When your baby girl goes to high school

Today is the day of freshman orientation. I'm not going to lie I'm a little bit of a wreck. Almost 14 years ago exactly, I held my little baby in my arms and fell in love for the first time with her. She has been the light of my life and now she is almost all grown up. In four years she will be headed off to college, that seems so soon!

Over the years, high school has seemed so far away. It is that time in your life when you develop your identity and everything that you do really matters. Hopefully, you learn to love yourself as God loves you.

Next year, at this time, she will have her drivers permit! For some reason, that never seemed possible. When I was her age, I was getting into all sorts of trouble. Trouble and making bad decisions. Trouble I hope she does not get into and decisions that she makes in a better way than I did. I really think that it was around this time in my life that I lost myself and my life became about surviving instead of striving.

This is a tough time of mommy guilt. You start thinking about all the things you should have taught her, all the habits you should have gotten her into before this time in her life. All the pictures you should've taken, the home movies and videos that you should have taken, all the life lessons you have yet to teach her. 

Today is really the beginning of the rest of her life. So today my only good choice is to make it the first day of the rest my life. It is time for me to set a good example of which I have failed to do in certain aspects. To get healthy, to establish routines and good habits in life, to take care of myself the way I hope she will take care of herself. It is a tough choice and it will be hard to do, but she is so worth the work.

So here is to today, the first day of the rest of a Lexi's  life, and the first day for the rest of mine.

Day 45- Armageddon

No my peeps, Armageddon is not upon us but it sure looks and sometimes feels like it is.  My heart and prayers go out to all those suffering from these fires and my post below is in no way intended to take away from the seriousness of their situation .

So my 90 day journey ends the day of my half marathon.  My problem has been that it is SO EASY to make excuses not to run in the smoke.  It drives my allergies nuts, wreaks havoc with my asthma, and gives me a headache from hell. I gave up my gym membership long ago because I much prefer to exercise outdoors and dance at the studio.  

BUT, I am grossly undertrained at this point and have got to log some serious miles in the next 45 days.  So tonight I'm considering trying to run my four miles.  If it doesn't pan out I'm going inside.  I'm going to research some free gym trials and hopefully they'll get me through the smoke.  

So that's day 45- no more excuses! 

Fighting the Good Fight in Family Law?

The last few months I've noticed a lot of my family law clients, celebs, and even friends and people I know are getting divorced.  No shocker considering family law makes up the majority of my practice-- but what is shocking to me is many of them have been married the same length of time I have or are my age. 

When I dreamt of being a lawyer I did not dream of being a divorce lawyer.  Do any of us really?  I never intended to practice it in law school and not even during my first 3 years of practice.  My first couple of cases I took as a favor.  Surprise!  I was good at it!  

Over the years I have seen what family law conflicts do to people.  And what people do to each other and their kids.  I'm not going to lie, it's hard on an emotional human being like me.  

So why do I do it?  I do it because I care about people.  Divorce is a traumatic life event.  And even going through modifications of child support or parenting plans is tough on a soul.  I try to encourage couples to reconcile, and I've been successful at times.  But often divorce is a necessity for two people and a family to live the life they want or need to live.  And it is too often the only way for someone who will never be appreciated, respected, truly loved, or valued to escape from their cage.  

Sometimes I end up on the wrong side and it is too late.  Sometimes I end up with an ungrateful client.  And those times are really hard because I put a lot of my heart into my cases.  It is my ultimate goal as an attorney to lessen the impact I allow my cases to have on me.

BUT, not to eliminate it completely.  Because being a lawyer is what I'm good at.  Because being an emotional soul is not only who I am but what I am.  Because I really care about people and I love helping them.  But most of all because I am a warrior, inside and outside the courtroom. It is what God created me to be, a warrior.  So I will fight the good fight as he brings it to me with the tools he has given me.  Even if it sometimes hurts.