I love your brain

This week has been all about filling my mental toolbox.

I’ve come to realize that if I want to successfully help Cole with is anxiety I need to arm myself with some useful tools and strategies. My approach, generally to try to reassure him that everything is going to be all right and to spell out every step of each day so that he has a complete understanding of the days expectations isn’t working, even just a little bit. Last night I started reading a book about dealing with kid and teen anxiety and they eschewed my instinctive actions practically from the first page, so I have some reading to do this weekend to see if I myself can get a better understanding of anxiety and methods for supporting Cole.

I am also adding some creative tools to my box. I have quite a few DIY home projects I want to work on and while I’m not necessarily a builder, designer, or mason (some involve brickwork!), I do have some visionary qualities and want to build on that. Saturday night I’m attending an art party where I’ll paint and drink wine, both with the intention of sparking my creativity. I’m not a painter, but it sounds fun and I’ve come to realize that I don’t pursue fun enough. I need to play more!

I’ve also recognized that I have a tendency to procrastinate so I’ve been working on moving myself forward instead of being stagnant. The summer left me a bit shell shocked and I felt like I didn’t accomplish any of the little projects I had wanted to take care of whilst being tethered to the home front. Now they are all screaming at me to take care of them!  Each little task that gets handled makes me feel lighter, and brighter.

Even though things are still in flux and Cole’s still not back to his old self entirely, I realized that me standing still isn’t going to help anyone.

On a really positive note today, Cole happily stood up for about ten minutes at his physical therapy evaluation…Maybe he realized that moving forward even just upward, is better for him too!