This is probably one of the hardest posts I’ve decided to write, mainly because of the comments I could receive on the decisions I’ve made but, honesty on my mental health journey is part of the reason why I started this blog in the first place. Please remember though, I am not a medical professional and only speak from my personal experience.

Within the last couple of months, I have been diagnosed with ADHD. I’m still early on my journey but I wanted to share how it’s been going so far. 

For years I’ve dealt with anxiety and depression. I have been regularly going to therapy for almost 10 years trying to figure out how to manage my mental health. With more and more information coming out about how ADHD affects women I’ve found myself wondering if I had it. Some of the symptoms I had were: 

• My mind was constantly going. The best way to explain it is my mind was loud all the time. There was never a moment of calm and quiet. Even when I was relaxed random thoughts would pop up either about my to-do list, a random observation about the room around me, or even just a daydream. 
• I am very easily distracted either by notifications on my phone, or email and teams messages at work. Also, when I would be in a public place and if anything was mildly distracting for a neurotypical mind I would be completely distracted even if I was mid-sentence. 
• I get overstimulated easily.
• I am constantly exhausted even when I would have a good night’s sleep. Even a couple of days of good sleep wouldn’t be enough to feel rested. 

As time went on I would have honest conversations with my husband and my therapist. The first person to suggest I might have ADHD was my husband since he has ADHD and we also have a child who has been diagnosed. Since there have been links to show that ADHD is hereditary, he had to get it from somewhere. I was diagnosed by going through the diagnostic criteria in the DSM V with my therapist and an appointment with my primary care provider. 

There have been a few things that have come out with my diagnosis, during a phone call with my mom it came out that there was speculation I had ADHD when I was in elementary school. She didn’t get me tested because she was doing what she believed was best for me; she didn’t want me to be put into a box with limitations. I hold no hard feelings about her choice because I had to make the same hard decision with my own child and we had more information on what it would mean for our child. In the late 90s, there was very little information. And mom if you are reading this, I know you did your best and I love you for that. 

Now, what does this mean now? I have decided to go on medication because managing my ADHD without medication has become an issue and something has to change. I personally started with a non-stimulant option first. This is mainly because I wanted to start myself off slow. I am already on an SSRI for my anxiety and depression, and I wasn’t quite ready to go the stimulant route. So far it’s been working. Some of the changes have been that my mind is quiet and staying focused has been a lot easier. Also, writing has been a lot easier from this blog post, text conversations, and long emails at work has been so much easier. 

Let me know in the comments what your experiences have been and if this post has helped you! 

If you follow me on Instagram you know that my husband Daniel and I remodeled our full bathroom in our 1983 2-bedroom home. Here are a few things I have learned while going through this process.

Constitution Timetables

Keeping on a schedule during construction is super hard! Especially when you are doing all of the work on your own, you have 2 young children, and work full-time jobs.

This project started as a simple facelift to help sell the house. We were planning on only replacing the caulk around the tub, painting, and replacing the bathroom vent. Well, as Daniel was removing the caulk around the bathtub, rotten drywall started to fall out. We could not in good conscience just seal it back up for the next owner of the house to deal with. So, we gutted EVERYTHING! What was supposed to be a 1-weekend project ended up taking us 5 months. Part of the reason it took 5 months was because we ended up taking a 2 month break initially because our kids’ birthdays were coming up but then, we got COVID, and then we had AMAZING weather that we couldn’t waste.

Drywall Texturing is an art!

Putting up drywall wasn’t too hard but, we spent a few weeks trying to figure out the drywall texture. Before this project I had never textured drywall. After 3 attempts trying to match the swooping texture that is throughout the whole house, we decided to sand, then mud the walls flat, and apply a simple orange peel spray texture.

Not everything was hard

Some of the easiest things about this project were painting and flooring. When we moved into this house 9 years ago we had primed and painted the kitchen, living room, and the 2 bedrooms. We also replaced the 1980’s brown calico carpet with laminate flooring in the living room and 2 bedrooms. Needless to say, both Daniel and I have some experience painting and installing flooring. Also, because of that experience and how small the bathroom is I was less intimidated by painting the entire room.

In the end, both Daniel and I were very happy with how the bathroom turned out. Now that we are in our new home we are planning on remodeling the 2 bathrooms because we miss our old one.

I keep trying to write about this year to try and review it and try to make this post not completely sound fake as all get out. I am having a hard time with that… This year has been a lot of small things that didn’t go as planned and dealing with the day to day of everything. Yes, there were a ton of things that did go well. Like my children were able to have normal birthday parties with their friends from school. Both Daniel and I were able to take trips on our own and enjoy a long family vacation to Washington and Arkansas. As well as the start of this blog, which has been a true mental health saver. 

So, here are the top 3 experiences that sum up my 2021:

1. Human interaction! – the best thing about this year is that we were able to send Jason back to school full time! We had birthday parties for each of the kids which included friends from both school and daycare. We were able to get together with friends and family which I truly missed and needed for my mental health. 
2. Natalie got COIVD – Natalie’s daycare had an exposure to COVID in early October and Daniel and I thought almost nothing of it because Natalie was acting completely healthy, not even a stuffy nose. We got her tested and BAM Natalie was positive, and we were in quarantine. Daniel and Jason did not get it but, I was not so lucky. I received a presumptive positive and had to isolate myself in Dan and I’s bedroom for 3 days. I was so glad to be able to test out of my isolation! I’m not sure that I would have made it through the whole 10-day isolation in the same house as my family. 
3. So much traveling! – just like everyone else we hadn’t done any traveling since November of 2019 which was only a quick 3-day trip to celebrate Thanksgiving with Daniel’s extended family. This year though we had the ability for each of us to do a solo trip and then the whole family to go on an extended vacation to both Washington and Arkansas. 
   1. In early September I went on a girl’s trip with my best friend Katy and her mom to Vegas! 
   2. The next week after I got back from my trip Daniel went to Green Bay with his parents and his uncle to watch a Packers game at Lambeau Field.
   3. The day before thanksgiving we started our family trip
      1. Washington – This was our traditional every 2-year trip to see Daniel’s extended family for thanksgiving! This year was a crazy year where we had around 45 people come to thanksgiving dinner and all of them were family! This trip always does my heart so much good. On top of my kids being able to connect with their dad’s side of the family this trip always reminds me of how truly grateful I am to have married into such an amazing family. A couple of the highlights of this time was when I made 2 chocolate satin pies with my niece Kali (5), Jamie’s daughter Rachel (5), and Natalie (4). Although making the pie was stressful, the connection I felt to each one of them was totally worth it and the pies weren’t half bad either. The 2nd highlight from this part of the trip was Natalie got to ride a horse for the first time! She absolutely loved it! 
      2. Arkansas – Saturday after Thanksgiving my little family (Daniel, Jason, Natalie and I) along with Kelly and Roger traveled to Northwest Arkansas where my family lives. I hadn’t been to Arkansas to see my family in over 15 years and this time was so much sweeter because I was able to bring my own little family. There were a couple Pinochle games played which is a game you learn in my family when you’re about 13 years old because that’s when your hands are normally big enough to hold the hand of 20 cards you’re dealt. The big points in this trip were that we got to spend the entire time with my grandmother, explore Silver Dollar City in Branson MO, explore my parent’s new house since their move from AK to AR in 2019, enjoy my aunt’s bunkhouse in Gilbert (Kelly’s Bunkhouse), and finally I got to visit my grandfather’s grave. My grandfather passed away 18 years ago, and it was really good to reconnect with his spirit while I was there. 

So, overall, 2021 wasn’t all too bad. I have hopes that 2022 things will be more normal, and we get to enjoy more of what life is truly meant for. Time with family that doesn’t involve quarantining, the great outdoors, and our health both mental and physical. 

This 4th of July weekend was a pretty awesome weekend filled with family, beach fires, friends, hikes, and Juneau sun. Daniel, the kids, and I spent 3 nights down at the cabin. With COVID we have not taken a vacation since November 2019 but this weekend felt like a mini-vacation from the hustle and bustle of life. We got to relax, enjoy time with family and friends, and watch the cousins make memories. 

Here’s a recap of the weekend events.

Friday July 2nd – Let the Weekend Begin!

We came down to the cabin after work. As we took our less than a 10-minute boat ride from the Douglas harbor the sense of calm came over me. It felt as if I was coming home since the cabin is pretty much a 2nd home to me since we spend so much time down there. Kelly, Roger, Kyler, Sydney, and their 3 kids: Kaylix, Kali, and Cambri, were already here and Kyler already had a fire going on the beach to burn some tree stumps that we had pulled out of the ground. As we pulled up to the beach my niece Kali came down to greet us with an excited “Hi guys!” As she almost always does. My heart was happy and I was ready for the weekend to get going.

Saturday July 3rd – Fireworks

Saturday started out pretty mellow and ended up being a fun-filled day of adventures. 

On Thursday before we came down I had made an Apple Crumb Cake that was absolutely to die for if I do say so myself. Once everyone had woken up Sydney and I started to make some french toast, bacon, and eggs for breakfast, more like lunch since it was 11:30 before we ate. I really enjoy cooking for the family but cooking with someone is always nice. 

Once everyone was done with breakfast Daniel and I took Jason, Kaylix, and Kali to get Daniel’s Uncle Gary from the Douglas Harbor so he could stay for 2 nights at the cabin. After we picked him up we pulled the Dungeness Crab pots Kyler had set the night before to see if we had gotten any crab to have for dinner. We were in luck! One of our pots was packed with crab, we ended up keeping 4 huge Dungies and throwing back 6 we could have kept. One of the most impressive parts was that Kaylix and Jason pulled up an empty pot too! 

After we had cooked the crab, the whole gang of us, 7 adults and 5 children headed down to Daniel’s cousin’s cabin a mile down the beach from our property. James and Kelsey and Kelsey’s parents own a cabin a mile further away from town from our property and next to them our friends, Adam and Ashley, have some land and were tent camping for the weekend. Since everyone was down there for the weekend we decided to hike down there and have a couple beers and hang out. It was nice to see their property and their cabin is coming along nicely. 

Let the festivities begin! In Juneau, our city fireworks display is at midnight on the 3rd of July. There are a couple reasons for this: 

1. If the weather is too bad (the cloud ceiling is too low to see the fireworks) on the 3rd they can postpone the fireworks until the next day and we don’t have to miss out. 
2. We have to wait until midnight because it doesn’t get dark enough to see the fireworks until then. 

This year though was perfect! We had 65 to 70 degree days with sun and not a cloud in the sky, so there wouldn’t have been a problem seeing any of the fireworks. Some years we like to go out on our skiffs into the Gastineau Channel where the cruise ships dock and watch the city fireworks out on the water but this year we ended up staying at the cabin. Mainly because it is a lot of work and our girls are a little too young to make it to midnight to see the fireworks anyway. So, we ended up having a raging beach fire and shooting off a ton of fireworks on the beach. The boys stayed up and shot off fireworks and the girls were able to get to bed at around 11:00 pm. 

Sunday July 4th – Today is the Day!

This 4th of July was a weird one for me. I grew up in the middle of downtown Douglas where all of the action happens and for years my parents still lived in the same house so we always had a home base in the middle of the chaos. In 2019 my parents retired and moved out of state and with COVID last year this year was the first year of 4th of July festivities without them. 

Overall though the day was a good one. Since the weather was nice Sydney and I decided to walk back with their 2 dogs. Honestly, the walk was a mental health break for both of us and for me calm before needing to pull out all of the coping techniques I needed to deal with the crowds of people. As for the 4th of July festivities, everything was still scaled down from normal. The Douglas Parade had no more than 10 floats, if that, there were only 3 food vendors where there are normally about 10, and the crowds of people weren’t nearly as big. We were able to spend some time at Sandy Beach, ate ice cream and listened to the band play for a while and just relaxed. Once we said goodbye to Kyler and Sydney the kids, Daniel, and I headed back to the cabin for our last night.

Monday July 5th – The Extra Day

Since the 4th was on a Sunday Daniel and I had the Monday after off of work. We finished the weekend with the classic cabin breakfast of sausage, fried potatoes, and eggs, packed up our things, and cleaned up the cabin.

As I write this I can’t help but feel this sense of gratitude. I am so thankful to have such a good relationship with both Kyler and Sydney and how our kids can grow up with each other. It’s something I never had growing up since we lived so far away from my extended family. The weekend all in all was exhausting but mentally rejuvenating at the same time. I am so grateful to be able to enjoy the cabin property.

This year I turn 30. What?! How did that happen?! Does anyone ever feel like they have no idea what they have been doing with their life when a milestone birthday hits? Yeah, me too.

This year I’m going to hit the big 3-0 and I’m feeling like I’ve done nothing and like I’m not old enough to have already done/have what I have. By my birthday I will have already had an 11-year career, been married for 11 years, raised a 9-year-old son and a 4-year-old daughter, and bought a house. I feel like I have already achieved so many external markers of what I’m supposed to do by the age of 30 but somehow I feel like I’ve done nothing at all.

When 2021 started I was completely freaking out about turning 30. But now that the big birthday is just a month away I am starting to feel a little more of a sense of calm about it. I have been doing a lot of thinking of why am I so caught up on what I am supposed to be doing? Some days I feel like I should be doing more but honestly with the pandemic I am doing what  I can to keep the day to day life moving forward. Luckily Daniel and I have been able to work from home since March of 2020. Though,child care and school have been huge struggles for us just like most other parents in the world. I could go on and on about all the things good and bad with the pandemic, but that would be off topic so, let’s move on. 

Why does 30 seem like such a big deal? It made me think of what I thought my life would be like as an adult. I imagined myself being a mom (check), having a husband (check), and being a teacher (not quite). But of course I didn’t imagine myself any older than like 25. So, as I go into my 30s things seem so unknown which is a little unsettling. As I type that last part I keep thinking of one of my favorite podcasters, Kaitlyn Bristowe, and how she says your 30s are the best decade of your life, so I am going to go with that! 

I just want you to know, if you’re going through it you’re not alone! We can do this together!

With love until next time!