This is Water reflection

My parents met in a half-way house in Chicago.  My mom suffered from a mental illness and my dad had little family support with this alcohol addiction and lack of purpose in life.  My mom became pregnant with me at the half-way house, got married to my dad, and tried to make their marriage work.  It wasn't long before their relationship broke down completely.  My mom was pregnant with me when she was in Elgin State Mental hospital.  She escaped and jumped off a bridge into a body of water while she was 7 months pregnant with me.  A woman found her and she was placed in solitary confinement for the rest of her pregnancy with me.  I was going to be given up for adoption at birth but my grandparents showed up to take me from birth until three years old.

Life was lonely and hard without my parents.  My Aunt took my brother and me in when I was 9 years old and we became a part of a blended family.  Even though I was raised by my Aunt, I was in constant contact with my parents:  talking them out of suicide and bouts of depression, etc.  This relationship with my parents left me with a huge hole to fill in my life.  I carried around an "orphans heart" and was always a bit jealous to see family units together who had loving parents, support, and help with their goals in life.

At the age of 19, I had several guides in my life that poured perspective into my life especially those who believed in the Bible and having a relationship with God.  I dove deep into faith and it has been what has sustained me all of my life.  Just recently in the past couple of weeks, a good friend has been one of those guides to help me navigate yet another mental health crisis in my family, my son who is 20 years old.

A dear friend of mine recently reminded me to have a GROWTH mindset vs. a VICTIM mentality.  A growth mindset views difficulty and trials as a way of moving forward to becoming a better person.  Victim mentality would be looking at difficulty as "poor me...look at what's happening to me - I'm the only one."  My goal has been to keep the growth mindset.  I am also a firm believer in acknowledgment of Life sucks ....but not staying there too long.  Trials really do REVEAL who we are as this quote says...we find out who we are.  So...if you are reading this I hope you will be inspired to have a growth mindset in your pain whether it be physical or mental instead of a victim mentality that keeps us stuck and prevents us from moving forward.

I'm sick of Covid and all the shutdowns but today the sun is out and I'm feeling some energy to be creative and grateful for the resources I do have and to make the most of them.  Have a great day fellow classmates and Professor!