DelightStruck

Pharma is broken, peeps. U.S. healthcare is broken. Executives and government are all pointing the finger at each other. Nobody wants the blame as to why the system is broken. Somebody is profiting, and that is being put ahead of people's lives. I don't really care who falls on the sword and takes the blame and gets it fixed, just somebody, anybody. Here is a little window into type 1 diabetes in America (T1D). Managing type one diabetes in America is exhausting. Especially if you are a middle class family and on a high-deductible insurance plan through your employer (which 47% of Americans are), oh and you kind of need insulin to... I don't know... live. 2017 photo, nope not school system he works at now So in our little family of four, Coach Man is the type one diabetic. For those of you wondering, that's the type considered juvenile and genetic, and yes onset came when he was young, and no he can't fix it with diet and exercise. However, those things do ...

Hello 40! I kind of dig ya. So what did I learn over my #39adventures this last year? The biggest thing was to shake it up. There are always adventures just waiting to be had. Never rest on your laurels, peeps. Also, I really like the woman I am becoming in these years of my life. I want to see more of her! I also have realized I know what I enjoy and what I don't, so in celebration for the big 40 this week, here's a few things I've come to realize, through keeping a gratitude journal last year, make my heart sing. In no particular order, just how it ended up in the journal. My faith Walking out the front door in early spring to singing birds  Coach Man, the hooligans, our families and our fur babies Soft peach roses Writing, storytelling and my job Autumn anything Coffee A fresh wall calendar  The glow of candles on a birthday cake Fairy gardens Weddings Belly laughs Going to a local play or musical Pachelbel's Canon ...

It never goes away entirely. Sometimes waves of grief slowly lap at the shoreline, and sometimes they seem to overtake you like a storm is a-brewin' at sea. This February has been one of those months for me. The waves are mammoth and angry. I've been in a bit of a funk and melancholy. Coach Man and I had a fight about... get this - my birthday. Of all things. Who fights about that? It's a bit of a milestone birthday this year, and I'm not in the mood to party. Not because I'm in denial of the number of years, but because I so miss my mama, and I'd prefer for this February to pass by quietly. It's so not fair that she's not here for this specific year, and for all the other milestones that come and go. She left us in 2013. Six years this month. Grief ebbs and flows, but it never leaves. And you never quite know what will trigger it. I will forever miss her. Yes, I smile at the legacy of love she's left behind, I weave pieces of her into my li...

Do you ever step back to think about the facade that you present to the world? How the outward layer of yourself day in and day out comes off to others. Are you an open book or more of a carefully crafted masquerade? This world we live in is very good at nurturing facades. The facade of wealth. The facade of power. The facade of success. The facade of perfection. The facade of happiness. The facade of a heroism. The facade of a flawless marriage and perfect kids. And oh so many more facades. It's easy to put on these various pretenses, but when the facade cracks and the real oozes out, what then? A facade built of smoke and mirrors is exhausting to keep up and will eventually crack. Do you frantically spackle like Goldie Hawn and Meryl Streep in Death Becomes Her or finally let your stuffing hang out like The Velveteen Rabbit ? Why are so many of us so afraid of taking off the masks? Of living in the real? Why do we want to hide our true self? I think the easy answer is ...

Yep, I've been called Pollyanna a time or two. I do tend to be cheerful and optimistic most of the time. It's just me, always has been. My sister teases me calling me ever the cheerleader, full of sunshine. Now don't get me wrong. I am human and do have bad days (okay sometimes weeks) from time to time. I'm just as imperfect as the next person. Plus I'm not naive - I know there is evil in this world. I just choose to lean into love, look for the good and... try to be the good. This past Sunday one of the readings was from Corinthians 13. I adore Corinthians 12 - 13. It talks of the gifts of the spirit and then dives into love and what it is and isn't. My favorite part is 13:4-7. Love is patient, love is kind. It is not jealous, it is not pompous, it is not inflated. It does not dishonor others, it does not seek its own interests, it is not easily angered, it does not rejoice over wrongdoings, but rejoices with the truth. Love always protects, always tr...

I've often heard my siblings reminisce about the year my mother threw a magical Valentine's Day party. She surprised them as they got off the school bus that afternoon in the 70s (long before I arrived on the scene). They had no clue at all of what she had been secretly planning in the days before. She sure had the gift for weaving childhood magic out of the simplest of things. Back when there was no Pinterest or Googling, she created her own dream parties for the little hearts that meant the most to her. To this day all eight of my siblings remember with great fondness and wonder her after school parties. I have my own wonderful memories with her, but not quite the same as theirs, since there is 12 years difference between myself and the sibling right before me. I kind of grew up an only child, with the benefit of much older siblings - really two different generations. A Retro Valentine's Day Party Getting back to them, her and the parties... With eight of them, th...