Hello all!
A blog post is long overdue. If you are still watching the page/Facebook thank you for sticking with us! Hopefully this summer we will be able to be more active on here. We do have our wedding in July and a week together in one of our Jeeps with no real destination. Speaking of wedding, if you have an RSVP please get that sent to us soon. We have to give the venue a final guest count soon. We haven’t even received half of them back yet. Yes, this is me giving all of you stern talking too. Moving on folks!
Last night while giving Grant a bath, he was rolling around and hit his head on the side of the bathtub. This was the third time of the day that he had managed to hit his head. I told him that he needed to be more careful and that he needed to protect his noggin. He then gave me a very confused look and asked me, genuinely, “Why?” I couldn’t help myself, I laughed. Hard. He genuinely was asking me why he needed to protect his head. I told him that your head is very important and that you need to be careful with it so you don’t hurt it. He seemed good with that for an answer.
As I thought about it last night, that was good for the moment since he is only 4. I also realized that I am going to have to teach him about protecting his noggin mentally too. That his mental health is very important and something that he should learn. Right now he is 4 so let’s try to just survive his daredevil phase. But one of the best ways that he can learn about mental health is by me and Tyler modeling taking care of our own mental health. So I am going to tell you about what I have been doing to help mine. Will, he ever read this? Maybe, maybe not but the act of me writing it and putting it out there is important not only to become the model I want to be for him but also for myself.
A few weeks ago, I took a HUGE step towards taking care of my own mental health. I signed up for therapy through the app Better Help. Currently am in week 10 and Tyler was the only one who knew about it (Thank you love for always supporting me through this). I am so incredibly happy that I took this step and made the decision to do something solely for myself. Leaving my toxic marriage, moving to Bloomington, going to school, all of those things were for Grant’s benefit. Truthfully. I did those for Grant, not myself. But talking to a therapist once a week, I did that for me. I have gained so much insight into my mental health and also why somethings are the way they are in my mind. We also created some techniques for me to use and she has given me some great books to read in my spare time (which is almost never now haha).
I don’t think I am ready to fully talk about what I have learned but I will one day. I know that I don’t have to but I think it would be beneficial to my healing. That is going to be my next step I believe with my therapist. Last session she told me to take some time to figure out where we needed to go next or if this was the end of journey. I have seriously made some amazing progress. Tyler can be the biggest advocate to that. But I believe that I need to now figure out where I go from here. Now that I have discovered what the message is that causes me so many issues, I have come to a cross road it feels like. Do I continue living my life like I am now or do I make some changes and possibly confront some people? I truly do not know, but I have never felt more like I was heading in the right direction. All because I took a leap on myself and taking care of myself mentally.
To wrap things up, if you have seen ads about the app Better Help and are questioning if it would be right for you, take the leap. For a while now, I knew that I needed too but one I was scared that my ex-husband could use it against me somehow with custody of Grant, and two because it is expensive. With Tyler’s help, I realized that no one is going to see me talking to someone once a week as a bad thing or a reason why Grant is not in the best hands. Better Help is super affordable and if you fill out a quick form you can get it at an even more discounted rate. So check it out. Even if you don’t have a mess of things to sort through as I do, it could still be a beneficial thing for you.
Take care of your mental health folks. Protect your noggin kid.
With lots of love,
-Caitlyn aka Pretty Lady
