Columns

Last summer, I met a new friend, Amber Bosselman, at the Virtual Cure SMA Conference. Amber is a certified life coach with a bachelor’s degree in psychology. She uses her knowledge to…

January marks the eighth anniversary of when my blog came to life. I was never much of a writer prior to launching my blog. In fact, when I announced that I’d be blogging in between classes and schoolwork during my final semester of college, my family…

Doesn’t it feel like we all carry a lot of baggage in life? If we could just forget about all the negatives, we could live on cloud nine. What if I told you that we would be permanently stuck on ground level, going nowhere in life, without all the heavy…

Kudos and a whew! to us all for surviving 2020. Vastly understated, last year was memorable. Overall (and thankfully), my family managed to welcome the new year intact. However, a second loss connected to my teaching stint at Brockman School hit hard. Brockman, a self-contained school for students with orthopedic…

The pursuit of independence is almost always on my mind. As a disabled person, I face numerous challenges when it comes to living an independent lifestyle. From financial obstacles to managing caregivers, the very thought of one day moving out of my parents’ house fills me with more…

It cried out in the dead of night. The wild call erupted like the sensual panic of a volcano beneath placid moonlight. My partner, Andy, was helping me get situated in bed for the night when the startling sound rang from the woodland edge outside our bedroom window.  “That’s…

I didn’t plan on spending the majority of the day after Christmas on the toilet with a sharp pain in my side, but it was a rather fitting end to 2020. Despite my best efforts, I couldn’t escape this year without at least one visit to the ER. …

Inspired by Susannah Conway, I’ve started to assign a word — yes, a single word — to the upcoming year, as a kind of landmark. Something to focus on as I go through the seasons, so I don’t lose track of what’s important to me. Your word is, in essence,…

Christmas Eve marks four years since I became an uncle, or as I like to call myself, a “funcle.” I let my sister and brother-in-law attend to all of the important parental responsibilities, while I do things like watch Disney movies and play hide-and-seek with my niece and…

I may have thrown a fit about genetic testing, but at the end of the day, it was easier than most things. The genetic counselor sent me the test in the mail. (I’m tired of COVID-19, but I will say I’m enjoying the ability to do pretty much everything…