Grammy & Papa Rock!

We've always know that Grammy and Papa are the best grandparents EVER, but sometimes we still need to blog about them! They've had enough of their own 'stuff' going on in their lives, but they still ALWAYS manage to make their kids and grandkids their number one concern and priority. Bailey has struggled with some anxiety issues this summer. Actually, she has struggled with it for a lot of her life, but has learned to control it pretty well. Sometimes it gets away from her a little bit, and she ends up sick. That's what happened this summer. Grammy showed up at the house one day with an envelope that said, 'Keep Calm and Eat Popcorn." There are few things Bailey would rather do than eat popcorn! There was a gift card inside to a fun popcorn shop that we love! So cute! Bailey was so excited! Grammy and Papa seriously are the biggest supporters we've ever had in our lives, and we're so grateful for them! And, I'm happy to say that Bailey is feeling like her happy self again!

Keep Calm and Eat Popcorn!

Now I'm going to write a little bit about the anxiety. I've had a lot of people ask me about it lately. Most people would not have any clue that she even has it. I have several friends with kids that have it as well. It's actually a pretty common problem in some form or another. Bailey's started out when she was pretty young. We started noticing it when she was about 6 years old. It isn't just unhappy, hard, or stressful things that trigger it. With Bailey, anything that was exciting or out of the norm would bring it on. I have lots of birthday, and Christmas pictures with her hanging out on the couch with a bucket in case she threw up! We've had to postpone a lot of early Christmas mornings until she could get herself relaxed enough to calm her stomach down. As she got older, it went away for a few years. Then it came back in a different form. All of a sudden she would not be able to get air into her lungs, which is scary, and that would almost cause a panic attack. I watched her really closely for awhile and figured out what types of things would trigger it. But, sometimes there was no rhyme or reason to it, and it would hit at the weirdest times. She could be watching a movie, and all of a sudden not be able to get a breath. It was the strangest thing. If we were out on a long run, and she didn't know where we were or how far we had left, the same thing would happen. I noticed that if I explained the exact route we were going to take, and took out all the uncertainty, it didn't happen. It got pretty bad in 5th-7th grades. I thought about getting her put on medication. If you know Bailey, you know that she HATES taking any kind of medicine. She worked hard to recognize when it was coming on, and got really good at getting it under control before there was an issue. Every once in awhile it gets away from her, and she has a tough time reigning it in. If it goes unchecked for too long, she ends up physically sick (stomach issues, headaches, sore throat, and finally a dreaded cough that usually takes forever to get rid of). This doesn't happen very often though. And, just for the record, it doesn't mean she's always stressed out or unhappy. She's actually a VERY happy, well adjusted person, with a very great outlook on life. She loves a good challenge too, so it really hasn't ever kept her from living life or accomplishing big things in her life. Hopefully she'll understand it more as she gets older, and she'll have less and less problems with it. But until then, we'll gladly deal with this. It's so much easier then what a lot of kids her age have to deal with. So there's her anxiety issues in a very brief nutshell.