Developing resilience.

Everyone experiences hard things. I have reached a point when I say “I can’t do this.” According to the American Psychological Association, resilience gives us the emotional strength to successfully adapt to difficult or challenging life experiences. Resilience is a person’s ability to withstand adversity, bounce back and grow despite life’s downturns.

I have wondered, how am I developing resilience while I am in the midst of the struggle? I have a few ideas that I thought of.

Stop ruminating, begin writing. In the past, I relived the difficult event over and over in my mind. My thoughts went around and around like on a spinning wheel. Journaling about the situation can help me process the experience. I often gain different perspectives and clarity. Then I am able to list two or three positive things about the experience and I can begin to move forward toward healing. I sometimes can see a different way to respond to the difficult situation.

Be kind to yourself. Realize that you are not alone. Gather those around you that will support and help you. It is difficult for me to ask for help. And yet when I resist my tendency to isolate during a crisis, and instead reach out, I am comforted by the outpouring of love and concern I receive. When I am open with others and share what is happening, I receive help that oftimes, I am not even aware that I need.

Keep up good habits of healthy eating, light exercise, and ample sleep daily. When stressful events happen, my good habits often disappear. After Nicks’s recent seizure episode of 28 hours a couple of weeks ago, Arden and I spent the next few days resting and recuperating. It wasn’t selfish, it was self-care.

Tackle strong emotions directly by facing fears. Visualize what you want instead of what you fear. Adopting a more balanced and healthy thinking pattern helps me to evaluate the situation. And if I will look closely, I can find that I have grown in some area as a result of my difficult experiences. Dieter F. Uchtdorf said, “It’s your reaction to adversity, not adversity itself that determines how your life’s story will develop.”

We can’t change what happens to us in our life, but we can control our responses. I believe that each of us is the author of our own stories. I have decided I will find the joy in the situations and I will have my happy ending.

What are your thoughts, have you had similar experiences? I would love to hear from you. It can be an incredible blessing to hear the stories of others.

Please share this blog post if you know someone who would benefit.

 

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Announcing that I have finished a book with the working title of “The Fairy Fort.” I am currently pitching it to publishers. Keep checking back to watch the progress of my newest novel.

Here is a quick glimpse of the story.

Sarah Doherty is an 18-year-old living in rural Ireland at the tail end of the Great War. Plagued by severe epilepsy, she is protected by her parents and lives a sheltered, secluded, lonely life. The Fae, local Irish fairies, interfere with her life. She falls forward a century in time through the local fairy fort of standing stones. She had a seizure in 1918 and woke up in 2020. The 21st century world includes life-saving prescriptions, physical comforts and the independence and freedom she seeks. The locals are welcoming and Andy Mclaughlin, a handsome young historian, is intriguing. She doesn’t want to return home.

Then a letter arrives from Boston divulging the story of Sarah and Andy’s lives that are deeply entwined in the previous century. They are not yet in love but as they seek to verify the letter through online resources, they feel a growing obligation to their unborn family and to each other. What would happen to their posterity living in Boston if they don’t return to 1918? Even if they do make it back, her parents can never know what happened to her or that would change everything.

This Young Adult time-travel romance explores the question: Do we have the freedom to make choices or is free will an elaborate illusion?

This is my third book. I love reading time travel romances. I am an advocate for epilepsy awareness because my 43-year-old son has intractable epilepsy. As a genealogist specializing in Irish research, I live part of the year in the village where the story is based. I wrote the book to help young adults understand that difficult situations can change your life. Sometimes miraculously.