Humbly Courageous

Hello and welcome back to Humbly Courageous. I’m glad you are here! It all started when my husband and I went on one of our anniversary “hikes”. We were married in the fall, which just so happens to be my favorite season. Almost like I planned it that way or something. 😊 I always love to get out in the woods to really get the full effect of the autumn leaves, which are just breathtaking right around our anniversary.  A few years ago, my husband, my youngest son and myself had gone on a weekend getaway for his fall  break. I told them I wanted to try a short trail to try and push my body a bit to see where I was at. I was armed with my hiking sticks and I was ready for a short loop in the woods. About 3.5 miles later we finally exited the woods. Needless to say we got a bit more than we bargained for. Took a wrong turn, perhaps? It was a difficult hike to say the least, complete with stairs and all (stairs are my nemesis). I was completely and totally wiped out, and at the sam...

Hello, welcome back to another week at Humbly Courageous! Do you have something that is very emotional that lies just beneath the surface and tends to just come bubbling out at any given moment. Moments when you are asked about this topic, or sometimes just when you are thinking about it? It chokes you up, or makes you angry? Something that you feel like no one in the world understands? Something that is triggered very easily? I think for the majority of us the answer to that would be yes, and if not now then maybe there has been something like that at some point in your life.  Recently, I’ve found myself back in the very place that I often talk about climbing out of in the past. A place I never wanted to go again, and vowed to myself I wouldn’t. Despite my best efforts I’ve found myself in the slimy pit of self-pity, again! I’ve felt sorry for myself and resentful towards something that hasn’t turned out the way I had hoped, or the way I understood it would. I’ve found myself aski...

Hello and welcome, I’m so glad you are here! One of the things that is most frustrating to me living with a disability is when I tell someone I can’t do something, physically, and they question me. As if I don’t have a better grasp on what I am physically capable of than they do. Which brings me to the point of this post….being ok with saying…I can’t, right now.  Now don’t get me wrong. I love a good physical challenge. I get a lot of satisfaction from pushing beyond my limits and accomplishing something that seems a little of out of my reach. It fuels me to keep up the good fight. I find it extremely rewarding to get to the other side of physical feats like that. However, I also think it’s ok to admit that you just can’t do something, and be confident in that statement.  I’m sure we’ve all heard a phrase similar to something like this…you can do anything you put your mind to! To be honest, that phrase really annoys me, and I think ultimately it just makes people feel like a f...

Hello and welcome to another week at Humbly Courageous! I’m so encouraged, and my passion fueled when I see how many are now reading my blog posts each week. My hopes of reaching others has become more than just hopes. It’s become a reality, and I couldn’t be more excited, as I watch this space grow!  Has your spirit ever been broken by someone? Your confidence shattered into a million pieces? For most, I’m guessing the answer to that question is, yes. Over the course of your lifetime, it’s probably happened more times than you want to admit. Maybe it was a teacher, coach, guidance counselor, doctor, family member, or possibly even a friend.  I’m what many people would refer to as a highly sensitive person. They would be correct. I even read a book about it, and during the entirety of the book I was like, “yep that’s me!” It is just the way I’m made. There are some drawbacks to being a HSP as it’s called, but there are also some positives. I’m usually the person in the room wh...

Welcome back to Humbly Courageous! If you are new, I’m glad you stopped by! I strive to make this a space for learning about what it’s like living life with a disability, as well as to connnect with others on a level that I always needed in my life. I’ve been overwhelmed by the response to my recent post “Dear Muscular Dystrophy”. Sometimes things in life go exactly as you’d like them to, and so far this has been one of those things. This piece still has places I want it to go too! Writing this piece was such a huge release of emotion for me, and also a release of bound up words that I’ve been trying to unscramble and make sense of for a very long time. I’m going to share a stem cell update in this post, but first I wanted to share a few things people have said regarding that post. Their words moved me as much as my words moved them. What a beautiful connection!  You can read “Dear Muscular Dystrophy” here ⬇️ https://humblycourageous.blogspot.com/2023/06/dear-muscular-dystrophy.htm...

Hello and welcome to another week at Humbly Courageous. Several years ago, my mom gifted me with the Book Titled “Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff (and it’s all small stuff). I’m sure many of you have heard of it and maybe have even read it too. For a long time, it sat on my bookshelf. I’d pack it up whenever I moved, feeling guilty to get rid of it because it had a beautiful, encouraging message from my mom in the front of it. Each move, I’d box it up move it and unbox it to put it back on the shelf to collect dust (I’m sorry mom, but keep reading!) For several years, the title of that book just ticked me off. My worries were not small stuff! After all, I was living with a lifelong disability that, at the time, was not yet named. I thought, “this book probably doesn’t even apply to me anyway!” Wouldn’t it be great if we could have the insight we have now as an adult when we were kids? Oh how I would have done things a differently! That’s just a part of the the process though. Live and lear...

Hello, welcome! I’m glad you stopped by. Last week, I found myself in an a situation that I wasn’t expecting at all. It was something that I had been dreading for a very long time. The thought of it was something that terrified me, and I felt like whenever it happened, I would have failed, given up. Like it would somehow be my fault. Like I had failed me and everyone in my life. When it finally happened, it wasn’t at all what I had envisioned for so many years. I remember when we built our home 20 years ago. My husband made sure to work with our builder to make our house wheelchair accessible. I remember thinking at the time, “oh that’s great, but I don’t see me needing those accommodations unless I have a surgery or something”, which is when I had needed a wheelchair in the past. As each year ticked by though, I found myself thinking of that as more of a reality. That’s how muscular dystrophy works, it just takes and takes showing no mercy. It’s selfish like that. Some types progress ...