As some of you know, my mother has advanced Alzheimer’s.  She has lived in a nursing home for over a year now.  I thought that she would have headed on out by now…but she is alive and continues to be alive.  At this point, I think she is going to live forever, in this strange dream of a place that she resides in.

My interaction with her has changed pretty dramatically over the last handful of months.  Rather than edgy and mean or having intense scary hallucinations, she has been more child like….and sweet.  I can imagine her as a young girl now…before she became the angry adult she turned into…and I can see this sweet, fun kid who was curious  and mischievous.  She has become surprisingly delightful.  I have conversations with her that feel warm and fuzzy.  What a surprise!  And what a gift~

I am not saying that every interaction with her is fun….much of the time it is pretty strange and sometimes it still has pretty sharp edges…but, I love that she has this young part of herself that I get to connect with.  I wrap it around me like a cozy blanket.  And when the conversations get sharp or freaky….I remember this other aspect of her and I feel a little less conflicted.

There are so many challenges for those of us dealing with this.  Alzheimer’s is a marathon.  A very long marathon.  We need to make sure that we hydrate.  That we have good running shoes and comfortable clothes on.  We need our people standing along the road and maybe even running along side of us…supporting us.  Reminding us that we are okay…that everything is okay.

I have many clients who are in the middle of all of this.  It is messy.  It is exhausting.  It is sad.  It is sometimes charming and sweet.  I hope you have good support, a good sense of humor and lots of little ways that you can give yourself self care~  Your not in this alone…there are many of us out here~

That’s it for now.

Have a lovely rest of your day~~~

Since I haven’t written a blog post in a bazillion years….I was going to give you a quick update.  I wrote for a while about this and that.

And I just deleted it.

Then I was going to share some fun little experiences that I have had lately…just to make you smile I wrote for a bit…

And I just deleted that too.

Now what?

I am not sure how to come back to blogging.  I have lots of great stuff to chat about.  I have some cool tools to share.  I have some interesting thoughts about some interesting things.

I want to show up like an old friend that you haven’t talked to in a long time…and it feels like no time has passed. But instead,  I feel a little bit more awkward than that.  So, awkward in fact…that it took me about 20 minutes to figure out how to log in to my blog!  Instead of feeling comfy umfy…I feel squirmy…distracted… and frustrated that I feel so squirmy and distracted.   So, here I am feeling awkward and totally NOT in the grove.  I feel a sense of the groove…but, it is kind of over there a bit…rather than right here at my finger tips.  The groove has been hangin out over there for awhile. I have been waiting for it to come closer…and hence (yes! I said hence)…the months have passed by.  

I am attempting to jump start this groove. I am attempting to align with that comfy, grove kind of place when writing felt fun, creative and expressive.  But, maybe that is too much…too fast.  I can feel the energy start to rise up…and then it goes back to its spot.  Right over there. 

What I do know is that I enjoy writing.  I have lots of good stuff to share.  I enjoy being in the groove.  I love when I write something funny.  I love the co-creative nature of this medium.  And I love that I can do this in whatever way I want to…total creative freedom.  My kind of gig.

I want to approach this differently then I initially thought.  I thought that if I could just start to write…I would get back into the flow and brilliance would be right there at my finger tips.   Well… I guess that was a wee bit of  magical thinking.  I think that I need more of a warm up.  Keep the awareness of what is enjoyable about this process while honoring that it is feeling hard and awkward…and do it anyway.  Gulp!

Yes folks!  We have another paradox!  I keep running into them 😉

I can feel that my energy is starting to dwindle.  So, I am going to go have some lunch.  Peanut butter and Jam always makes this sort of thing feel better!

Until next time… something to ponder if you feel inspired:  Is there a place in your life where you feel the desire to move towards something…and the awareness of how hard it is to get into the groove of the doing of that something?  Want to join me in this awkward kind of dance?

From one awkward human to you   Have a good rest of your day~~