Ninasusan

Happiness gently landed on my shoulders

family

  • Healing the mind in conversation

    Our Spirit Group facilitator, Mary, helped me through an emotionally challenging, teary discussion by having me switch to referring to myself in the 3rd person rather than as I. Using this process (while cumbersome at first) really works in taking the sting out of words. Later on, during a counseling session, a therapist used the Read more

  • Losing the need to “tell my story”

    When I was in the grips of pain, depression, and overwhelming anxiety which I blamed on my job, my role as caretaker of my elderly mother and Aunt, feeling like an outcast in my husbands family and hating who I was because of the way I was thinking and the way my body looked…whew…I felt Read more

  • The thing about Birthdays

    Welcome to my therapy session…With the exception of the boys-grand babies, every birthday that comes and goes, I feel a little lost….not because of everyone being a year older but birthday celebrations created by my mother are missing! I wish I could ask her why birthdays and holiday celebrations were so important to her and Read more

  • So..after all these years I’m not lonely?

    That needle in a haystack…that feeling of loneliness that is like a thread with no knot that pulls through the eye of the needle? I can’t really say I never recognized the loneliness…I know it has always been there but I’ve always given it a different name and excuse…but today, TODAY I had one of Read more

  • Nina Sue want a turtle?

    This is a story I cherish. When I was young and very young, my dad would take me on long walks down the dusty gravel road at Grandmas. Usually we ended up at the little cemetery about 1/2 mile down the road. He would point out headstones of our dead ancestors and share with me Read more

  • Sometimes…..

    sometimes we get so caught up in the drama and speed of our lives that we don’t remember, realize, recall just how lucky we are and how much we are loved, as well as, our capacity to spread our love around. We spent a long weekend “back home” in Iowa.  My heart was beating out Read more

  • The silverware of our lives

    As an only child and only niece … actually the only child born to two sisters from the teens of the 1900s…. I inherited everything. Almost 9 years since my mother and aunt passed, I’m still sorting and sorting, storing and donating and then doing it all again the next time I start feeling overwhelmed Read more

  • The Wonder on his face

    We spent New Year’s Eve with JJJJ tonight. After a great meal, we played some games then turned on CNN to watch Andy Cohen and Anderson Cooper bring in the New Year in New York. Jenny and Justin had talked to Jax about what we were going to watch and what it meant….conceptually, I don’t Read more

  • One time he screwed up the pumpkin pie

    …..and since then, his pies have been coveted by the family for the pumpkin pie holidays. It was simply the difference between evaporated milk and sweetened condensed milk. This year he added to the pie count with a butterscotch with meringue. Delicious…and I’m not terribly embarrassed to say I ate one full size slice of Read more

  • Being a gramma has helped me work through some guilt

    I’m one of those lucky grammas….retired, I live close to my grandkids and get to spend quality time with them several days a week…and through the 4 year old, I’m opening myself up to life..love…acceptance…joy and sadness for what it is…right now…it is what is happening right now at this moment. There is no perfection Read more