June - "Dirt Therapy"

Watching television, movies, and even Facebook have becoming challenging. There are pictures of hot men everywhere! My kryptonite; Henry Cavill, Chris Hemsworth, along with any other man at this point. I needed something (other than cold showers) to cool me off. So, why not go in a different direction. Something else that has completely frustrated me this year was the fact that my garden was over-taken my thistle weed! This kept me really busy and it was a great distraction for me. I didn't see it at the time, but I see it now. God always has a plan. It was a wonderful achievement to sit back once the garden was thistle free and really started to fill in with yummy goodness; Zucchini, Spaghetti Squash, Tomatoes, Cucumbers, and Watermelon. PLUS, with all my hard work in the garden I was able to bless others with amazing veggies.

"Keep yourself busy if you want to avoid depression. For me, inactivity is the enemy." I've found this to be an absolute truth. I definitely have seasonal depression and I realize it is because during the colder months I am less active and feeds a vicious cycle - the less active I am, the more my depression acts up, the more my body experiences pain, and it just keeps going round and around. All of this changes for me around Mother's Day. This is when my family buys a bunch of flowers for my mom and plant them out back. I call this my "Dirt Therapy" - when my hands are in the dirt my entire mentality changes. We all have something that changes those brain chemicals and spreads a little sunshine inside an otherwise dark place. June is also my mom's birthday, so it's a busy month of planting, gardening, and then maintaining. I also made sure my inside plants were cleaned and fertilized. A real gem was going to local stores (Wal*Mart, Loews, and Home Depot were my choices) and going to their gardening centers and checking out their clearance racks... the plants might not look great, but with some TLC they come back and look beautiful. It's another feeling of accomplishment when you can nurse the poor things back to life.