adventures and life lessons of a super-woman: New year, new goals, new adventures....

adventures and life lessons of a super-woman: New year, new goals, new adventures....: Greetings readers, friends and family. Welcome to the New Year. I ended 2016 with several good friends, and lots of hugs and plenty of kis...

New year, new goals, new adventures....

Greetings readers, friends and family. Welcome to the New Year.

I ended 2016 with several good friends, and lots of hugs and plenty of kisses on the cheek, with some sent and received texts to the people I love that were not able to join me at midnight. If they couldn't be with my in body, at least they knew that in spirit, I was never far away.

I know it's very early in the year, but I just want to say, one week into 2017, and I'm off to an up and running start.

After a day with my niece painting, a busy week at work, starting some new things, including...well there's a surprise that we'll talk about in a bit.

The first thing I decided to do, before I sign up for any graphic design classes, was to start editing and revising my novel.

For those that aren't away, the novel that I so was so mysterious about, is about heroin addiction. It is told from the perspective of several loved ones who lost someone to addiction, including a daughter, and a mother, , a recovering addict, and an addict who overdosed and died.

While it's not something that I talk about often, I do believe that we let survivors and recovering addicts know that there is a wide range of emotion involved in the healing process. People like to hush it up when it happens, but maybe it's time we stop shushing people and start talking about it.

Aside from that, one of my new 2017 adventures is one that is sort of unexpected. I started a dance class.

When I saw the event on Facebook, believe me, I text several of my friends and tried to convince them to go with me, so that I didn't look like a fool going alone.

After several rejections, I decided, you know what...I'm just going to go and push myself out of my boundaries. Maybe I'll meet new people, maybe I'll make new friends, and importantly...maybe I'll have some damn fun.

You know what? I did. Enough fun that I'm actually planning to try and go back weekly. I doubt I ever get good enough for any sort of dancing with Ohio stars, or anything like that, but I will have fun.

Another new thing I did today, and I'm nervous about, but proud that I am at least making an attempt, and hopefully get approved.

I applied to be a guardian for Findlay Honor Flight, a program that takes Veterans to Washington D.C. to spend a day viewing their memorials.  I have always wanted to apply, and finally made the decision to.

There's one catch, there is a $400 donation if I get approved. So, if I'm hitting people up for donations in a couple months, you'll know why.

Really, I think it would be an honor to spend a day participating in something bigger than myself, with a veteran, and helping him or her to see the memorials that exist soley because they gave up something in their lives.

You would think that would be it, but there's actually more, I got an invite to possibly go on a Mission trip to teach English in Haiti for a month. Now, I highly doubt that will be this year, or anytime soon, those funds are a lot harder to raise. But I was honored to be asked.

The same way I was honored to be asked to be a guest blogger on another site. Which....nope..that one is a surprise.

Next month a weekend Cleveland trip, planned with one of my best friends..and while we're there, I bet I find another castle that you guys didn't know about, and one I have neither photographed or blogged about before. I'm keeping you in suspense on that one.

But, if anyone has any recommendations for off the track restaurants or bars, feel free to pass those along.

So with all of this activity in the new year, all of these new plans, there are still emotions and thoughts that I deal with.

The other day, it dawned on me that inspite of one of my best friends getting married at Christmas, a friend letting his gf move in, and several Christmas engagements and relationship changes, before I had always thought I was being left behind by life.

Now though, with all of the exciting things that I'm taking the time and chances to do, I wonder if I'm not just better off.

I mean, before I was always sorta okay just being the single girl. I've had a ton of adventures that I really enjoy and probably wouldn't have gotten to have if I had been tied down to a guy who didn't like to travel, or like my randomness.

And now that I'm officially an empty-nester, well, I won't lie, there is a large part of me that truly misses my boys, having them home, under my roof. That part of me gets especially sad on the holidays when there was no one to make homemade cinnamon rolls for this year.

The rest of me, well, I'm doing surprisingly well. Between work, volunteering for the Reading For Life program, new things coming with the magazine, a couple of exciting trips that I'm trying so hard to get planned for the year, and now, some more writing projects and a new dance class, maybe empty nesting isn't that bad.

I miss my kids, but for the first time ever, I get to be completely selfish and think about what I need and what I want to do.

For someone that turns....yeah I'm still not hitting that next decade yet, but I still have big dreams and goals.

That's all for today everyone. I hope the new year treats you well, and I hope you chase every dream you have this year.

Until next time, go chase some castles.

And life goes on

Reflections of 2016.

As the ball dropped on the year 2015, I did something that I had been telling myself for at least six months I would do. During a quiet evening spent with only three other people,  I raised my glass and toasted a good riddance to the turbulent, tumultuous  year  of 2015, the year that almost broke me, the lost year.

I promised myself that in 2016 I would be better, I would do better, I would force myself to heal. I thought that my sheer will power to deny anything that had happened would push me through.  

I promised myself all of these things that I would do during the year, like, starting to work out again, and taking a graphic art and design class, and finishing a novel, and finding great love, and allowing myself to heal. I told myself I would do things to my house. Only some of those things came to fruition.

Towards the beginning of the year, I made a friend that would become the first person I would open up to. Because this friend hadn’t known me in my previous version and had some struggles of his own, he was able to see past the tough exterior that I tried to put on and see how broken I felt and in his own ways, pushed me to begin the healing process.

I will respect his privacy, but he opened my eyes about a lot of things in my life and about myself, including my previous denials that I wanted someone to share my life with.

See, before, I thought that if I pushed myself hard enough, I could force myself to heal. If I just told myself to snap out of it, I would. I didn’t know that it would take time and months of intensive counseling and therapy to keep all of the hurt, anger, rage and sadness at bay.

Many mornings I didn’t look in the mirror, because I didn’t want to see the toll the year before had taken and because I wore the guilt of things I couldn’t control like a badge.  

I had thought that if I continued to say that I was fine, I eventually would be. That if I denied the desire to have someone share my life, the desire would go away.   I thought that if I just kept pushing every emotion down and swallowing it, it would be ok.

I went out with friends, probably drank too much, worked too many hours, obsessed over working out, but when it came to talking, I just wouldn’t.  I told people I was fine, that I was okay, that I didn’t want to talk about it, or think about it.

By April, those things were beginning to weight more than I could deal with.

There are things that only those closest to me knew over the summer. Only the people that were in my day to day life knew about the debilitating panic attacks, which caused me to be unable to leave my drive way, or shop, or see friends.

Only  a few people who love me most knew about the times that I woke up and cried and rolled back over to sleep because I couldn’t’ deal with the pressure of everything. I couldn’t figure out how to get over a string of  heartaches, let go, and move on.

There are people in this life that will tell you that you just pull yourself up by your boot straps and deal with it. That’s all fine and good and dandy. I agree eventually you do have to pull yourself up by your boot straps, but those people weren’t beside me or with me, when I sat for 30 minutes in my driveway and physically couldn’t make myself leave. Those people weren’t with me when I felt like I had been gut- punched constantly.

They didn’t understand how many things had finally built up and taken a toll on me, or how I had spent years bottling up emotions and tragedies without shedding tears. I boxed everything up and shelved it until the weight finally caused everything to tumble down.  

With so much grief and anger, there were times I felt like maybe I didn’t deserve to move on and have my own life. I felt like maybe I wasn’t a good enough mother, friend, niece. I felt like if I had tried harder, things would have turned out differently.

Guilt in grief has a way of almost destroying you.

See the thing is, people don’t talk about mental health. They don’t talk about the way it impacts your body, and a lot of times we’re shamed or called weak if we break down and can’t push through. But I’m not weak. I’m one of the strongest people I know, ask anyone who loves me. So my loved ones sat quietly by as they couldn’t figure out to heal me or what I needed in order to move on.

So, I knew it was time for me to start counseling. I had to hit rock bottom, before I started climbing back up. 

Months later, after talking and talking and talking and learning ways to process, ways to heal, and healthy ways to grieve, I finally realized that nothing that happened the year before was my fault. Other people make decisions about their lives, and no matter how much it hurts me, I can’t control nor dictate their choices. I can only control my reactions to it.

As I have healed, I have finally started making choices that are about me, choices that are about me and my own future.

I took a job, where although the pay is lower than I’m used to, but I get to meet people, and  have a flexible schedule, and have opportunities to grow and develop as a person and use personality strengths.

I kept writing for the magazine, and have loved every minute of it. I am watching as it grows and develops. I got certified to tutor English for an adult literacy and English as a second language program and have enjoyed seeing my student develop and hope to help her continue her development.

And I completed my novel. It needs revision, but I know in my heart it is good. I know it is timely, I know there are people in this world that will read it and maybe have it touch their lives or open their eyes.

As with every year, I have gone on great adventures to tell people about the existence of structural and natural beauties. I have made my way to castles across the state, to Kentucky and to Indiana.  I thrill for those days when I can tell someone an exciting piece of history and people say “I had no idea, thank you for showing me that.”

I have opened up to people, and shared my heart, my dreams, my strengths and weaknesses. I opened up and shared not only my darkness, but that light that in previous years I had only let my closest friends see. 

What those people have done with me being laid bare, has no consequence for me. I opened myself u whoand finally after years of not giving anyone an opportunity to get to know me, allowed someone to hear my hopes, my dreams, my passions, even my weaknesses.  

For once, I have allowed myself to be human, to be vulnerable. That in itself has been a challenge for me.  And in allowing myself to be vulnerable, I have finally started to become whole again.

I have stood by my loved ones as they went through their own personal struggles this year, and sometimes through their struggles I have learned things about myself. One of the things I learned is that there are times they are strong, because I have been strong. They have told me they have looked up to me and admired my persistence, my stance that you must love yourself before you allowed yourself to be loved. I have learned that in times of need, I will remain strong for them.

I am growing, I am developing. This year I finally realized that the hurt of years gone by does not define me, and that I can move on without settling for being treated as less than.

I finally learned that for some people, it won’t matter how much I am, how smart, how pretty, how funny, how good, they will never love me. But I will no longer allow that to define me. I am finally learning that my happiness means more to me than saving the feelings of those who do nothing but attempt to tear me down.

There are things that will always hurt. There will always be anniversaries, birthdays, or just some days when I am genuinely sad because of the memories. But, I finally have the ability to remember not just the hurt, but the fact that I was lucky to have loved people so much that losing them hurt so much. Where there is great hurt, there was also great love. That’s taken me awhile to understand.

The last two years I have allowed myself to be lax on having a five-year plan. I stopped asking myself where I see myself. I stopped asking what I wanted and how to accomplish my goals.  

That changes this coming year.

In 2017, I will revise my freshly written novel, and will start the submission process. I have a story that I think needs to be heard to help other people begin their healing. Even as I wrote it, there were times I had to walk away because there were feelings that were too fresh, too familiar.

I will continue writing for the magazine and tutoring. I will also spend more time working on and developing my blog. This means many more road trips to destinations off the beaten path.

  Maybe sometime I’ll travel to someplace exotic, maybe I’ll fall in love, real, true, lasting, forever love. Maybe I’ll take some more classes and learn new skills. Maybe I'll toast the New Year with a kiss, maybe I’ll toast it with a hug from an old friend. However I roll in the New Year  I will toast to a me that has finally grown, a me that is evolving, a me that went through hell and came out the other side, tattered, but not broken.

Whatever happens in 2017, I will know that although 2015 was the lost year and 2016 was the year I learned how to heal and without that, I wouldn’t have 2017, the year of dreams and possibilities. 

Then there was hope.

I'm overdue for a blog post. I'm aware of this.

I don't always know how to talk about these things without backtracking to when I started this blog.
When I started this blog, I was so excited for my future. I was a mom, a student, an intern, an employee and I was juggling all of those things so well and discovering so many new and exciting things along the way.

Then I was a reporter, and I was living my dream of writing for a living.

Then, life happened.

I have said over and over that the last two years of my life have been my darkest days, my darkest period. I havent always known how to reach out and say "someone help me" an in fact I'm normally very bad at it.
 
This isn't a sad post though, it's a happy one. I'm only talking about the dark things because I need to talk about the panic attacks that happened because of that.

I've always been the type of person that if I was hurting, I shut down and shut people out. I refused to talk about my problems, my sadness, the aches. I tried to fill the hours with work, so that I didn't have to think about the hurting and sadness.

Only, finally those things caught up with me and one day I couldn't breath. I couldn't leave my driveway. I couldn't do all of the million things that I used to do without thinking about them.

I slept for days on end, and sat in my car one night trying to convince myself to simply pull out of the driveway to go see friends. Even that wasn't possible.

I guess for the first time, I'm not ashamed to say that I am in counseling. I'm not ashamed to say that I needed help to get me over the hump. I'm not ashamed to say that I started reaching out to my friends and saying I"m sorry for the times I've shut them out, because I really didn't realize I was doing it.

I am proud to say that I finally have found some light. I finally have found some hope.

My life has been constant change and upheaval the last two years. All of those changes were destructive to me. Now I'm making changes that are positive. Changes that will allow me to grow. 

Through counseling, I started resetting goals. What are the things I want to do with my life?
1. I want to write for a living. One way or the other. That dream may be slow but it is and always has been my number one goal.

2. I want to help teach literacy. I didn't realize that was a goal untilw

3. I want to have many adventures an travel.

4. I want to take a graphic art an design class. 

5. I want to have people who love me.

I guess I always had number five, but when you're hurting sometimes you feel like no one else in the world can understand that pain.

This past week, I can honestly say was the best week I have had in those two years.

I got my certification to teach adult literacy and I meet my first student tomorrow.

I'm writing for "This Is Findlay" Magazine

This past week I went on three adventures!

I went to the Columbus Museum to see the Picasso exhibit, I went to Kirtland for the Vintage Wine Festival, and I went to Fort Wayne to the Zoo.

And yes, two of these adventures were with a special new friend, but I won't discuss that until I'm good and ready, other than to say he is an incredibly sweet person. 

Two months ago none of this would have been possible. Two months ago, I had forgotten who I am.

But now I remember.

I remember that I am a person with dreams. I am a person with goals. I am a person who is not happy unless they are meeting people and trying to explore the outer world.

I know that normally my blog posts are filled with descriptions of the places I've been. They're normally filled with suggestions of adventures you should try.

This post wasn't really about my adventures though.

This post was about having your chest feel literally heavy because of the darkness and then finding a tiny spot of light and pushing that light until it's bigger. Until you can see the world again

I know who I was in all of the "befores" before the last two years and I know who I have been these last two years. I know I'm growing and changing.

I think I'm going to like the woman I become, because I'm working so hard to become her.


By the way, the Picasso exhibit it worth it, if you make it and it's only there until the end of September. So, I would still highly recommend it.

adventures and life lessons of a super-woman: Slaying those dragons

adventures and life lessons of a super-woman: Slaying those dragons: It has been more than 90 days since I sat here in front of my laptop to tell stories about adventures or feelings. It's been more than 9...

Slaying those dragons

It has been more than 90 days since I sat here in front of my laptop to tell stories about adventures or feelings. It's been more than 90 days since I've chosen to reflect on who I am and where my path leads, both good and bad. Yet, here I am again.

I am sure that there are people who are wondering, have wondered, what types of adventures I was up to. What types of things I wasn't sharing. What glorious life lesson had I learned.

Let me tell you a story. I'll try to keep it brief as I know the average attention span of Americans today is three minutes.

This story is about a woman, who had lost everything. One of her best friends committed suicide two years earlier. She lost a god brother to heroin addiction, two sons, one to stupid bad decisions and one to the military to get sent several continents away. During that time, she switched jobs, from a job she loved, to a job she hated, in order to keep a house that her uncle who died had wanted her to have.

Are we following me so far? Does this girl seem familiar?

This woman at the beginning of January met a guy. This guy will go nameless, but she thought he was really something. Maybe because she had already lost so much in her life, in her mind she gave him super powers he didnt have.

Maybe in her mind, she gave him the superpower ability to heal her.  Only, he didn't heal her. AS we all know, no one can really heal another person and it was only a short matter of time before he realized his inability to heal her and called it quits.

I will defend him and say, it wasn't his fault. He's a nice guy, not a bad guy. but one person cannot handle that much emotion.

I said some hateful words to him at the end, words he didn't deserve from my mouth.

So here's the truth. If you had met me a month ago, you wouldn't have recognized me.

The woman you all have known that went on adventures, and smiled a huge smile and couldn't wait to meet new people and learn new exciting things? She was gone.

She had been buried underneath a rubble of stress and sadness, grief, and anger. So much anger.

In her place was a woman that woke up, saw what time it was, looked at her phone and cried before rolling over to go back to bed.

In her place, was a woman who wondered, what it would feel like to just....not exist. Would it be dark? Would I be reunited with the loved ones I lost ?

And here, here it is. What I say is, don't judge this next part. You havent lived my story.

I drove around late one night, perfectly sober, but with the feelings and emotions as if I had drank a fifth of whiskey. I cried as I drove and text several people, desperate to reach out to any human contact that would hold my hand for a night.

As I drove, I thought, "I don't want anyone to be as angry at me as I was at my friend."
I started thinking about the letters I would write to the people who have loved me, begging them for forgiveness but telling them I couldn't take the hurt anymore.

I prayed to the God that I grew up learning about and asked him to just stop this hurt. I railed against him for letting me hurt so much anyway. I haven't been a bad person, what did I do to deserve so much pain and not deserve love

That thought of people being that angry at me, and hurting that much is what finally propelled me to call a counselor the next day.

And so here is another adventure. This adventure is a lot more subdued than chasing castles, or horseback riding. It isn't an adventure to the unknown. This adventure is an adventure in healing.

In the first two hour session, my counselor lifted something about my friends suicide off my shoulders.

For two years, I had walked around hating myself for not being there. I had walked around hating myself for not saving her. That has always been my job with the people I loved, wasn't it, to save them? To heal them?

For two years I had walked around with my head held down, knowing....I failed. I failed several of the people I loved with my inability to save them, from themselves and from life.

One session lifted that off my back. I won't go into full details about that session. Let's just say I ugly a river of tears and lifted my head just a little higher.

Fast forward a month. I've taken several steps on my own to begin healing. Including, switching jobs again. This time to a job I'm a little more comfortable with. It's not my dream job, but that will come with time.

I reconnected with an aunt that has been my emotional strength through most of my life. The last few months though, we hadn't been close and i felt like I had lost her in my life too.  That day five hours of healing tears were cried.

The counselor says my emotions have been like a box. The box was full to overflowing and I couldn't cram anything else into them, but kept trying.

I kept not wanting other people to see what was in that box. I didn't want to burden people with that box. I didn't want to hurt people, or anger people. 

I thought I was supposed to be the strong one. I was supposed to be the one that heals other people and takes care of other  people. I am supposed to be the champion, the dragon fighter, the superhero in other peoples stories.

There's never been a time in my life when I wasn't able to do that, until all of these things.

These days, I look forward  to jumping out of bed  and finding my next adventure. I look forward to meeting new people and hearing their stories, and sometimes they are as interesting as mine.

Speaking of meeting people, as I unpack these old hateful and hurtful emotions, I am unpacking to make room for someone real in my life. To dive with both feet.

I know not who this nameless and faceless person will be, only that I am finally open to real possibilities and opportunities rather than giving it only mouth value with no action.

The pain, the grief, it is still there. There are still certain dates, hearing random phrases, or even not being able to hug my boys and tell them I love them anytime I want, that brings me to tears.

There are moments where there is still an overwhelming sadness, but they are moments, rather than entire days spend underneath a blanket begging for release from this world.

I know not what my next adventure will be, where I will go in this world. I still don't know what this next year will bring as even more changes are underway with my youngest son graduating.

What I now know, is I am my own dragon slayer. I am the superhero of my own stories. My smile is back. My hope and belief that good can overcome the evils of the world. I'm back.

Do you know what my first adventure was? My first adventure is the fact that for the first time in four months, I sat down and wrote these words.

I can honestly say this year's reflections for 2015 and goals for 2016 have been the hardest I've ever had to sit down and think about.

See, my reflections and goals started years ago when I wanted to see how far I'd actually come through the year. I wanted to remember the lessons I had learned through out the year and write the memories one last time before I started fresh for the new year.

A few years back, Gina started doing the same thing. It still hurts to know she will never again write those goals, or write her accomplishments for the year.

Each year, I read the previous year's reflections and goals to see what I accomplished, right before I sit down and write the next year.

It's strange that in a year where I set no goals and said anything is possible, I became so lost and broken.

For 2015 I said I had achieved so many goals that I wanted to take a break from big goals.

It's probably a good thing, because with the losses I've endured, I don't think I would have acheived them.

Let's call 2015 the lost year. The hard year. The year of brokenness. The year I lost my uncle Ken, the year I lost my god brother, the year two of my sons are no longer home, the year I lost my dreams, the year I lost sanity.

My friends and those who love me have struggled this year to know what to say, to know what to do. None of them were ever used to me being the broken one but every one of them wanted to heal me.


I've gone on adventures to castles and horseback riding. I've traveled to Georgia. I've pushed myself and forced myself to go play laser tag with the family and to go camping and to concerts. I've made myself go on every adventure I was offered to try and hurt a little less. When you're busy you dont have time to think or feel.

I also lost something else this year. I lost my pride. It's hard to be prideful when you're not sure if you're going to get out of bed in the morning or just go back to sleep because when you sleep the pain doesn't exist. It's hard to be prideful when you don't sleep for days because the dreams don't come if you're awake.

It's hard to be prideful when you start drinking at 10 am on Thanksgiving because you can't handle the memories or the ache.

Actually, it's hard to be prideful when you tell the people that love you, that if you go to the hospital, please remember to........and for once, when you talk about psychiatric care and being pushed to your limits, you're not making jokes.

So yeah 2015 is the lost year.

This past weekend, Matt and I went to see Trans Siberian Orchestra.

Which, speaking of Matt, I'm sure he'd call this year the lost year too. He's probably lost more than me this year. and everyday I've wished I could heal him, I could make him better, I could make him know it will be okay and someday it wont hurt as bad, but it's hard to give him that when I didn't have it myself. 

We went to Dayton ,and went to Brandeberry  Winery (4 miles outside Yellow Springs and I recommend it) and ate too much food and probably drank too much wine and then went to the concert.

It was something we had both always wanted to do and for reasons that are not mine to share, we finally went.

We dressed up and both looked so nice. I had always wanted to go because of the lights and because of the idea of classic music (which I love) mixed with rock.

I had no idea it would be so emotional.

During the first half of the concert, they tell a story of a little girl who runs away from home. She is sad and broken and hurting and loses her dreams. Through the magic of Christmas and a little help,  they're found again.

I had no idea I would cry, but somethings, hit home. I felt like someone was giving me a gentle reminder. "Yes it hurts now, and no it's not easy but you can still find your dreams again."

Tomorrow, Zachary will be 18. This year he will graduate and leave home.

I always knew because I had kids so young, I'd be young when they were old enough to leave home. Somehow when I was exhausted from being a single mom and working and taking care of the house and going to school field trips and baking class cupcakes for three kids ...this day seemed so far away.

I'm not even 40 and my youngest son is 18.  I never really thought this day would come, but here it is.

At the same time that my heart breaks, it gives me a little pride back too.For all the people that trashed me as a teenage mom, I struggled every damn day, but I got here and I got here without any help.

When this weekend rolls around I'll be hosting a girls day for some of the women that have helped me make it through my year. We'll keep creating new memories.

I guess now that this is already this long, it's time to set goals for 2016.

Well, even though I had a setback in the writing department, I have a couple of opportunities coming my way in 2016.

Those opportunities will help me release my creative side and help me take large roles in guiding the future of some publications. I've got plenty of  ideas. and am hoping that in 2016 I will actually get to take an Adobe Indesign class for graphic layout and design.

It will be helpful with the magazines.

I've also started a novel this year. The subject touches close to my heart, as it's about heroin addiction and the impact it has on families. It's written from several points of view and I will finish that this year.

I'll start working out again and eating better again. (I stopped working out when Uncle Ken died).

In the spring, I'll start work on my yard. I'll trim the bushes and plant some flowers and tear out the wheelchair ramp and hopefully find spots in the barn for beer pong and air hockey. 

My biggest goal for 2016 is to know that its okay to have days where I'm incredibly sad and cry because of the memories. It's okay to have days where I'm happy and I'm laughing and even though my loved ones aren't here, it's okay for me to be happy, because my strength, tenacity, fiestiness and laughter are some of the things they loved about me.

I know the huge hole in my heart may never be completely filled. It will be one day at a time every single day.

Let's call 2016 a year to start healing.

If you look below, these are the pictures of the people I can say I wouldn't have made it through the year without. Each of these people is someone I owe my heart to, I owe my life and my sanity to. Without these people to take care of me this year, I would have never found ways to start to heal. With everything else, I know that I am incredibly blessed to be loved so much. I am aware that part of my pain has been that the more you love the harder it is to let go. I cant function from day to day without these people in my life. Each of these people love me a little differently and each one gives me something different in my life that I need. But these people are the people that keep me fighting every day. I love each of you. Thank you for being my friends and support system.