I’m watching spring awaken around me more and more each day. I love the sound of the birds singing after so much silence in this world. Each day I find myself more and more thankful for the courage it took to move to Raleigh.
“I feel like so much transformation is happening around me and within me as well.”
I feel like my soul has become like a garden and I’m learning more and more about how to properly tend to it as an adult. With my sensory issues and Dysautonomia always causing a distraction, this can be a little overwhelming. Some days it’s hard to get outside to go for a walk because my blood pressure isn’t steady. Some days it’s hard to meditate because my anxiety wants to run away with itself. Some days my sensory issues make me want to draw all the blinds and cover my ears.
But that’s some days now. It’s no longer most days. Progress is progress. I’m finding myself replacing the sense of fear with curiosity and replacing overwhelm with gratitude. This shift has changed my life and continues to do so. I’m so thankful for the people around me who help remind me to keep going when the world is too loud. They are there as my doctors are ordering test after test trying to find the root of my medical struggles. It’s hard to not grow weary. But I will never give up. I know one day I will be well again. I can feel it in my bones.
Being in college, as an adult with Autism is challenging too. It’s come with its own set of worries that I have to challenge every day. But it’s worth it and my efforts are working. I know that my dreams of working in an adoption agency one day will help push me through this hard time. The beautiful memory of my friend Mary Beth who inspired such a career for me, lives on in the very spirit of serving others and in this dream of mine. I aim to make her proud. I know she’s watching from above.
“Above all else, love is growing in this garden of mine. Love of many kinds.”
I’m working hard to open my heart to the possibility of a family one day. I had closed my heart to that very idea long ago. It’s nice to finally feel my heart waking from that slumber and watch the doubts and fear melt like a soft blanket of snow. Love is such a vast feeling when you open your eyes to it. It’s simply everywhere I look these days.
Where do you feel like you’re growing most in your own life? Where are places you can plant love and weed out fear?
Gretchen McIntire
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