I first suspected I had ADHD as a teenager, but finding the right professional to take me seriously was much harder than I expected. Previous attempts only ended in frustration and tears.
Enjoying the holidays with a food allergy sounds like an oxymoron doesn’t it? After all, eating together is an integral component of the holiday season. I looked forward to making our traditional holiday foods until I was diagnosed with a dairy allergy in 2012. What was to enjoy about the holidays when the foods associated with it were off limits to me?
It was a short, ten-minute drive from the hotel to the residential facility. I maintained composure while I navigated the busy public roads, and then residential streets. I had a whole range of emotions racing through my body, mind and spirit as we pulled into the campus. This was not just a pleasure drive or a routine errand, this was a significant milestone in the life of my son and our family.
While Halloween is a fun time of year for many children, it can be a really difficult time for some, including many children with additional/special needs. For them it can be a confusing, anxiety-inducing, or even utterly terrifying time. But it doesn’t have to be like that. If we stop for a moment to think about the things they might find hard and how to put things in place to help them, children with special needs can safely join in the fun, too. So what are some of the things about Halloween that children with additional needs can find hard?
“While we’ve had many years of travel speaking together on marriage, discipleship, and other topics, we are seldom alone and ‘just us’”Joe & Cindi Ferrini write on the struggle of never truly being along as special needs parents, and the importance of making time “just for us.”
What kind of faith do you have right now, is it sustaining faith, or mustard seed faith? A guest pastor challenged us on the quality of our faith and the nature of our prayers. He pointed out that we may ask God for what we need, but not our deepest desires. He then put forth this question, “Do your prayers make God sweat?”
During some seasons of our life, we had what seemed to be no free time whatsoever; at other times, we had some. We’ve had seasons when we don’t see the light at the end of the tunnel. But over time, we have purposed to take back the sound track of our life and change some of the noise into music we want to hear. We’ve learned the freedom experienced when we don’t have a lot of plates spinning. What are some things we can do to get to that place? Here are a few thoughts that with a little creativity can help us embrace this place.
