August 13, 2026

Today’s update.

I did the basics. I fed myself, took my meds and took care of Beaker.

I decided I needed to get out of the house for a little while, so I grabbed Beaker, put him in the car and we went for a ride to get gas. Nothing exciting. Nothing particularly productive. But we left the house, and lately I think that counts for something.

Tomorrow, Beaker gets his nails trimmed. He will be thrilled, I’m sure.

Beaker has never really been much of a playful dog. He’s always been pretty content just hanging out, but his world has changed too. He lost my mom, who absolutely adored him and was his best friend. So I think I’m going to start making an effort to take him out for more walks, more rides and just spend some extra time with him.

Eventually, I want to find the right puppy companion for him. I’m not going to rush into it. The right little dog will come along eventually. Until then, Beaker and I can keep each other company.

I’m really sad today.

That’s to be expected, I suppose.

I’ll take a shower in a little bit and probably spend the rest of the day relaxing. I wouldn’t exactly call today successful, but it’s definitely better than yesterday.

Day by day.

I guess that’s the new motto.

I’m not entirely sure how I feel about that because I’m someone who likes to control everything around me. I like plans. I like knowing what I’m doing and what’s coming next.

Lately, everything just feels like chaos.

I don’t fucking know.

Sometimes I feel like I want to hate everything around me, but I don’t. Maybe I haven’t quite reached that anger stage of grief yet. Or maybe grief doesn’t give a shit about stages and I’ll bounce around between sadness, anger, acceptance and everything else whenever my brain decides to.

But there is something I have been thinking about more and more.

I spent the last six years of my life caring for my parents. Between caregiving, doctors, hospitals, insurance, medications, finances and everything else that comes with trying to care for aging parents, I learned more about our systems than I ever wanted to know.

And a lot of those systems are fucking broken.

We do not treat our elders the way we should.

We don’t make it easy for families to care for them. We don’t make navigating healthcare simple. We don’t make quality care affordable or accessible enough. We put enormous burdens on families and caregivers and then somehow expect everyone to figure it out while they’re exhausted, scared and watching someone they love decline.

I’ve lived it.

And now I’ve lost both of my parents.

One thing I know is that I don’t want everything I learned during those six years to disappear with them.

As I continue building my platform, I want advocacy to become part of it. I want to talk about elder care. I want to talk about caregivers. I want to talk about healthcare and the ridiculous hoops families are expected to jump through. I want to use my voice for people who are too exhausted, overwhelmed or vulnerable to scream about these things themselves.

I’ve even found myself considering running for office someday.

Yes. Me.

Politics.

I’m sure that would go wonderfully.

The first politician to piss me off would probably get my full potty mouth, professionalism be damned. Sometimes you’ve got to be an asshole when the situation calls for it.

I’m also incredibly frustrated with so much of our current political system. Too many people in positions of power seem more interested in maintaining power than actually listening to the people they’re supposed to represent. There are exceptions, of course, but I want more people in government who actually understand what ordinary families go through.

At the same time, I have to be realistic about my own limitations. Public office isn’t exactly an easy job, and living with a debilitating disability means my body doesn’t always cooperate with whatever plans my brain has made for it.

Yesterday was a pretty good example of that.

Maybe elected office isn’t the way I eventually advocate. Maybe it is. Maybe my platform, my writing and whatever FRDCreations grows into will give me another way to make some noise.

I don’t need to figure that out today.

Day by day, remember?

God, I hate that.

But maybe losing so much control is teaching me that I don’t actually have to know exactly what comes next.

For today, I got out of bed.

I took care of myself.

I took care of Beaker.

We left the house.

I thought about the future.

That’s enough.

Now I’m going to take a shower, take my pants off and lie directly in front of the AC vent because this humidity is fucking nasty.

One day at a time.

One problem at a time.

One ridiculous Beaker adventure at a time.

And somewhere along the way, maybe I’ll figure out what I’m supposed to do with everything the last six years taught me.

But not today.

Today, I’m taking my pants off.