After a year of having to delegate most of my mom duties in 2024, I dove back in head first in 2025. I mommed so hard this year.
There were health appointments, evaluations, 504 meetings, single parent weeks, rehearsals, birthday parties, and as mentioned in my previous post, lots of concerts and shows! I’m not sure why I was surprised that my Photos app’s year in review was all Colette.
Colette’s chronic pain and fatigue escalated in 2025, so I started searching for treatment options. She tried a few medications but never felt a difference, but also never really took them routinely enough for a difference to be made. In June we found a great local program that combines physical therapy, occupational therapy, and psychological therapy. Unfortunately with camps and travel we were unable to get her started with the program before school started.
I held my breath hoping Colette would be relieved of pain and have the stamina to attend 5 days/week of school. The first few weeks were ok. She made it through the school days, but she would come home to nap for about 2hrs. She would wake up, have dinner, try to get homework done, then fall back asleep by 10pm. As you can imagine, she fell behind on her work. Of course we had already put in guardrails with the school, so she wasn’t being penalized for late work. However, the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, so she was quite stressed about late work even if it wasn’t a grade issue; it was a meeting expectations issue for her. By late September, I thought we would get into a routine and overcome some of the fatigue. The first semester for any school change is rough.
By October 13th, she was in a full on flare. Crying in pain and so exhausted some days that she could barely get out of bed. She missed school from October 13-October 31st. However, by October 24th, she had decided that 5 days was just unsustainable. Thankfully, her school offers a program called Flex. The program allows for self-paced online courses, but with weekly to-do lists that keep you on track in order to graduate with your original classmates. She can go back to campus in the Fall if she feels like it will be sustainable, however, she currently thinks she will stick with Flex through graduation.
Because it is self-paced, Colette also has time for the program with the 3hrs of therapy each week. She started in January and will continue through March. I’m really hoping to see a marked difference. I’m not sure she’ll go back to her cartwheeling and silks days, but even just a little relief of not having to skip out on activities she once loved would be a major improvement.
Between supporting Colette through her school transition and finding treatment options, I was one busy mama in 2025. As per my previous post, of course we had to “buy the tickets” just for some stress relief.
Yes, William is still part of the family. There was advocating for him too. Thankfully, he hasn’t faced the physical challenges that Colette has. Give that kid some video games, YouTube, and DND, and we could probably go days without hearing from him. Unfortunately for him, his mama still needs her moments with her growing boy. And fortunately for me, he gets so excited to share parts of his games and the biggest challenge he is facing. He also loves to come teach me new and interesting facts. So, he pops his head out of his room periodically. One of my favorite things though is for me to be in the other room and to hear him just cackling to himself. Sometimes I’ll ask him what he was laughing at. He may remember, he may not. But it’s obvious that he is quite happy and content entertaining himself. This proves quite helpful when trying to support your more demanding child.
While I still kept some of my motherly duties in 2024, I came back with a vengeance in 2025. It was hard to feel like I missed out on a year with my kids. They were truly strong and supportive through my treatment, but I was ready to take care of THEM again.
2026 brings a new dynamic. Colette is turning 15, William will be 13. They are maturing and reaching that search for independence phase. As hard as teenage years are on these kids, I think it’s going to be hard on me too. I have to adjust my role as their parent. I want to hover. I want to protect. I want them to live life and have experiences, but damn, I’d really like to be able to control which lessons and how they learn them. I’m SLOWLY learning how to give them their space, but we’ll be learning this together. I definitely feel the clock ticking to figure out who I am apart from them. What other aspects of myself can I lean into? Considering it’s February 2nd, and I’m just getting around to posting this, I’m apparently not leaning into keeping this updated!
I have plans. I just have to tear myself away from my children to implement them. I’ve got 11 more months in 2026 to make progress on this. I can do it! Right?