Humbly Courageous

Hello and welcome back to another week at Humbly Courageous! If you are new, I’m glad you stopped by! My Family    As I mentioned in part one, there were some serious worries, and real concerns going into my first pregnancy as a woman living with Muscular Dystrophy. The second time around was no different, but this time the concerns were a little different. I knew I could get through a pregnancy. My body had shown me that it was capable, and that there were ways I could adapt to make it through. I also knew that I had learned a lot in my journey so far with Luke who by this time was 3 years old. I had learned to adapt and care for Luke in my own unique way. This time around I was thinking, can I care for an infant plus a busy 3 year old who is very active, and has a mind of his own? Anyone who has raised a child knows that age 2 has nothing on age 3, haha! Physically, things were challenging, and to be honest I had always thought that if I did have a child, then I would defini...

Hello and welcome back to another week at humbly courageous! If you are new, thanks for stopping by! What is it like being pregnant and parenting while living with Muscular Dystrophy is a question I often get from those living with MD who are considering becoming pregnant, while living with a genetic condition. There are so many thoughts, feelings, fear and worry that come along with this big decision. You have so much to think about. I think one of the first thoughts that comes to mind is, will my child be born with my condition? If my child is born with my same condition, am I going to feel guilty?  Is it going to be too painful to watch my child go through all the hardships that he/she will inevitably face living with a condition that hinders you so much physically? Another thing that comes to mind is will my body be able to sustain a pregnancy, and where will I be physically after the baby is born? You worry about what it will be like for your child to grow up with a mom who ha...

 Let me set the scene for you. I'm walking through a store holding onto a cart (my safety net most of the time) and I'm with my son Luke who was about 10 at the time. We were walking along chatting when all of a sudden the toe of my shoe caught on the waxy floor and I fell HARD onto the hard concrete floor. I landed with all of my weight on my right knee. I can still vividly feel the pain. It was excruciating. I don't know how much experience you have with falling in public, but there are a few things that come to mind. The first being shock, the next feeling is panic because I am not able to get off the ground without either help from someone strong who knows exactly how to help me up, or a very firm structure at just the right height. Then creeps in the feeling of total embarrassment, and just an overall feeling of helplessness. I had fallen many times in front of Luke at home, but never in public at that time. Oh, the other thing that comes to mind is that most of the ti...

Hello and welcome back, or if you are new here, welcome! For those who have known me for most of my life this won't come as a surprise to you, but for those of you who I have only met recently through social media, you may be surprised that openly talking about and sharing my disability and all that comes with it, is fairly new to me. In fact, if you knew me growing up you may even be surprised that I am being so open. I used to be the exact opposite, and except for a select few people, I just didn't talk about my disability, or the struggles that it caused.   Part of that was because growing up, even though I was disabled, I didn't have a diagnosis. So, it was hard to talk about something when I didn't even know what I was talking about. A frequently asked question growing up was, "what is wrong with you?" That question immediately sent me into a panic. It was hard reliving the fact that I didn't know what was "wrong" every time someone would as...

This past week I had mentioned on my social media post that I hadn't experienced as much progress as I had been having. I was feeling a little discouraged. The past several weeks I have had some really encouraging and motivating progress. For the first part of the week, I just kept thinking, why isn't something happening? I was feeling pretty unmotivated, and almost nearing that feeling of just giving in because things just seemed to be plateauing. Then, I happened to think back to where I had been before this began. I'm not sure I even shared this with anyone, but in my mind I was starting to think about what it would look like to use a wheelchair in my home. I have used one a few times after some surgeries, or major illnesses that left me especially weak. My scooter that I have is not easy to maneuver in my home. I was thinking I would have to purchase a new chair that would be easier to use around my home. That's where I was with my disease progression, it was happen...

 Connections. Most of us need connections to survive. Meaningful connections, where we feel like the other person in the relationship truly hears and understands us. Someone who makes us laugh, even when we feel like crying. We can have lots of different kinds of connections in our lives, and draw from and learn from all of them.. As I have talked about before, as a child I always longed for a connection relating to my disability. I wanted to meet a friend who shared the same struggles, someone to who I could say .....this is how ______ feels, do you ever feel that in your legs, or does your weakness ever scare you? They would look at me with caring eyes and they would say "yes" I totally understand how that feels. They would be able to say this because they felt it too. Every human should be able to have that kind of connection. It's one that makes us feel truly heard and seen. I was 44 years old when I first felt that type of connection.  Since being diagnosed, I have m...

Hello, thanks for joining me here! I recently was invited to do a podcast on Dr. Sherri Yoder's podcast channel called Thriving Thoughts with Dr. Sherri. We were introduced through a mutual friend who thought we would be a good match. He knew she was interviewing people for season 4 of her podcast called Thriving Alone. He was a friend from high school that I knew, not well, but after reconnecting with my husband and I on Instagram, we have gotten to know each other more these days. After speaking with Dr. Sherri briefly, we also thought we were a good match, and she and I agreed to record a video podcast for her new season called Thriving Alone.  We didn't talk too much before the podcast was recorded. She didn't want to know too much of my background before we did the interview in order to keep the conversation as authentic as possible. I thought that was a great idea, but also as a planner, I felt a little anxiety going into it not really knowing what she would ask. I kn...