Starting New Holiday Traditions

Posted on December 11, 2019 by Angel Blair

Ah, the holidays. It feels like they came around mighty fast this year—even quicker than years past in my opinion. My husband and I will spend this holiday season in a new home and with that comes the possibilities of new holiday traditions. I look back fondly with love and joy at traditions my family engaged in this time of year. I want to re-create those meaningful and festive times and also create new memories for years to come. Well, let’s just say that’s always my intention.

One tradition my family carried out when we were young was Continue reading →

Is it That Time of Year Already?!

Posted on September 9, 2016 by Angel Blair

So this week marked the start of many students heading back to school and the unofficial ‘end’ of summer with the fall season being just around the corner. This time of year usually generates many nostalgic feelings; how it felt having to go back to school, which was sometimes a drag at first but eventually turned into excitement to learn new things, the change in routine and schedules, and the countdown to the holiday season. Even just the colors and smells of fall have the potential to bring about joyful feelings—it can be a very pretty and festive time of year.

For some people this week may represent new beginnings and changes, for others it may signify an anticipated change of season with teasingly cooler temperatures being just around the bend (hopefully). For others it may just represent a hope for change and new things to come. This particular week and time of year doesn’t necessarily look or mean the same to each person and it doesn’t have to; everyone goes through different things at different times and holds unique perspectives towards it. It’s more about finding what is special or important to you and holding onto that—knowing what feelings are prompted or what memories are beckoned when you experience time and season changes during the year. It’s a chance to create new memories, make adjustments to change, prioritize your needs, and most of all, to self-care—because there is only one you, and you deserve the most that time has to offer.

Making and Preserving Memories

Posted on December 28, 2015 by MSAA

By: Stacie Prada

As we embark on a new year, I think about the highlights of the past year. What makes me grin, what am I proud of accomplishing, and what was meaningful to me? How can I memorialize these things so that I can enjoy them in the future? I think it’s important to mark the passage of time, celebrate our successes, and keep our years from merging into each other without distinction.

When asked what one thing people would save in case of fire, they often say their photographs. I think this is telling for how important memories are to us, and I think this is helpful information for us to proactively add joy and meaning to our lives.

If we lose our photos, we will hopefully still have our memories. But what if we lose them with MS disease progression or aging? I may never reach a point in my life where I experience the extent of memory loss that people with Alzheimer’s and dementia experience. Still I think it’s helpful to look at the extreme cases and learn from them. People with dementia are sometimes able to recoup some memories through music, stories, and photographs, and this can improve their quality of life.

Creating Memory Triggers: We can work to improve our memory, but I also think it serves us well to create memory triggers that help us retrieve memories. I like to preserve memories physically through photographs and mentally through tying them to other things like music, people, food, and aromas. I try to enjoy the moment, feel it, and store it away in the subconscious. These are some ways I enhance my experiences and create memory cues:

• Take photographs. I love my camera and tripod attachment that will allow me to take a time delay photograph of everyone in the room – no need to have one person take the photograph and be left out of the photo. Have someone take action shots of you doing things you love. These will help you remember how you felt while doing them.

• Put photos in an album either in hard copy or digital format. Just make sure they’re accessible to look at. If you can add notes about the photo, all the better.

• Pay attention to music. Buy the soundtrack to a movie you enjoyed. Make a playlist of the songs you heard for the first time this year or are meaningful to you at this time in your life.

• Journal about things you care about. This is a terrific way to remember your thoughts and how you felt at a specific time in your life.

• Relish the taste of foods you love. Tell people in your life your favorite foods. It’s pretty incredible how people tend to remember other people’s favorite foods.

• Take time to smell things and register them. Think about how a baby smells fresh from a bath, how a forest smells after a rain, or how baked goods smell fresh from the oven. Take a big whiff if you like something, and pause to appreciate it.

Preserving my memories is not a solely selfish endeavor. My memories involve my friends and family, and compiling them is a gift for them to share with or without me. My mother kept a scrapbook for our family when I was young, and the stories she wrote to accompany photographs truly tell a lot more beyond the photographs. She’s been gone many years now, but seeing her thoughts preserved in her handwriting brings her back to us in a special way. My sisters and I treasure them, and things we may have known at one time but hadn’t remembered are available to us now.

With MS, other neurological diseases, and just aging in general, cognition and memory can be something that declines. The idea of losing my memory is scary, but it’s less so when I can actively do things that may improve my life now and for years to come.

Resources:
• Music & memory is an organization that provides iPods with personalized playlists to people with Alzheimer’s and dementia that improves those people’s quality of life. https://musicandmemory.org

• StoryCorps’ mission is to provide people of all backgrounds and beliefs with the opportunity to record, share and preserve the stories of our lives. They have an app that allows anyone to record their stories. https://storycorps.org/

*Stacie Prada was diagnosed with RRMS in 2008 at the age of 38. Her blog, “Keep Doing What You’re Doing” is a compilation of inspiration, exploration, and practical tips for living with Multiple Sclerosis while living a full, productive, and healthy life with a positive perspective. It includes musings on things that help her adapt, cope and rejoice in this adventure on earth. Please visit her at http://stacieprada.blogspot.com/

Summertime Memories

Posted on June 12, 2015 by Angel Blair

The summer season usually conjures up warm memories for me (sorry, no pun intended!) of times when things were simpler being young and summer was the best time of year. Growing up, my family used to gather at my aunt and uncle’s house for get-togethers and special occasions, especially during the summer months because their house was attached to a private elementary school where there was a lot of open area. They acted as caretakers to the school grounds so we had access to two different playgrounds equipped with slides, swing sets and jungle gym activities and a large tot-lot for playing basketball and volleyball. We often had family barbecues there and were so excited when the 4th of July holiday was celebrated because we could watch the fireworks right from their porch. These are some of my best memories I hold from my childhood – playing outside with relatives and being with family and thinking the summer should never end.

As we grow older our memories stay with us – as special pieces of time you’ve stored for yourself to take out and reminisce over whenever you’re feeling sentimental, or just want to recall something good. There are certain triggers that can activate these memories – songs, movies, places, things. For me, my summer memories are triggered by the smell of flowers and grass, barbecue grilling – and the charcoal kind, not the fancier gas grill devices seen all over the place nowadays. Rice Krispy treats – my grandmother used to make the best treats for summer occasions. And mosquito bites – I know this one is a bit strange, but those little buggers would eat us alive playing outside during the summer!

The point is, no matter what the memory is or its trigger, these precious fragments of time that represent moments throughout our lives are something to treasure and hold onto with care. They allow us to go back to times we remember fondly and that gives us hope that the memories could possibly be recreated again someday.

What’s your favorite summertime memory?

Creating New Memories this Holiday Season

Posted on December 17, 2014 by Samantha Schech

“What if Christmas, doesn’t come from a store. What if Christmas…perhaps…means a little bit more!”
― Dr. Seuss, How the Grinch Stole Christmas

Growing up, one of my favorite activities in school was around learning and exploring new cultures and how they celebrate holidays. Being so young and not yet having a chance to explore the world around me, I found it fascinating that people were different from what I assumed was the norm.

For example, in Germany, December 6th is St. Nicholas’ Day and “der Nikolaus” comes to the home of small children and brings gifts, such as sweets and chocolate, and puts them into the shoes of the children, who place them by their doors the night before. Then on the night of December 24th, Father Christmas brings presents to the children.

In Argentina, families celebrate starting Christmas Eve with a large family meal following with a fireworks display at midnight, toasting to Christmas. Many families stay up late into the night meeting with friends and family, then they will sleep all of Christmas Day.

To celebrate the New Year, people in Greece hang an onion on their door to symbolize rebirth and in the Philippines, women wear polka dot dresses and men carry coins in their pockets to symbolize prosperity and happiness for the new year.

The purpose of sharing these variations of holiday celebrations is to show that no matter how you choose to celebrate a holiday this year whether it is Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanza, remember that it is OK to be different. Value time spent with family, not the gifts that are given, or the decorations that are hung. Create new memories this season and don’t be afraid to veer from the holiday norm. As the Dr. Seuss quote illustrates, the holiday spirit cannot be bought from a store, the holiday is what you make of it.

If you are looking for some inspiration from other countries on how to add some new culture to your holiday, check out the Why Christmas webpage to learn more about Christmas Around the World or 123 New Year to learn about New Year’s Traditions and Customs.

How do you plan to make new memories this holiday season?

References:
http://www.whychristmas.com/cultures/
http://www.123newyear.com/newyear-traditions/philippines.html
http://www.businessinsider.com/new-years-rituals-around-the-world-2013-12#in-greece-people-hang-an-onion-on-their-doors-3

Holidays Past

Posted on December 5, 2014 by Angel Blair

The holidays are a time where people come together to celebrate the joy of the season, to honor past holiday traditions or to create new ones for generations to come. Holidays of the past can foster different types of memories – fond ones, funny ones, and those, “I still can’t believe that happened!” moments. For me, the holidays were always a hectic time, where you never quite knew what was going to happen. I do hold some fond moments about old traditions in our family, and though they may seem odd to others, every family is different and has their own ways of celebrating.

In my family, Christmas Eve was the night our extended family would get together to celebrate the holiday and exchange gifts through a Pollyanna. But the gift exchange and celebrating couldn’t happen until midnight, when it was really the start of Christmas day. As a child this was agony, as half of us would fall asleep before the countdown to midnight even began, and the rest of us were so tired that when it did come time to open presents and rejoice, we didn’t really appreciate the tradition at that late hour. However, this still remains a heartwarming memory for me, because for some reason or other throughout the years, this tradition is no longer. As more children were born into the family and members didn’t want to travel home so late, gifts are now exchanged at leisure, with no countdown or anticipation as years past. It’s still a nice tradition, but it’s different, and now we take time to reminisce about those past holiday memories and look back with joy.

Each holiday season brings varied traditions, moments, and feelings that are unique to each person and family celebrating the occasion. And even though things may change through the years, making holidays different from ones that came before, there are still memories to be made and joy to experience.

What are some of your holiday memories?

Lasting Holiday Memories

Posted on December 1, 2014 by MSAA

Having just polished off the leftover bird from the table, cranberry sauce and stuffing galore, you may be experiencing a sigh of relief or even a moment of anticipation as further holiday and end-of-year festivities abound.

Whether you had a pleasant or taxing Thanksgiving, you probably are not thinking about what creates a lasting holiday memory, but inevitably as the season progresses you may just think back on past holiday seasons and some of the stand-out moments which are meaningful to you. Over time, sometimes even the mishaps and anxieties which were so troublesome to you at the time may even win out for most re-counted and favored memories.

For example, I’ll never forget the Thanksgiving my dog snatched a turkey leg right off my nephew’s plate (why he had a giant turkey leg, I have no idea). I chased the dog around the dining room and battled for it. When I finally broke his hold on the greasy turkey leg, riotous laughter erupted around the table. At the moment he stole the food, my thought was, “Oh no, he ruined Thanksgiving,” but the reality was there was plenty of food to go around and everyone delighted in some comic relief. A few years later, and it has become a story we re-count when we talk about all being together and what we are thankful for (which does, in fact, include our dog).

So as the year winds down and you anticipate even more hoopla, remember that even the crazy, wild, and hectic moments can turn into those lasting, laughter-filled, or meaningful moments. Events may not turn out exactly as planned, but the love, support, and laughter of those that surround us and support us are what the holidays are all about.

Summer Reflection

Posted on September 12, 2014 by MSAA

By: Matt Cavallo

For me, having MS sometimes means more sleep. This is especially the case for me with two young boys, who don’t tend to sleep in and have endless amounts of energy. I find that when the seasons turn to fall and the long sunny days turn to long dark nights, I find myself chronically tired and needing to hibernate. When I feel like I need more sleep, I draw on lessons learned from the summer.

This June, my wife and I decided to drive to take the kids to Legoland in San Diego. San Diego is about a five hour drive from my house, so we loaded up the minivan and hit the road for a three day vacation. Prior to that vacation, I put it in my mind that it was going to be hot and that I was going to be waiting in long lines for the rides, but that I needed to give my kids a vacation to remember.

The first day took a lot out of me. The drive was exhausting. Even though the kids behaved and there was only a little traffic, driving that long can be taxing. However, once we got to the hotel, the kids wanted to play. Even though I was exhausted, we met up with friends and went to the beach. I spent the entire time at the beach playing in the water with the kids. After about twelve hours of going non-stop, we went to the hotel and I crashed.

The next morning came too early, but the kids were up and ready to go. I felt like if I could just get a little more sleep, I would have energy for Lego Land. More sleep was not to be had but we spent an awesome twelve hours running around the amusement park, going on the rides and playing the games. The sun was brutal and beat me down as I waited for ride after ride. By the time we got to bed, I was so exhausted that I didn’t think I could possibly pull it together another day.

The next day came and I needed just a little more sleep, but that was not going to happen. It was day two at Lego Land and the kids were ready. It was a repeat of the first day and the kids were having the time of their lives. We spent another twelve hours roaming the park being roasted in the early summer sun. By the time we got back to the hotel, I thought I was going to pass out from exhaustion, but the kids wanted to swim at the pool. So even though I had expended all my energy at the park, I needed to dig down and find the inspiration for one more hour of activities.

While I was sitting at the pool watching the boys swim, I thought that this is what life was all about. It turned out that I didn’t need more sleep. Sure I was tired and the sun and MS fatigue were wearing on me, but I needed to be there. At this moment, having MS meant time with my sons. So many times, I had let my MS fatigue get the best of me, but I fought through it to create memories that will last a lifetime.

As I look forward to the fall season and the long nights, I think back to that summer vacation. I look back at how I was fatigued and didn’t think I would make it, but created precious memories. For me it is all about getting going, because for me getting started is the hardest part. This fall, I am not going to require more sleep. I am going to spend more time with my sons, because that is what motivates me to keep going. What lessons from summer are you going to use to keep going this fall?

*Matt Cavallo was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in 2005. Matt is an MS blogger, author, patient advocate, and motivational speaker. Matt also has his Master’s degree in Public Health Administration. Matt is the proud father of his two sons, loving husband to his wife, Jocelyn, and best friend to his dog, Teddy. Originally from the Boston suburbs, Matt currently resides in Arizona with his family. To learn more about Matt, please visit him at : http://mattcavallo.com/blog/

Looking Back to Move Forward

Posted on September 8, 2014 by Samantha Schech

Subtle hints of fall have spread throughout the northeast – the falling leaves, cooler nights, pumpkins, and mums popping up in local stores. While summer is slowly on its way out, it is bitter sweet to reminisce about the times had. This summer we talked about ways to beat the heat, many of which involved remaining indoors, or doing activities in cool public places. Regardless of where you made your memories, it is important to keep those happy memories alive and present to take with you into the fall.

Journaling about an event or encounter that makes you smile will bring you back to that moment and hopefully increase your mood. You can look back at those journal entries and remember the good times that were had. Also having pictures or souvenirs from a trip or event can help to bring you back to that moment. Try taking a moment to close your eyes and remember how you felt at that time.

When times are hard or you are having difficult feelings about a situation, take a moment to re-focus your thoughts on one of those happier moments. Re-focusing your thoughts can help momentarily take your mind off of a certain problem or situation and better prepare you for dealing with the task at hand.

When looking back on those happy moments, focus on the feelings or emotions that were created in you at that time. Allow yourself to re-live that moment and take a deep breath.

What moments do you carry with you? How do they help you in times of stress?

Did You Ever Have One of Those Days?

Posted on June 20, 2014 by Angel Blair

You know the type of day I’m talking about. The kind where it seems like NOTHING can go right. You’re late for something, something breaks, unexpected news is received, and there isn’t enough time in the day to deal with everything? Sometimes it seems like all the elements of the universe got together to plan out a bad day for you to have. It may feel that way when these types of days sneak up on you.

We’ve all experienced our share of bad days, and they seem to stick with us. But I wonder, when we have good days, do they stay with us just as strongly as these other types of days? It doesn’t always seem like it. Sometimes it’s easier to remember a bad day than to recall a good one. But what if we were to do just that-to purposely recount a good day we’ve had? What would that look like? Sure, with bad days we complain, grieve, and vent, but with good days, how do we describe these? How can we pocket and stow away those good moments so that we can retrieve them and re-experience them during one of these other days?

One idea is to write down your good experiences, that way you can take a look back at how the day played out and what good came of it. You can learn to be mindful of the good moments while they happen; when the good times are actively occurring, soak it all in, notice how you feel in that moment, stay present with your breath and what’s going on around you. So that way when you try to remember the good moments, they’ll be fresh in your mind, and you can hold onto them like precious fragments the universe brought you that day made especially for you. Recalling good moments and positive memories can help get you through those other types of days, so why not reminisce more often about the good?

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