And then you were 14…

Dear Hunter,

Well, you are now officially 14 years and 1 day old.
I remember so much about the day you were born and the day we brought you home.

And so much about all the days since then.

I often tell you that I wish I could go back and do it all over again but do it better – because now I know HOW to BE better and do better. But, I can only bring those lessons into today and into all our tomorrows.

And man, some days it is really hard.

You are in FULL TEENAGER MODE. Both feet firmly planted in fluctuating moods and emotional surges. Not even a pinky toe remains in the ‘little boy’ world.

Everything is stupid. School is stupid. People are stupid. Your emotions are hot or cold.

And, oh, the arguing.

Some days it takes every fiber of my being to stay present and not lose my ever-loving shit.

There is all of that.

And there is your laughter, your sense of humor, your smile. The moments when you feel proud of your accomplishments.

We are in for a bumpy ride, you and me. But my heart and soul know we’ll make it to the other side.
HBD, buddy. May this trip around the sun be full of love and joy for you.
Love,
Mom

All The Ways To Say Love

Love crosses t’s and dots i’s
It lives in quiet moments
and satisfied sighs

Love holds laments and hopes
It walks through dark
and offers light as a rope

Love laughs and breathes
and when called to
sometimes it seethes

Love dances through sorrow
and willfully ushers
in a brighter tomorrow

Love entwines unlikely souls
knowing the union
makes each one whole

Love says everything
in the doing of it all.

~annie ricci~

Almost 14

Dear Hunter,

In three weeks you will be 14 years old.

I often say that I wish I could back to when you were a baby and do it all over again but do it better.

When I think back to the hard days of your toddlerhood, pre-school, and early elementary days, I remember the times when I showed up tired, hurting, frustrated, impatient and behaved those ways, too. With you. The sweetest little soul. My heart walking outside of my body. And I feel ashamed that I was not able to get my shit together sooner.
I am sorry for that, my sweet boy.

Thankfully, I recognized it sooner than later and started working on myself. I am still a work in progress – as it should be, really. Because if we aren’t always working to become healed and better then what’s the point??

One promise I make to myself every day (and to you, too, really) is to keep taking care of my whole self. So that I can show up for you and others and myself as my wiser, truer, better self. The one whose calm center is the safe space for you. The one who stays curious as you grow and change and evolve…without judging or shaming.

You are the light of my life. I will do my part to help that light shine brightly.

As you begin the next trip around the sun, I promise to be your safe place and to also hold boundaries to help you navigate through the year when things get hard and confusing. That might not always feel good to you. That might make you mad. But you’ll know I come from a place of love and curiosity rather than anger and hurt. The guardrails won’t be fun for either of us but I know they’ll serve you, especially, as this teenage onramp to adulthood gets wild.

I love you to the moon and beyond.
Love,
Mom

Standing Up When It Costs You Something

Dear Hunter,

I am unsure how I will bring this up with you in a conversation. But I will.

A day – a moment – will come when you are hanging with some buddies. And one of them will say something about girls or women. It might be a nasty comment. It might be a comment about doing something to a woman or girl. He might try to make it sound funny. Or he might be pressuring others to join him in his poor behavior.

He might make it sound like his view of girls and women are true.

That will be the moment that your truest character is tested.

That will be the moment that my constant harping will come home to you. “Integrity is what?,” I ask. You respond with “Doing the right thing when no one is looking.”

“And?”

“Doing the right thing when everyone is looking.”

This is when they will be looking. And it will be hard.

But, in that moment, I hope my words are in your mind. You’ll know that standing up and shutting that shit down is the right thing to do because you will feel nervous and maybe afraid that these guys will laugh at YOU, will tease YOU, will call YOU names or shun you, exclude you.

It is my deepest hope for you, my sweet boy, that you be the young man who tells that instigator and his followers to Shut Their F-ing Mouths.

It can be, “Dude- so NOT COOL and NOT true.” Or, you can let them have it with a stronger response.

He/they will tease you, call you names, and maybe stop hanging out with you.

That’s how you will know they were never your people to start with. They will have shown you that their values and yours do not align.

When that day comes, and you walk away with your head held high and you tell me the story… That will be the day that I did something right in this world. That I raised a son who became a man that is strong enough in his own skin to stand up for others.

I love you, Hunter.
Love, Mom

The Granted Wish

The genie grants you a wish. What is it?

I asked for a peaceful world, full of peace, full of kindness, full of love and acceptance, full of earthly stewardship, full of enough for everyone, full of health and vitality for all of earth’s inhabitants, full of compassion and acceptance.

She granted it.

Just Under The Wire…

Dear Hunter –

I posted in July. It looks like I will barely get a post written in August. Barely still counts. So I am patting myself on the back.

I returned from Alaska a month ago and worried about leaving you for a month and a few days. You are getting some grit with your dad but I still worried about how you would manage if he went off the rails, so to speak.

But from what I surmise so far is that the time together has gone well enough. That and you fished your heart out. Seeing pictures of you doing something you love makes my heart sing and my eyes leak.

I have spent the month:
Being sick for 10 days
Recovering from skin cancer surgery on my face for a week
and soaking in the peacefulness of home.

You know how people say ‘homesick’? Well, I have been son-sick.
Your time with us is growing short. Yeah, I know. Your Senior Year is 5 years away. For you it will seem like an eternity.
For me, it will be the blink of an eye.

You are taller than me. And… in so many ways you are also physically stronger than me. As an older parent – one whose friends are now grandmothers – I KNEW this was an eventuality. But I didn’t know how it would feel when the day came. I feel nostalgic for that little boy. I feel unmeasurable pride for this young man blossoming before my eyes.

My heart overflows, sweet boy. Overflows.

My sweet boy at the Anchorage Museum

Love,
Mom

Chasing Birds

At a Juneau laundry-mat

Folding hot clothes

I looked around

But you weren’t there.

I looked out the window

The sky threatening rain

And I saw you again

As you were

At one

At three

At seven

At eleven

And all the years in between

Chasing birds in a crusty parking lot

Pure joy on your face

Run, my strong boy, run.

I hope you always chase the birds

I hope I always get to see you do it.

~Annie Ricci~

Love,
Mom

Negative Thoughts?

What’s the best way to deal with negative thoughts?

After working on myself for … I don’t know?… at least 4 decades…
And after years of education, hundreds of hours counseling people in the therapy room, and thousands of hours as a certified coach …

I don’t think there is only ONE BEST way and there isn’t a one-size-fits-all practice.

I think that noticing it, naming it, and the getting curious about it can be a way to deal with negative thoughts.

Recognizing this is the voice of the safety instinct or the worried part of us or the voice of a critical person in our lives, or the voice of social rules helps us to get a sliver of distance.

Noticing and naming it: Oh, that’s the ‘meanie’ that lives in my head doing its thing again.

Curiosity: What’s this negative voice telling me? What is it afraid of? What is it protecting me from? What is another, more realistic thought?

That little bit of distance can help us see that just because the negative thought was the first on the scene and the loudest, it does not have to be the ONLY one.

More curios question to ask ourselves: What’s more likely true? If I didn’t listen to this first thought, what is possible? If my best friend or someone who loved me just as I am were talking to me, what would they say?

——————
Neuroscience research shows that if we start speaking kindly to ourselves – like we would to someone we care about – ex: You got this. –
more often, then we start to feel better and negative thoughts begin to loosen their grip on us.

It’s hard to tie this all up in a neat little package. And like I said, there is no one-size-fits all solution. But, from my own experience and that of my clients, I see these practices (and it IS a continual practice) be effective in quieting that negative voice so it doesn’t keep holding us back or making us feel crappy.

Just my 2 cents.

Healing Takes Time

Dear Hunter,
Man, spring break 2026 was harsh and cold and ended with a bang.

Like a door slamming closed on life before that storage unit moment
and all that came after.

The deconstruction of what we thought was safe and secure
only to find out that the human parts of us
can get really scary.

If I could have been with you and dad in that moment,
I might have been able to prevent it.

Instead, the best I could do was damage control afterward.
And daddy and I struggled with the whole thing — for weeks.

I was scared.
You were scared.
And it brought us closer.

But pushed dad into the cold Montana spring.
Left out.
Unsupported.
I found it so hard to understand it all.

I fought my way back to myself,
my true self,
my mother-self,
my peace and your dad.

When I saw your dad trying,
when I listened to him with my heart — finally —
I was able to release my fear and anger.

And all that while, I held you close.
I kept talking to you.
Reminding you that you did nothing wrong.
And that everything was going to be ok.

And Hunter —
it is.
We are.
You are.
All my love,
Mom

Baseball field

Ugh…

Yep – sometimes life feels like a dumpster fire.

Just when a person thinks that they are over one particularly challenging hump on life’s road and ready to run on all cylinders once again, –

WHAMO – life says, “Not so fast, sweetheart.” And it hands whacks you in the back of the head with a freshly milled two by four (2×4).

I find myself at a lost for words that encompass what my heart and soul feel right now. My mom often used the saying, “I feel like I’ve been drug through a knothole backwards.” Yeah, mom, I feel it now, too.

Without the elaborating on the details, I am struggling to deal with strife in our family. I thought my partner was open to trying new ways of relating to our kiddo along with the world around him. I thought I had developed the ability be in a conflict and speak up when it was most needed.

Looking back at the past two and a half weeks, maybe not.

And as the stress hormones start to subside, I just feel tired. Tired and ineffective. And like I am failing at my most important job:
Motherhood.