Personal
This is where you will find posts about all things personal to me. This section includes posts about interesting things I do or make, reflections on everyday life, and everything in between.
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What’s in a name? Our last name decision
When we made everything legal last Friday, we finally had to address an issue we had been dancing around for years: our last names. Tradition would have me change my last name to match Cal’s. However, I am not big on tradition for the sake of tradition. There are so many different approaches to last names with marriage now. I could hyphenate. Cal could hyphenate. We both could. We could choose a new name altogether. Cal could change his last name to mine. You get the idea. For us, this decision was further complicated by the fact that we we had children before getting married. When Ryan was born, I gave…
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My Awesome Bookworm Beachfront Proposal
On March 18th, Cal suggested an impromptu trip to the beach. It is still very cold in New Hampshire in March, but it was nice to go to the ocean. Ryan collected seashells, while Saoirse and I watched the waves crashing on the shore and enjoyed the fresh ocean air. The beach was surprisingly busy. A lot of people had the same idea to go enjoy a cold but sunny day by the ocean. Even without any other plans, it was a great family day. Cal had bigger plans though. While we were alone on our stretch of beach, Cal told me he had a gift for me. He handed me a…
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Mo Anam Cara – My Soul Friend and Our Journey to Here
Today we are going to City Hall to take care of all the paperwork to get legally married. We are going to Ireland in two weeks for the ceremony, but it is a lot easier to take care of the legalities here first. The Irish have this beautiful concept of a soul friend. According to the philosopher John O Donohue, the anam cara is a “friend of the soul”, a person with whom you can share your true self, mind and heart. A friendship that applied across all convention and category. Someone with whom you can experience unconditional understanding, love and belonging. For me, Cal is that soul friend. I…
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Catching Up Again
It has been roughly 5 months since my last post. I definitely did not meet the last goal I set for blogging regularly. Looking forward, I can only do better. I have made a lot of progress in the past 5 months. The biggest thing: I finally finished my thesis and submitted it, all I have to do now is wait for my MSW to come in the mail in August. I cannot describe the overwhelming sense of relief at finally having that off of my shoulders. If I had not finished it by May 30th of this year, I would have run out of post residency time and all…
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Our Family
As I attempt to get back into blogging, it seems helpful to give a more detailed introduction to each of the member’s of our family. Ana (me!) – My name is Ana, and this blog is all about me! I became a mom halfway through undergrad, but through the support of everyone at my school, was able to finish with my BA in Psychology and then went on to graduate school for my Master in Social Work. I am steps away from finishing my MSW, all I have left is the completion of my thesis. I have always been fascinated by how the mind works and have worked helping others as…
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Developing a routine
When Ryan was first being evaluated for autism, the question of routine kept coming up. “Does he need to follow a particular routine?” “Is he routine oriented?” “Does he thrive with routine?” I initially did not realize the little routines he followed so carefully, and how well he did when he had a routine that he could count on. As we learned more about autism and the way Ryan’s mind worked, we really discovered just how much a solid routine helped. Ryan truly thrived with a routine. Similarly to Ryan, I also really thrive when I have a routine that I can follow and stick to. It is a way…
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Back to blogging
It has been 6 months since my last blog post (through some glitch in my blog, my old posts are showing up as newly posted, but they were actually posted in June 2016). Clearly, my goal of blogging at least four times a week did not work out for me. I found fitting writing into my daily routine more difficult than I anticipated. Now, it is a new year and I am ready to recommit myself to blogging. My new goal is to have a new blog post up by 9 am, every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. In the past six months, I have made a little bit of progress…
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Overcoming Anxiety – A Goal Oriented Approach
It would be nice if I could wave a magic wand and make my anxiety go away. Actually, my son is pretty sure he is a wizard and healing spells seem to be his specialty, I bet if I asked him, he would try it. Unfortunately, as far as I know, there is no magic healing spell for anxiety. However, I find that keeping goals helps me work to keep it under control (or it could make it worse, but for now I think it will help). I have a lot of goals right now, and I think that writing them down publicly might help me keep my focus. Some of…
