Anyone need a pep talk?

Sometimes we need a good pep talk.

Today is one of those days. I need one too. 

This week I have felt scattered and messy, on the inside and out. 

For example, every time I sit down to meditate, my thoughts bounce around in a million different directions.

My husband often asks how my meditation session went, and when I'm feeling like this I respond - It was a nice 10-minute rumination session, thanks for asking. LOL. 

This morning, within my first minute of meditation, my thoughts included:

I need to refill our service dog's anti-anxiety medication prescription.

We have to get our new German au pair a social security number and set up his online bank account.

Do I have cancer? (unfounded fear, simply because I had a routine mammogram last week. lol). 

If I have cancer and don't make it, what will I say in the letters I write to my husband's future girlfriend and wife to welcome her to the family even though I am gone? (yes, this is what my brain does). 

I need to do that pile of laundry in the closet.

What peer-reviewed journal articles would be best for framing the research on PDA that we are working on with the University of Michigan?

After a minute, I finally wrangled my attention back to my anchors - the tingling of my hands, the sound of the fan in my room, and my breath leaving and entering my nose. 

But just as I started to settle into the present moment, as if on cue, my PDA son comes in and tells me that our au pair has a terrible migraine and needs me to come down and pack lunches, get them breakfast, etc. 

As I start to prep the lunches, I can hear the sounds of vomiting in the bathroom.

And then I realize there is no food in the house that my PDA son will eat for breakfast or lunch, so I call my husband, who is on the way home from the gym, to ask him to please head to the grocery store and buy hot Cheetos and pepperoni. 

So today I need a pep talk too.

Here it is, for all of us! 

PEP TALK

• You are an intuitive and capable parent with the resourcefulness to find peace for your family, even if it means going against the grain of the rest of society and many bumps and roadblocks along the way. 
• It is OK to do things differently than other parents with PDA children and teens. (For example, if you make different decisions around screens, schools, siblings, or boundaries than someone else in a PDA support group or someone else you see online). 
• You can make decisions that are different than the ones I make in my family (they should be different! Your context is specific to you, your child, and your constraints). 
• You are already a great parent and your child is blessed and lucky to have YOU.
• You are allowed to experiment, make mistakes, collect data, and make informed decisions. You get to create the life you want to live.
• You are a member of a global - and ever-growing - community of parents that is unlearning and experimenting with a radically different way of seeing and being with their PDA child or teen. This is healing inter-generational trauma and positively changing the trajectory of lives and health. 
• You are the catalyst and the captain of the ship. At the same time, you are allowed to feel all the feels (Grief! Rage! Exhaustion! Resentment! Confusion!), be imperfectly human, and prioritize your own well-being. 
• Although it may feel isolating and that your whole life exists within the walls of your home right now - especially if your child is in burnout - please know that what you are doing will ripple out into the world in ways you can't even imagine and for years to come. 

It will get better. You got this!