With cerebral palsy, my confidence takes a knock in the summer months. With years of having to conform to the summer months with a physical disability, I always struggle this time of year.
Summer shoes and summer clothes highlight my struggles. The winter months don’t get to me in the same way. I’ve also been to the hospital this week to get some more lesions checked out and those will need removing at some point. They've been checked so there’s nothing to worry about.
The break in temperature from the hot spell we’ve been having should help. I struggle with what I deal with in the hot temperatures.
As you know I thrive in the hot months and get fairly down when it's cold. I guess I have seasonal affective disorder or SAD.
The area that I live in stays pretty warm in the summer and usually cold in the winter, except last winter. Last winter we had mild temperatures almost the entire season with very little if any snow which was fine with me.
This summer so far it's not been too bad. Temperatures have been so far as high as 96 degrees but we've had terrible rain fall the entire month of June and into July. I think it rained everyday. This is the first week we haven't had rain on a daily basis.
I can understand your problems with the heat. My son doesn't seem to fair well with it either. His body temperature will actually go up. He sweats terribly on a daily basis even though he is in air conditioning.
Thanks Lisa. Yes the sun does affect us in more ways than we think. The summer months tend to get to me more because I deal with CP. It reaffirms all of my struggles. I feel for your son too. It must also be hard for him.
I'm pleased you like the sunny months. I wish I could tolerate it a little more. It would make what I deal with that much easier.
Yes there does seem to be a lot of that going on and I know summer can be very difficult for me at times too.
We just see so many tourists in my area and I sometimes envy the fact that they can afford to spend so much money while having such a great time. It has also been a very tough week, ending up with hearing how badly my father seems to be doing and not being able to do a lot about it since he lives so far away!
It just brings up so many feelings considering we had to take care of him a lot of times when we were kids and he would be too drunk to take care of himself.
People seem to be thinking that we're not willing to do anything for him but he lives far away and has already refused to move closer to us. It just really irritates me because we're being made to look like the bad guys in all of this.
We're not able to just drop everything and travelling during the hottest week of the year would be really miserable without AC in the car!
I'm just very tired and not dealing well with the extreme heat myself. It turns out that I do have problems breathing when it's 100 degrees out and the humidity makes it feel like you're breathing pea soup. It would be really nice if people would just give us a break and try helping instead of being so judgmental!
We grew up being treated this way so it's bringing up many old feelings that I don't enjoy. Hopefully we can resolve this situation without too much more pain.
Yes the summer months bring up so many problems, particularly when we cope less because it is hot!
I completely agree with you though when you talk about people being judgmental and yet they don't fully understand our circumstances. They think they know and still pass an opinion which puts us in a bad light.
I know how that feels but would say the problem is theirs, not yours. Sometimes we have to be thick skinned so we don't get hurt or think they're actually having a go at us! As long as we know we're doing the right thing, it really doesn't matter what others think.
Given your father's alcohol problems and what you had to endure as a child, he's very lucky you're still choosing to be a part of his life. I would say do what you can, when you can and ignore people's comments.
People will always comment, you cannot change those; but you just have to block those comments out. They've not lived your life. They really don't know how things are.