, and language skills.
In retrospect, I wonder how I could have missed those early signs. I guess that was the greatest form of a denial—only a mother could find a justification for every symptom of what could be wrong.
It’s quite ironic, actually. We had an appointment with the developmental pediatrician and been waiting for this day for over two months. And then we had to cancel
My husband called in to let them know, and the receptionist asked, “Are you sure you can’t make it today? It will take a long time to reschedule.”
My husband said, “Yes, my wife has just given birth to our second son.”
And so amidst all the chaos of having a newborn, my first born got diagnosed and I felt as if my life was completely shattered.
I felt cheated—for me, my son, and my family.
He did not deserve this.
We did not deserve this.
How could it happen to us? What did we do wrong?
There was time for grief and acceptance. (Don’t know how many days I cried for.) Then it was time to get to work.
And so I did.
I decided to leave my job in academia. I did not care about any of that any more. All I cared about was my son. I wanted to make everything right.
And the only way I knew was to become an expert myself. This is something I excel it— researching, synthesizing, and becoming a self-proclaimed know-it-all on a topic of my choice.
Only this time, the stakes were high. And the goal was to save my son’s present and his future.
I bought 30+ books on Autism spectrum disorders and therapies, and memoirs of parents living with these special children. I got informal training in speech, occupational, and ABA therapies and hired my own therapists to do the work.
And my son made progress by leaps and bounds. He went through two years worth of therapies in six months, shocking his therapists and consultants alike. How could he do this, they wondered. They had never seen any child do this before. Ever. They called him gifted.
We were so grateful for his learning ability.
This was the kid who “might never catch up,” communicated to us by a helpful early intervention staff member.
Two years of tears and sweat, a big chunk of our joint savings, and lack of any social activities went into this story.
He surpassed all their expectations. He outperformed all his fellow classmates in math and reading. He is a kid who is eccentric—the emotional age of kids half his age, loud, always happy, always fun. And he is going to a mainstream school.
His diagnosis was formally changed to Asperger’s, which has a better prognosis in terms of social and emotional well-being.
Because I ended up staying at home for over five years (my second child also started speaking late), I had time to re-evaluate my life.
I decided to let go of all that I was expected to do—a job that didn’t feed my soul, a social circle that started to disappear, and flashy stuff that we simply couldn’t afford anymore.
My son’s diagnosis turned our lives upside down. But it also taught us to appreciate both of our sons for who they are and to be grateful for each and every blessing in our lives.
At the end, I came out on top because I adopted the following beliefs:
Awful things might happen to you; take all the time you need to face the reality.
You need to grieve; do it.
Need to cry, not come out of your house, stay in bed all day? You can do that.
What you can’t do is keep it all bottled up inside, pretending it never happened. That your life is the same as it was a day before.
You need to face your emotions and deal with them. But don’t rush. Take your time. Healing takes time. It will happen when you come to terms with it.
It is not your fault.
I am sure you are thinking that it’s your fault—that whatever you’re going through, you caused it somehow.
We all feel that way. We scrutinize our life. We go over every inch to try and see if we did anything wrong.
It’s not your fault—and it’s also not going to do you any good thinking like that and torturing yourself in the process.
If you need to hear it, ask somebody you trust. And then really listen. Say it with me: It is not your fault.
Let go of what you don’t need anymore.
You have faced a setback. Your life is different, so you have to do things differently.
What is it that you don’t need in your life anymore? Is there a job that isn’t working for you? Any commitments you made? How many things do you say yes to that you could just pull back from?
Bow out gracefully.
Your husband loses his job. Your teenager has been in an accident. Your mom’s tumor is malignant. Your brother lost his house so his family has to move in temporarily.
Whatever it is, it needs your attention, which means the unimportant must go.. Now.
Start believing and discover possibilities.
Your life is different now but that doesn’t mean it has to be worse. It can be better. Don’t listen to the naysayers and anyone else who tells you otherwise.
Don’t listen to the experts who tell you that your chances are not good. Listen to your gut. Do the work.
You might feel like you are all alone in this, or that you don’t have all the resources. You might feel trapped or feel like you don’t have many choices. Become resourceful. Do the best you can.
Amidst that chaos, can you discover any truths about your life and your dreams?
Now that you have let go of stuff that doesn’t matter, stuff that didn’t work, what could you do to bring normalcy to your life? What can you do to stay sane?
You don’t have to go through a major life change to appreciate what you have. All it takes is a wake up call. Mine was major; yours doesn’t have to be.
What will it take for you ?

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3 Lessons to Help You Find Peace When Fighting a Hard Battle

 

“He who has health has hope, and he who has hope has everything.” ~Proverb

August 3, 2001. I still remember it like it was yesterday. It was around six o’clock in the evening when she sat us down. Luther Vandross was singing in the background on the radio: “And it’s so amazing and amazing, I can stay forever and forever. Here in love and no, leave you never.”
Quite ironic when you think about the news I would soon receive.
I had just finished summer school and my sister had just returned from an internship on the East Coast. My mother had such a pensive, yet positive look on her face when she asked us to come into the living room.
“This is hard for me to say, so I am just going to say it: I have cancer.”
Immediately, my sister and I broke into tears because, up until that point, every single relative or friend who had battled cancer lost. And in my shocked state, I thought it was perhaps time to start saying goodbye because I was already feeling quite defeated.
The person who had always been the anchor in our family would soon become lighter due to weekly radiation and chemotherapy appointments. Although she physically grew weaker, her actions taught me a few lessons I will never forget.
Today, I would like to share three of them with you:
Learn to Let Go
Impermanence. Everything fades away and nothing lasts forever.
My mom used to have long, beautiful black hair with a sheen that many envied..
Unfortunately, the type of chemotherapy she was being treated with slowly killed her hair cells. As for many women, this was very hard for her to accept because it was a part of her identity, her femininity, and it’s generally what society deems to be beautiful.
But as the appointments stacked up and the strands dwindled away, she had to face a reality that was quite sobering: most of her hair was gone, and she needed to find the courage to ask my father to completely shave her head.
Then the day finally came.
As the remaining hair fell to the ground, Black Rapunzel was replaced by a cancer patient who learned to be grateful for what was instead of trying to hold on to something that no longer existed.
As Steve Maraboli wrote, “The truth is, unless you let go, unless you forgive yourself, unless you forgive the situation, unless you realize that the situation is over, you cannot move forward.”
My mother learned to let go and finally made the decision to move forward.
Inspire Yourself with Your Journey
“That it will never come again is what makes life so sweet” is something my mother would say. “So write it all down—the victories, the setbacks, the magical moments, the not so loving moments, and the moments of complete loneliness. Write it all down to serve as a reminder.”
Each day we awaken, we are given a pen with 86,400 seconds of ink to write with.
During her first week of treatments, my mother picked up a journal to write about her fight with the Big C and how she planned to defeat it, even though she was sometimes the one knocked down for a while. Nevertheless, she persisted.
Sure, she wrote about her hair loss, the pain at night, and the sadness she sometimes felt. But she also wrote about the joys of raising her children, the extra energy she could sometimes muster up to walk a bit further, and the faith and hope that was keeping her grounded.
She saw her journal as a way to inspire herself when she wanted to look back and see how far she had come on her journey thus far.

Love Well and Far

Cancer woke us up to the fact that nothing lasts forever, and words that go unsaid may never be spoken.

After my mother’s diagnosis, my close family got even closer as she expressed her desire for us to show more love to each other, and to be grateful not only for the fun, easy times, but also for the tougher times.

That’s what it means to love well and far: loving unconditionally even when it’s hard. Sharing your love even when it’s difficult. Being there for the people you love when they need you the most.

So I ask you these three important questions: Is there anything in your life that you feel you need to let go of? Are you recording the magic moments from your life? Are you reaching far with your love?

I wanted to share these three lessons not only to pay tribute to my mother, who has been in remission for the past twelve years, but also to serve as a beacon of hope for those who may be dealing with something similar right now. It’s hard and it hurts, but now is the time to be stronger and more loving than ever.

Now it is the time to love well and far

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Preserving Kindness in a Busy World: We Are All Connected

“.The smallest act of kindness is worth more than the grandest good intention.” ~Oscar Wilde

Three times in the last two months I have nearly been run over by a fellow shopper’s grocery cart. Each time the customer rushing closely behind me had to suddenly swerve and push past, clearly annoyed with the obstacle, which was me.
As unpleasant as this was, I can relate to that shopper’s sense of urgency. Grocery shopping is one of my least favorite tasks. I focus on my list, sometimes while talking on the phone, and get done as quickly as possible.
There has always been busyness and stress to distract us from one another. Now with the pervasiveness of smart phones, there are requests for our attention always at our fingertips, pulling us away from the people right in front of us.
When I focus exclusively on my own needs I, too, am oblivious to the people around me.
I used to take my grandmother to the grocery store, when she was still determined to do her own shopping. Long suffering with emphysema, it took a tremendous amount of energy for her to get dressed and go on such an outing.
As she rode around in her scooter while I walked in tandem, she always had a smile for the ladies behind the deli counter who remembered her name. At check out, too, the clerks recognized her and would say how good it was to see her. Once in a while another shopper would look at her and share a friendly greeting.
In those moments I glimpsed my grandmother’s younger, playful self as she bantered back and forth, eager to experience those connections again.
I felt overflowing gratitude for these small acts of kindness. These folks could easily have continued about their day without pausing to acknowledge this frail woman. Such a small effort on their part became a high point that would set the tone for the rest of my grandmother’s day.
The reason she persevered in doing her own shopping was not the independence of getting her own groceries; it was the shared humanity she experienced in these small acts of kindness.
The conversations with the salesclerks and the few shoppers who smiled and greeted her buoyed her spirits beyond anything I alone could provide.
In the produce section recently I was considering my mental shopping list when a woman approached. She paused a moment to gaze at the heads of red leaf lettuce. Then she turned to me and beamed,
“Aren’t they just so pretty?!”
She happily picked one up and continued shopping. As I paused in front of the lettuces I realized they were quite lovely. And I smiled.
In one simple, refreshing comment that woman shared an acknowledgement of me..
She saw me, affirmed our shared experience, and presumed that I, too, would value the beauty laid before us.
My life is full. I am not seeking friendship in the grocery store.
But in that simple exchange I was reminded that we are all connected to one another.
I recently read that “among our most powerful human motive is the desire to form and maintain social bonds.” (Baumerstein & Leary.) We are social beings. No matter how busy or independent we are, our actions affect others.
With that in mind, while I was at the grocery today I made a few changes.
Slow down.
I walked at a steady pace. No speeding down the aisles.
At the freezer aisle a lady in a scooter asked me for help. This never happened when I was racing through the aisles. I gladly reached what she needed.
Observe.
I looked around me and made eye contact with several people. I stayed off my phone.
In the cereal aisle I noticed a woman with two young children, and I smiled at her.
Stay present.
At the check out, an older gentleman ahead of me turned around hesitantly. On making eye contact he initiated a conversation about his wife who passed away. It was a brief exchange that never would have happened had I been checking my email on my smart phone.
I will never know how these small acts of kindness affected anyone else today. But I do know that I respected my connection to these strangers by being fully present in those moments.
Being open to others might take us away briefly from our multitasking, busy lives. But by doing so we honor the inherent value in ourselves and each other. And nobody is left feeling like a speed bump in the grocery aisle of life

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How Anger Leads to Anxiety and What to Do About It

“Holding on to anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one who gets burned.” ~Buddha
I have a confession: I’m mildly obsessed with anger.
Not the negative feelings, the volatile outbursts, or the fly-off-the-handle reactions, but rather, how humans express anger.
I’ve largely made my living by dealing with various states of anger. More on that in a bit…
Years ago I was shopping at a bookstore with my friend Alex. We were first time parents with toddlers at home.
The idea was to find resources on how to raise emotionally healthy children, and to avoid the parenting mishaps we witnessed too often at work.
As school social workers we provided family counseling to young children and wayward teens in the inner city.
As Alex obsessively scoured the aisles for the latest research-based writings on emotional intelligence, my eyes gravitated towards an entirely different topic.
The black, matte-textured book with the blood red title practically screamed at me: Hatred: The Psychological Descent into Violence.
I devoured it that night.
It’s not that I didn’t want my kid to learn to soothe himself when upset, to resist peer pressure, or to misread social cues—but in that moment I felt a stronger pull.
Part of the fascination stems from my ancestry; I’m half-Italian and half-Irish. A DNA hotbed, if you will.
Meals were eventful. When I would lose my cool at the dinner table, my dad would wildly gesticulate in my mom’s direction. She, in turn, would shrug and reply “It’s The Fighting Irish, in her, I suppose.”
Additionally, I’m a psychotherapist who specializes in anxiety issues—generalized, panic and social anxiety disorders.
Do you want to know the quickest way to get a handle on your anxiety? Get ahold of your anger.
I realize this may sound counter-intuitive. After all, we don’t normally associate anxious people with bad tempers and loud voices.
The anger management connection is not exactly linear.
It takes courage to express anger—to stand up for yourself and your values, which sometimes includes taking an unpopular stance.
Bravery is valiant, strong, and admirable, while anxiety is cowardly, weak, and anything but enviable.
Because many anxious people have a problem asserting themselves, feelings of helplessness, avoidance, and frustration take residence.
Compounding the issue is the fear that if you express anger, you might lose control.
And since many anxious individuals are people-pleasers and caretakers, these feelings are especially unwanted.
But feelings go somewhere.
And typically, when you take on too much responsibility, you inevitably feel exhausted, taken advantage of, and angry.
If you don’t have a firm grasp on your anger responses, you’re going to hold it in until it explodes, or you’re going to yell, scream, stomp your feet, and possibly say and do things you regret.
Then comes the guilt. And next, the overwhelming urge to fix the situation, and before you know it, the cycle repeats itself again.
All the while, you’re wasting precious emotional energy that could be better used on enjoyable tasks.
The good news is there’s strategies you can do today to help you feel more calm.

I included five common ways I help us go from anxiety to zen below:

1. List the places in your body where you feel anger.
Is it in your chest? What happens to your heart rate? How does your stomach feel?
It’s important to recognize the physical cues of anger in order to alert youself that it’s time to calm down.

2. Visualize different behavioral responses. How do you react when you feel angry?

Do you scream, tantrum, throw things, bottle it inside, or pretend that everything is fine?
Write down three different reactions you will do instead, such as:
Calmly assert your needs, deep breathing, count to ten, walk away rather than stick around for a fight, and close your eyes to reduce visual stimulation, etc.

3. Make friends with “no.”
I know, many nice people have a hard time with this one. The association with conflict makes us feel mean, insensitive, or too direct.
Know that “no” means you respect yourself, your time, and your values. Practice saying “no” in the mirror until it sounds deliberate and natural.

4. Ask yourself if you value expressing anger over getting along with others..
It’s a fact that some people enjoy the adrenaline rush of letting go and projecting their uncomfortable feelings onto others.
Recognize that the short-term feelings of power are no match for the sleeplessness, headaches, and despair, which endure long after the “anger high” wears off.

5. Think about the last time you got angry. How did you go from anger to a calmer place?

You’re probably really good at getting angry already, so let’s focus on the other side. Be specific. What behaviors did you call upon to get to zen?
This will reinforce your coping strategies, and it will serve as a reminder to focus on solutions rather than stewing in anger.
The more you practice reacting in positive ways, waiting until the anger subsides, and considering your options, the more skilled you will become at managing anger.
It’s possible that your body is wired to be more anxiety-sensitive, and you’ll have to work harder than others to calm yourself. And that’s okay.
These are temporary solutions, and you’ll still need to control the anxiety itself. But they’ll get you started in learning to respond with more awareness, and less emotion.
You’re the expert on your life. And you get to choose how much anger to allow in your heart, mind, and body every day.
With intentional focus on doing things differently, you can feel more calm, confident, and in control.

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Dealing with Dark Days: Help for When You Don’t Feel Your Best

“The problem is not that there are problems. The problem is expecting otherwise and thinking that having problems is a problem.” ~Theodore I. Rubin

I live in a rainy city. For most of the winter it’s endless grey—weeks in which you’re lucky to get a glimpse of the sun at all.

It might be drizzling, it might be pouring, it might be merely fog. It is certainly wet.

For me and a lot of the people who live here, it’s almost a deal breaker. When I first arrived, I spent a lot of time complaining that it was raining again. When the sun came out, it was summarily dismissed with “yeah, but for how long?”

Sometimes I still fantasize of moving somewhere nice and hot. Maybe I’ll melt all summer long, but at least there’s sun, right?

But the bottom line is that I like living here. For a thousand reasons, it’s my home. I’m not going anywhere.

So my choice is this: embrace my decision with a full heart, rain and all, or live in bitterness, fearing the next cloud.

I can’t change the weather.

I also live in a rainy mind. Like everyone I’ve met, I have anxieties, fears, and a thousand other difficult moods that arise in me on days when I’d counted on sunny, focused productivity.

For the last couple of years it’s been panic attacks.

Everything is going so well until something derails and my world becomes scary, my breath comes with difficulty, and I’m falling down the rabbit hole again.

The hardest part to let go is my plans for the day. I was going to write a blog post, clean the kitchen, or go out with friends, but now I’m crouched in the corner expending all my energy to keep air pumping into and out of my lungs.

Not fun.

But recently I realized, I can’t change the weather.

Sure, I can do things to take care of myself so panic attacks are less likely, but if it’s not one thing it’s another:

I couldn’t sleep last night and now I’m tired. My project isn’t coming along like I’d hoped and now I’m cranky. The other people involved in my plans got sick and now they’re cancelled.

Life isn’t always sunny. Life gets rainy.

And no, that’s not fun. Rain on a day you were hoping for sun is frustrating and sad. It can seem like everyone in the world expects constant sunny positivity from you, and when you can’t manage it, there’s shame and guilt.

But it’s kind of magical when you decide to look at it like it’s largely outside of your control. What if today’s mini disaster blew in on the wind with the clouds? What if that same wind will blow it out again?

Maybe today you finally buy some rain boots so you can go for a walk without getting wet. Maybe today you learn that the beach is different in the rain, but still kind of cool. Or you could spend today curled in a ball, cursing the grey.

Either way, it’s still raining. Either way, you’re still lovable. You don’t have to like the weather, but it’s an option..

And the funny thing that happens, once you stop fighting your internal weather, is it becomes calmer. It turns out that so much of the problem was the expectation that things be different than they are, that everything would go smoothly.

Now when it rains, I tell myself I know that I will see the sun again. It might be two weeks, but it’ll happen. Probably sooner than I think.

When I feel anxiety creeping up I remind myself that we all have emotions that are difficult for us. That I will feel calm and happy again—probably pretty soon.

And then I have the space to make the best of the day I was given, not the one I ordered.

Some thoughts that help (think of them as affirmations, if you like):

1. This is the weather right now. I can’t change the weather, but I can take it into account to make myself more comfortable.

2. The sun always comes back. There are always days when things go right. This discomfort is temporary.

3. Everyone has hard days, even if not everyone talks about them. I’m still normal and lovable when my weather is rainy.

4. I’m allowed to feel disappointed that things aren’t going the way I wanted. I don’t have to be ready to make the best of it right away.

5. What if today were supposed to be rainy? What if this were exactly the right thing?

What helps you on days that things aren’t going according to plan?

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