I’m reading a book called “Fish in a Tree” with my 11-year old son, Andrew, and the father of the main character (an 11-year old girl) is in the military.

“The military seems pointless,” Andrew said as we were reading tonight, interrupting the story.

What??

“What?” I asked. “What do you mean?”

“We’re not at war, so what’s the point of the military?”

And so I explained the point of the military and the importance of making sure our country is always protected. Then he asked…

“Why does it seem like everyone is always fighting?”

I put the book down and realized that talking was going to be more important than reading. Andrew is so young, and the world is still very innocent in his eyes. We don’t shelter him, but we do spare the horrid details of what goes on in the world.

Bobby heard our conversation from the other room. He poked his head in and said, “The world has a lot of bad in it, but it’s not all bad. There’s a lot of good, too. You just have to take the bad with the good.”

And then the conversation steered in that direction.

“What does that mean?” Andrew asked, and Bobby explained.

He told Andrew that, for example, if he thinks about all of his friends, there’s most likely something about each of them that he doesn’t totally love, but that it doesn’t matter… you just need to take the bad with the good.

He told him that you have to accept the “bad” in your friend in order to enjoy the “good,” because they come as a package. (And then he reminded him to always pick people in his life that provide much more “good” than “bad”. Isn’t parenting an ongoing life lesson?). He taught him that it’s important to accept the negative and positive aspects of everything in life.   

As irony would have it, Andrew and I had a horrible moment together today. He’s pre-teen and I’m his mom. Enough said. He finally concluded after our moment (and rough afternoon following that moment) that today was the worst day ever; in fact, it was the very worst day of his entire life.

Before knowing that he would later learn the phrase “take the bad with the good,” I explained to him that he should never summarize an entire day based on one moment, good or bad.

I said, “I can wake up happy, talk to my kids about what we’ll do that day, find joy in the day’s plans, get grumpy when those kids start fighting, get happy again when I’m driving my car and see a funny bumper sticker, get grumpy again if someone cuts me off in traffic, on and on and on.  I was trying to help him recognize that life is fluid, and that things can be happy one minute and not happy the next. Sure, if your day starts with coffee spilled down your lap, continues with a foreclosure on your house, and ends with a car accident, you can call that a “bad” day.

But really, I told him, nothing in life, day by day, is usually so “bad” that you can call it a “bad day.” I wanted to steer him away from that black and white thinking, because the truth is, he’s getting older, and it’s my job as a parent to help him understand the world around him.

There’s plenty he’s going to discover on his own, of course, but for now – and I think every parent of young children can agree – we need to talk to our kids about their curiosities and help them put things into perspective.

I wanted to share this story because a rotten afternoon turned into a wonderful evening of reading and learning, and that’s all we can hope for every single day – a little good, a little bad. And as long as we all remember the phrase “take the bad with the good,” things might just go a little smoother.  

We go through life, day by day, some things meaning nothing, other things meaning everything. And we never know when these “everything” moments are going to happen. And sometimes the “nothings” become everything.

My mood yesterday was in the toilet. I found out that my kid’s school district was going virtual until January. January! We ended in-person school in March. That’s almost a year of at-home learning, at-home access to siblings 100 percent of the time, at-home going stir crazy. And my guess is that we won’t go back in January. These thoughts swirled in my head to the point where I was going to chew someone’s head off so I left the house. I put headphones on, pushed Ava in a stroller, and had Evan in tow on his scooter.

I listened to music and enjoyed the evening air, trying to clear my head, even as they chattered in the background. I walked faster and faster with every ounce of anxiety flowing through my veins. My head was about to explode with thoughts. And then I ran into a close friend of mine who lives nearby. She was out walking her dog. She was clearing her head, too.  

My friend is a teacher, and she has been shopping for a desk so she can set up her home office, and she can’t find one that she likes. Amazon is back-ordered. Stores are out of stock. She’s frustrated, and I don’t blame her.

My niece, who lives in Colorado, recently went bike shopping with money she got for her 9^th birthday. I went with her. The stores were out of stock. Bikes were taking weeks and weeks to be put together. There was no way for her to get one on the day that we went shopping. She was frustrated, and I don’t blame her.

I’m in the middle of getting my master’s degree. If I stop my program, I have to wait more than six months to restart, and I’m not willing to do that. My classes are one month long each, and when one ends, another begins. They’re intense. I read more than 400 pages of textbook every month. I write papers. I do presentations. I do this all with the help of babysitters and friends who sometimes watch my kids. I do this at night. I do this on weekends. I do it when I can.

So what’s supposed to happen when I become a teacher next month? I have a sixth grader, a fourth grader, and a daughter who is supposed to go into transitional kindergarten. I don’t feel that it’s fair to expose her to “school” on a computer, so we opted to put her back into preschool this upcoming year. So, that leaves me with two to teach. Two to keep on track. And my own schoolwork to stay caught up with. Needless to say, I freaked out yesterday when I heard the news.

But during that walk, my friend said, “Oh well, I’ll get a desk when I can. It’s out of my control.” She totally let go. And I realized, that’s what I needed to do, too. What’s the point in freaking out when it doesn’t do any good? All it does is make me feel anxious and unhappy, and why would I do that to myself?

I went home, put Pandora on my phone, and blared it while I took a hot shower. A song I had never heard came on. I Googled it and I can’t find it. But that’s ok. The song had a message, which was that life is full of choices. I decided right then to choose positivity. To choose a better attitude. To be a better role model for my kids, who don’t need my negativity in their life when they’re the ones suffering more than I am by not being able to return to school.

I decided right then to make better choices. Because, the truth is, there are still plenty of choices I have control over. I have control over what kind of mom I am. I have control over what I eat (I’ve lost 21 lbs in the past 6 weeks, which I’ll write more about later). I have control over finding happiness in every single day. I have the choice to be thankful that my family is healthy.

My mindset is up to me. The world feels like it’s falling apart, but I can show up in it however I choose to show up. I feel empowered by that thought. I am the only person who has control over me. I am going to make the best of these times. I am not going to get caught up in the negative, regardless of how easy that is to do these days. There is still plenty for all of us to be thankful for as we navigate these strange, uncertain, confusing times.

We just have to focus on finding those things. And this power lies within us. I am grateful for this shift in mindset that I have embraced. And as I said before, we never know when “everything” moments are going to happen, and we don’t know when “nothing” will become everything. So hang in there, and enjoy the ride as best you can.   

I’m about to get real personal and extremely vulnerable here. For the past 20 years, I have struggled with my weight. I have refused to share this story of struggle because I thought this was my story. Nobody else needed to know about it. I would deal with it on my own, fix it on my own, and one day, people would see my miraculous transformation and never need to know how deeply I struggled with this problem.

But recently, it occurred to me. This isn’t my story. This is the story of every single person on the planet who has ever struggled with his or her weight. This is why I decided to share it. Before I tell you how I got to the healthy mindset I’m in now (and one I pray to God I can maintain), I will tell you how my story looked…

Binge eating when nobody was looking. Stashing snacks – my car (I was good at finding nooks that nobody knew about), my dresser drawer (under my socks), behind all the kids’ snacks in the pantry (I stood on a chair to reach them. I was never without a secret stash of some form of chocolate or cookies). Eating in the middle of the night after getting up to pee. Driving through (mostly to get cookies…I’ve never been a huge fan of fast food) and throwing away the evidence before anyone knew I went (and spending cash so there was no trail of me driving through Carl’s Jr.!).

The other part of my story? Trying to hide my weight. Wearing clothes that were too loose to hide the fat. Buying bras that would cover as much back fat as possible. Wrapping towels around my body whenever I was in a swimsuit.

What did I experience from all this sneaky eating and hiding beneath my clothing? Shame. SO. Much. Shame. I started saying awful things to myself in the mirror. All I thought about from morning till night was what treats I was going to have that day. If I ordered my favorite salad from Luna Grill, I made sure to order a side of fries. I literally became afraid of eating “healthy” without having something unhealthy to go with it. I was afraid of my body feeling that sugar crash, so I just kept pumping it with carbs and sugar. And, alas, my fat kept growing and the weight kept pouring on.

Now, let me take you back 20 years. I was a dancer. I danced at least three nights a week at my local dance studio in Arizona, at least two hours per night. I did jazz and I was an avid tapper. I was in love with dance. I was not in love with working out and I never felt like I was actually working out. Even though the first 20 minutes of every dance class was the equivalent of what someone these days would call a hardcore boot camp class.  I had a 6-pack that I didn’t even work intentionally to get. I had toned arms and legs and I was extremely thin and strong.

With this body, I was also an avid water skier, snow skier, rock climber, hiker, swimmer, you name it…if it was active, I was good at it. And I did it effortlessly because of this body I was living in.

I realize that some people who struggle with weight never had the luxury (or curse…I’ll get to that in a minute) of having a thin body without trying. A lot of people have struggled with weight since childhood. On one hand, this was a luxury for me. Weight was something I never had to worry about, so it was not something I never had to think about. I ate what I wanted (I could down a half gallon of ice cream or eat an entire row of Oreos without putting on an ounce). I would just burn those calories right off with the activities I did. Some might say, “Ahhh, youth,” but really, some people never had that luxury.

And on the other hand, like I mentioned, I think that this easy way of living was also a curse. I never thought about weight, so when I hit my late 20s, started having babies, growing older, slowing down my exercise, and continuing to eat as though I was still dancing four nights a week, I still wasn’t thinking about my weight because I never had to and it wasn’t something that was even near my radar….Until I got bigger and bigger. I denied it for a long time. I called it “chub” because I no longer had a six-pack, but then that chub turned into fat.

I had three kids, headed into my late 30s, and my weight struggles hit me hard…that’s when the reality set in that I would never have a healthy body again without working for it…I mean, really working hard for it. Because, by then, I was a good 40 lbs. overweight with the mentality of a 20 year old dancer.

So, I needed to make a change. And boy did I make changes. Over the past 10 years, I have tried almost every diet, every fad, I’ve lost some weight, I’ve gained it all back. I’ve beaten myself up. I’ve become lethargic. I’ve gotten on blood pressure medication. I’ve hired trainers. I’ve quit the trainers. I’ve bought bigger clothes. I’ve struggled with becoming depressed about it (and I am not a depressed person by nature). My brain chemistry changed and I had a “What’s the point?” attitude. Then I’d look down at my three kids and think, “They’re the point, you fat idiot!”

But it wasn’t enough, somehow. And it scared me. So I coped by eating…

And then something shifted. I can’t say that I had some sort of epiphany or that there was some magic moment when I decided that, “today is the day!” There was no declaration. There was no big “aha!” moment. I just decided that I needed more energy. I needed to be more present with my kids. I was tired of them playing with my “wubble bubble” (the cute name they gave my fat gut). I was tired of telling them to play without me, that I would sit right here and watch. I was tired of my oldest son worrying about my weight and lecturing me when I would reach for a sweet. I was tired of thinking about my next food “fix.” I was tired of feeling like an addict. I was tired of focusing on junk food 24/7. I was tired of feeling like giving up at the age of 40. I was tired of making excuses.

So, as I’ve done a million times before, I cut WAY back on carbs. I cut out sugar. The first three days felt like I was going to die. But, alas, I didn’t. The next few days after that were easier. There are still days I want desperately to eat a piece of toast with my morning eggs or drive through somewhere and buy a cookie. But I refrain. I keep refraining. I put an image of my healthier self in front of my mind’s eye (sometimes I even close my eyes so I can really visualize it) and I focus on that person. That person that I want to be. Not the person who wants to stuff her face. That joy only lasts a few minutes. The pain lasts much longer. The internal pain. The inflammatory pain my body feels. The pain of knowing I’m on high blood pressure mediation when I could prevent it. The pain of knowing I wasn’t being the best mom I could possibly be.

To date, I’m down 12 pounds, and I have about 30 to go. Please keep me in your thoughts and wish me well because, as I recently told my husband, I am fragile right now. I am strong in every other way. I finish what I start. I am a strong mother to my children. But I am a weak, sad person when it comes to food. This will be a fight for me until all the weight is gone and healthy foods sound better than junk food 100% of the time. I’m getting there. I can honestly say that I am satisfied snacking on almonds rather than cookies. But I can’t say that I don’t struggle every single day to give in to my cravings (because I still have them).

But I have been satisfied before. I have spent long stints of time transitioning away from junk and into a healthy lifestyle, just to let it all go and regress. I’ve done it more times than I can count. I hope this isn’t one of those times. That’s why I started out saying that this post would be vulnerable and extremely personal. I hope that by putting it out there for all to read, that it would help me to hold myself accountable. My closest friends and my family encourage me all the time. But I have realized that it has to be me that does the work. Nobody else can do it for me. I only have myself to blame if I fail.

So, friends, for now, I am not failing, and I hope to never go back to that toxic, dysfunctional relationship with food that I have always had. I think that sharing my story is the first step in the right direction.

Thank you for reading.

XO,

Rachelle

A therapist I once knew said, “Your body doesn’t lie.” I will never forget those words. The physical reaction to a situation that your body has is your truth.

Whether it’s an overreaction, a reaction others might deem ridiculous, an underreaction…it doesn’t matter. It’s your body’s unique reaction and it’s something you have no control over.

Some people can look at a bad car accident, witness all the gruesome details and feel fine. Others might throw up at the same sight. 

Today, my tummy hurts and I have pressure in my throat from holding back tears. This is my body’s reaction for the day. Yesterday, I was fine. Tomorrow, I’ll probably be fine, too. But today, I sat in line with dozens of other cars at my boy’s school to collect the stuff they left behind when school suddenly closed two months ago, and the reality of everything hit me hard, all over again.

I am amazed (but not surprised) by society’s reaction to COVID. I see #allinthistogether everywhere. And the truth is, we are. We were all hit hard with the news. We were all in a state of shock, and then we evolved to fear, anger, sadness, acceptance and now, what?? Where are we? Most people I talk to simply say, “I’m over this. I’m totally over this.” I feel the same. But does it matter how I feel? The reality is, everyone is still wearing masks. Most everything (where I live) is still shut down. The world, to me, still feels partially apocalyptic whenever I leave my neighborhood.  

Every other post on Facebook is COVID related. How are you dealing? Is it too soon to have playdates? How does everyone feel about getting together with friends? How close is too close? Are you all still wearing masks? My kids are depressed. My two-year old has no interest in playing anymore because there is nobody to play with. I hugged my mom for the first time today (through a giant piece of plastic).

This has all become normalized. I hear rumors that schools might not reopen in the fall. There is talk that a vaccine won’t come out for a year or two, and nothing will feel “normal” until then. Every time I think, “I can’t do this anymore,” I realize, I have to. Just like all of you and everyone else has to. 

When I saw Evan’s teacher at school this morning, she ran up to my car to deliver his stuff and peeked inside to look for him. She wanted a moment with him. She wanted to see him…not virtual him…just him. 

Connecting with his teacher on Zoom for the past two months, it started to feel “normal” to see her there. But when I saw her in person, in the flesh, I realized how important people are in our lives. People aren’t the same on Zoom. I’ve had get-togethers with family and friends on Zoom and while it has become “normal,” I am realizing how much I miss them. I mean, I knew, but seeing someone in person that has been on a screen until today made me realize that this is not ok. Screen time with people suffices, but does not replace.

I am sad today. Soon, I will be fine. But today, I am listening to my body and feeling what I feel. And I feel sad. I feel like I’ve been going through a breakup with the world. Have you ever had one of those break ups where you lost a true love and nothing felt right for a long time?  

I have. It hurts. 

I have now officially broken up with my oldest son’s elementary school. I have broken up with the thought of feeling safe to hug other people. I have broken up with a life that knew no COVID. And just like it is with a real break up, there’s no telling how long these feelings will last, even when this time we’re living in becomes a thing of the past and things are back to “normal.” Because I don’t know when that will happen, and I don’t know if we’ll ever feel “normal” again.

Your ghosts are here, and I am too,

I patiently await.

Your untimely arrival,

Then I’ll open up my gate.

The quad you sang your songs in, I quietly sang, too,

Your school pride bursting at my seams, oh how I miss you.

I’ve seen your tears on drop-off day,

As moms waved you goodbye,

You stepped inside my classrooms,

Not sure how you would survive.

You were tiny, only five years old,

A day I won’t forget,

I held you all, upon my ground,

A weight I’d welcome back.

First grade came and went so fast,

I’d chuckle when you’d laugh.

On my playground with your friends,

Oh how I want you back.

I’m silent now, with memories,

Floating all around.

They’re silent, too, but you were not,

Children all abound

My cafeteria is void of food,

My office, hushed at rest.

Can’t mark you gone or tardy,

Cannot give you one more test.

I am here, and you are not,

Your ghosts keep me wide awake.

I feel you running in my grass,

The footsteps you would take.

Second grade, same as the first,

I blinked and it was gone.

You dressed for Halloween parades,

Had picnics on my lawn.

You somehow grew and went to third,

Before I was aware.

Of what big kids you had become,

A joy so hard to bare.

I had just two more years with you,

Before you’d walk away.

From all I am, a place for you,

On graduation day.

In fourth you learned to ballroom dance,

Played music I could hear.

Kept secrets from your teachers,

Grew closer to your peers.

The kids that you grew up with,

Would walk as one out of my gate,

When fifth grade ended, come mid-June,

But, oh…that’d have to wait.

They made you leave, I had to stay,

I’ve remained in place for you.

It’s not your fault, just rest assured,

That I will wait for you.

If middle school comes next and you,

Cannot walk through my gate,

I’m at peace with that, I prepared you for,

The next step you would take.

I am here, oh how I miss you,

My fifth graders, you have grown.

Away from crying children,

Into people of your own.

I’ll stay quietly beneath the lights,

And wait for what comes next.

It’s been a good five years with you,

Now go, and be your best.

Love – Midland Elementary School

Little girl, you’re only four and nothing is the same,

The parks are marked with yellow tape and everything has changed.

Masks in place of smiles have put questions in your eyes,

A silent monster in our midst keeps us living in disguise.

The friends that you once played with did not hide away from you,

They miss you every single day, that, I promise you.

Little girl, you’re only four, you’ve forgotten what it’s like,

To go to school all on your own, to learn to read and write.

Your independence might feel gone, but I assure you that it’s not,

When life returns to what it was, I’ll remind you what you’ve got.

Sass and smarts and confidence, a place here in the world,

That has nothing to do with living in the shadows of my mold.

Little girl, you’re only four, with so much left to give,

The fog will lift and make some sense of the life you’re yet to live.

Love – Mommy

I wrote this post three weeks before the COVID-19 pandemic. I was rushing through life just as we all were. I’m so glad I wrote this and never published it (because I hadn’t yet finished creating my new blog), so it was still sitting here on my computer waiting to be posted. I read through it and on one hand, it felt like I wrote it yesterday, but in reality, I wrote it a lifetime ago. The scenario I described in this article involved schedules, and Bobby coming home late from work, and piano lessons. Now, those are things of the past. I got choked up while reading it because I so desperately want life to return to it’s old norm.

But there was a part of me that said, Wait a minute, it’s time to put more effort into seeing the bright side of the reality we’re living in now. There’s no need to rush. There’s nowhere to be. It’s time to slow down and not long so hard for those old days because there’s absolutely nothing I can do right now to get them back.

And I just remind myself that they will come back, and what a sweet day that will be.

Original post written on Feb. 20, 2020

I am now in week 3 of my new Master’s degree program in a course called “Orientation to School Psychology.” I can’t believe the first month is almost done. This is what drew me to the program; its one-month-course-at-a-time structure. At this rate, I’ll be done before I know it. But just because it’s going fast doesn’t mean it’s going easy.

I think of it this way. I have kids, a husband, a house, a couple of side writing jobs…I have meals to make and schedules to keep and responsibilities that comes along with raising children and maintaining a home.

It’s a juggling act, and I just threw in another ball.

I chose the online version of this program (rather than the once a week, in-class option), for pretty obvious reasons. I have three children. My youngest is four. Enough said, right? Programs like this are designed for people like me; people who return to school after their first career has sizzled out and they want to find something new to sink their teeth into.

My class virtually meets every Tuesday evening at 7 p.m. We all login to class via Zoom, and we can see our professor in the middle of the screen. All of us students are logged in with our microphones on and our cameras aimed at us so when we decide to participate in the class discussion, we can. For those of you who watched The Brady Bunch, picture the intro…Mom in the middle, floating heads of the kids surrounding the mom. That’s us during class. We can all see our instructor. We can all see each other.  

As you can imagine, a lot has to take place for me to have the quiet space required to be able to login into a class and participate. My house is not quiet unless nobody is there. There are five of us in this home, it’s two-story, and there are only a couple of rugs to absorb noise. No carpet. It echoes. There’s laughing. There’s fighting. There’s complaining. There’s playing. It’s a full-time, live-action house.

And my husband, Bobby, has a job. An important job that sometimes requires long hours. Before signing up for this program, we agreed that he would need to get home every Tuesday in time for my 7 p.m. class.

The first Tuesday that I had class, I wanted everything to be perfect. I wanted to be sitting at my computer with washed hair, fresh makeup, you know, presentable. I wanted enough quiet time to exist before the start of class that I would no longer feel frazzled from the day. I wanted to have the kids bathed, fed, and almost ready for bed by the time 6:30 p.m. rolled around.

And I did. I had all my ducks in a row. I had all afternoon, starting right after school, to make sure that my boys, Andrew and Evan, practiced piano, and that my daughter, Ava, had her bath with proper playtime rather than a rushed “let’s get you out because mommy has something to do right now” feel to it.

They were all fed and clean when Bobby got home at 6:45. He was 15 minutes late, which I was expecting, so that was okay. I still had 15 minutes. As I started to open my school email account to locate the link for my new class, my boys got into a pillow fight and the corner of a pillow went straight into Evan’s eye. He cried. Hard. Andrew apologized, and Ava ran to get an ice pack. Evan said he couldn’t open his eye. It hurt too bad. He needed mommy snuggles. Okay, I can do this, I thought. I have a few minutes.

We snuggled on the couch, and then Ava, who sometimes likes to avoid taking breaks from playing by holding her pee in until the moment it’s going to escape from her body, peed on the bathroom floor right before she made it to the toilet. She started crying.

It was 6:52. I still had eight minutes. Bobby started asking questions. Have they eaten? Are they all bathed? Will they need bedtime snacks or did they eat enough for dinner? I answered all questions while cleaning Ava’s pee situation and getting her onto the toilet. Finally, things were starting to calm down.

Bobby found out he got a promotion that day. He needed to squeeze in that information in the midst of everything else going on. I don’t blame him. He was so happy and I was so proud. I hugged him and tried not to look like I was going to have a panic attack because it was then 6:58 and I needed everybody upstairs. I had my computer and notebook and articles we’d be discussing during class all set up at the kitchen counter. Upstairs is where all the bedtime action happens, so I thought I’d be safe. It was 6:59 and I was not safe. I was going to be late.

So, out came my mom voice. Not only to my kids, but to Bobby as well. GET UPSTAIRS I yelled. The kids started whining about the snacks they still needed and Bobby had another question or two. He was asking them as he marched the kids upstairs. Four people saying endless words, echoing up the stairs.

It was 7 p.m. on the dot. I rushed to my computer and hit the “Join Zoom Meeting” button. Phew. I made it. The noise upstairs was unheard by my new classmates, and well, for me, I’m pretty good at blocking it out when I need to. Bobby had it under control. And I attended my first class without a full-blown panic attack happening. It all worked out.

My point? When you want to do something, you make it work, no matter what. This situation could have been much worse… someone could have thrown up on me. Bobby could have gotten stuck in traffic on the way home. But, no. On this particular day, believe it or not, it was a success. I was in a quiet room, looking halfway put together (my hair was still in a sloppy pony tail and I had no make up on, but I was there).

This is just how life has to be done sometimes when you’re working toward something you really want. Messy, sloppy, rushed, and crazy…but it’s still possible…and worth it in the end.      

Someone who recently read my last couple of blog posts but didn’t fully read my website bio asked, “So, what’s your midlife reinvention?” I know that most people don’t always read every word of a website they’re browsing, so I wanted to dedicate this blog post to what exactly I’m reinventing at the age of 40.

I am going back to school to earn a Master’s degree in School Psychology. It’s a 24-month program through National University, and I am taking one month-long class at a time. I am currently in class number three.

The reason for pursuing this new career is very personal to me, and while I may or may not share those reasons (haven’t decided yet), this is the path I am currently on.

Now let me go back in time 23 years, to when I was 17 years old. I had just graduated from high school and I went on a family trip the summer right after to visit my grandparents in Oregon. They live in a small town on a beautiful river, and one afternoon, we launched our boats and kayaks from their backyard and went for a ride.

My dad and I rode together in a small, metal fishing boat, and as we paddled, I stared at the houses surrounding us. They were lined along the river, some with occupants, others falling apart. As we made our way down the river, we must have been quite a sight (there were about 10 of us making our way slowly down the river in boats and kayaks, and clearly, we weren’t local).

People were coming out onto their porches to see this floating parade of strangers, and it made me wonder how those people, who lived such rural lives, ended up there. What were their lives like before? They were mostly older and retired, and I wondered if they lived somewhere busier before they settled in a place where an exciting afternoon involved calling one another to talk about the out-of-towners on their river.

They all waved and seemed very friendly. I wondered about their life experience. I remember saying to my dad, “I would just love to go join some of these people on their porches and ask them all about their lives,” and my dad’s reply: “You should be a journalist.”

“A what?”

I was 17 and, to date, I had paid more attention to my social life than to the news or our local newspaper. I had been on my high school yearbook staff, but I had never thought about interviewing people and writing their stories as an actual career possibility. Before that conversation with my dad, I had my heart set on becoming a psychologist – and then everything changed.

I switched to journalism, earned my bachelor’s degree in Communications at the age of 21, and became a reporter for my local daily newspaper. I loved every minute of it. That 5-year career turned into a freelance writing career after I got married and decided to pursue my dream of writing a book. My book, “Once Upon A Wish: True Inspirational Stories of Make-A-Wish Children,” came out in 2012, and I have been writing for small businesses and different websites ever since.

I will never stop writing, but something was pulling at me to do something different. To try something new. To challenge myself in a new way that would take me back to an interest I had more than 20 years ago.  

I had never even heard of a school psychologist (only a clinical psychologist) until I met one that works at my kid’s school. She told me all about her job, and I wish I could say it gave me the clarity I needed. I had been juggling the options of becoming an Occupational Therapist (OT) or an Occupational Therapy Assistant (OTA) for more than a year. I had decided on the path of OTA, which required that I take Anatomy and Physiology as pre-reqs. Those classes almost killed me (that experience is worth an entire blog post, separate from this one).

The program at National University did not require any pre-reqs (they just took my bachelor’s degree and let me go from there); so choosing that path meant letting go of the credit I had just earned in Anatomy and Physiology. I went back and forth for a long time once I learned about the school psychologist career, and I finally made my decision.

I was going to become a school psychologist. So, I did the research, signed up for classes, and plunged right in. I have never been a person to dwell on things for too long. I usually know what I want. And while I did dwell for a long time with making this tough, life-changing decision (there were many pluses and minuses for all of the degrees I was considering, so there was a lot to consider), I made my decision and went for it. Sometimes, that’s what you have to do in life. Like my mom’s favorite singer, Cher, says, “You can always say, ‘Shouldn’t have done that!’”

But I don’t think I will. I think I made the right decision for myself and for my family. It’s not easy, that’s for sure, but it’s something I’m proud of. All I want to do with this blog is touch people’s lives – even just one person – if they are considering something they’re scared of or they think they’re too old for (that’s how I felt when I was first considering going back to school!).

So, if you’ve been sitting on a decision or dreaming of doing something you just haven’t had the courage to do, now is the time. Take it from me, it’s never too late.

XO,

Rachelle

The other night, my husband, Bobby, came downstairs after the kids were in bed and I was just sitting at our countertop, chin propped in my hands. Apparently I was staring into space and he said, “Is everything ok? You look…different.”

Different? That can’t be good…

I looked up at him with tears in my eyes and he leaned across the counter from me and said, “Oh, gosh, hon, what’s wrong??”

I told him that I didn’t know what was wrong, but he wanted to know. I thought for a moment to try and figure it out, and finally I said, “I guess that right now, my entire life just feels like a game a Whac-A-Mole.”

If you’ve never played Whac-A-Mole, it’s an arcade game that involves whacking plastic mole/beaver/rodent-looking things as they pop up sporadically from holes. You hit them with a big, soft mallet and as you hit one, the next ones (or two or three) pop up. Most of the time, you can’t keep up, and that’s the point of the game.

But that’s not the point of life, right?  

Bobby and I had a long, drawn-out conversation about how to minimize the moles I’m whacking everyday. Or, should I say, the way I could possibly get more order of those moles (in this case, three children that are demanding in very different ways, and who pop up at the most random times, all day long.)

This is just part of the deal with homeschooling, right? We went from organized chaos – schedules and rushing around to get everything done on time – to a slower pace, but with equal amounts of possible chaos.

Now we have to get all things done with the kids at our feet. For the past three weeks, I’ve been playing Whac-A-Mole 24/7. I’ve maintained all household duties while trying to get my boys (3^rd and 5^th grades) to do their schoolwork simultaneously. And I would play with my daughter on and off and let her float through her day longing for me to play with her 24/7 and I just lost my mind.

The boys are self-sufficient in some ways, but in need of extreme handholding in other ways. So, rather than roll out of bed into an arcade filled with Whac-A-Mole games that I’m trying to play all day and going crazy because of it, I came up with a game plan.

I get my boys started on their schoolwork in the morning, with tasks I know they can do on their own (whereas before, I was trying to go in order of the teacher’s day plan – then I realized, I can create my own plan timeline!). While they’re working, I do a few house chores and involve my daughter so she’s not “Mommy!”-ing me all morning.

Wow, did that ever pay off! She actually enjoys when I hand her a small pile of her laundry and ask her to put it away in her dresser drawers. She gets excited to pull up her stool and dry my pots and pans as I do the dishes. She loves that one-on-one attention, and I think she views it as “playing” with me. I know this phase will fade as she gets older, but I’m enjoying it now, and it’s helping with all of our sanity during this time!

As for the boys, I spend a couple of hours in the morning with my oldest, Andrew, while I give Evan (8) the assignment of playing with Ava. That’s right…I added an extracurricular activity to his schedule, which is to play and get along with his sister for about an hour! It’s either that or schoolwork, and he always chooses the playtime. Once Andrew’s work is done, the afternoon rolls around and it’s his turn to play with Ava while I help Evan with what he has left to do.

By 2 p.m., we’re done with school and the kids have the rest of the day to play. When Bobby gets off work (aka walks downstairs from our bedroom makeshift office), we eat a quick dinner together and I go upstairs to do a couple hours of work/schoolwork. I still do some writing for a few different websites as my part-time job, and I am in my third class for my master’s degree. It’s not an easy act to juggle right now, but it’s working because, after three weeks, I have finally learned to play the game.   

The irony of creating a blog that contains the word “reinvention” in the middle of a worldwide pandemic that changed everyone’s lives overnight is definitely not lost on me.

We are all in the middle of reinventing our lives as I write this. We’ve been at it for a few weeks now. When the scare of COVID-19 started to spread, the nation just sort of, shut down…with absolutely no warning.

We are all hit with unexpected things in our lives every day. If you think about it, not a whole lot goes exactly as planned. That’s why, sometimes, the best things in life come when we least expect them.  Spontaneity often pays off well.

But this pandemic we’re all in together is one of those things we just couldn’t see coming. It hit fast and it hit hard, and while at first it seemed like nothing good could come from this new way of life, I’m a person who likes to find the silver lining.    

My family – a husband and three children (10, 8 and 4) – were used to a robust schedule of school and sports and piano lessons and dance classes, and on and on. I had a day-planner filled to the brim with appointments to get to, and on most days, I found it hard to keep up. The days blended together and before I knew it, Mondays turned into Fridays, the weekends came and went, and we were starting another week.

And then one day, life stopped. The announcement came that school was out for three weeks. Restaurants were starting to close. Then most businesses followed shortly after. Then we were encouraged to stay home. Then we were required to stay home.

Our mindsets started shifting, naturally. What choice did we have? At the beginning of all of this, there were some complaints coming from people I talked to. There was disbelief. We were suddenly forced from our fast-paced lives to what seemed like some sort of twilight zone. It’s all that people talked about.

My neighborhood is filled with families, and we all started hanging out in the street during walks and bike rides rather than at barbeques and happy hours. We talked about missing those times, talked about how long we thought things would last this way, and then something shifted – we just started talking about regular stuff…how we were homeschooling our kids; how things were going working from home; what projects we were working on; what we were doing to keep our kids occupied. It became the new “norm” – a norm literally nobody thought could possibly ever become a “norm.”

Group texts started floating around the neighborhood – put teddy bears in your windows so we can take our kids on walks to find them! Create sidewalk art so we can read them as we pass by! Facebook became flooded with ideas about living life in the confines of home and occasional walks.   

Kids started begging to go back to school. Teachers reinvented their way of being, almost overnight. My son’s teacher recently said during a Zoom class meeting, “Bear with me, I never thought I’d be teaching online…but here I am!” She smiled and the kids chuckled. It’s not something any teacher – from elementary school to college – ever anticipated doing. And for those of us who enjoy the routine of getting a few hours of the day to ourselves by sending our kids to school – we never had any interest in becoming homeschoolers. But we all became homeschoolers overnight.

The thought of teaching my kids scared me. My 5^th grader’s Common Core math is completely over my head without Google by my side. How was I going to manage the schoolwork of two kids, in two different grades, with a 4-year old in tow saying, “Mommy” every three seconds? But I plunged in and did it, because I had to. All of us moms and dads have had to. And those who work full time? The process of transitioning from an office to a home-office with noise (lots of it, if you have kids) in the background must have been so overwhelming. But just like my husband did it, so has everyone else.

I have become a math teacher, an art teacher, a science teacher, overnight, as well as the mediator of three kids who love each other but have become sick of having each other around 24/7. But they have adjusted, too. My daughter (the four year old) has stopped asking me to take her to the park or to Michael’s Crafts or to the movies. She is used to those places being shut down. And it’s only been a few weeks.

The evolution of our mentality, as a society, has shifted, rapidly. We have all been forced to reinvent our lives, quickly. And if you are healthy and together with your family, then that’s really all that matters. So many lives have been lost. So many have been affected by this virus. Healthcare workers are going to work every day, worried that they’ll bring the virus home to their families. Grocery store clerks and bank tellers and healthcare professionals and all the other essential workers out there who are keeping life’s necessities going, are probably living in the same fear. But they are surviving.

We are all in this together, we are all reinventing ourselves every single day. And look how well we’re doing it, because we have to. Please stay safe and healthy, everyone.