WHAT CHANGE ACTUALLY FEELS LIKE · the skool CLASSIFIEDS

Naomi Quinn

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2h (edited) • General Discussion

WHAT CHANGE ACTUALLY FEELS LIKE

It’s not dramatic.

It’s the quiet moments where you suddenly realise life is different.

I open my eyes and it’s still DARK.

The house is in complete silence except for the soft clicking of the heating moving through the radiators.

I roll over to check the time.

Yennifer, my cat, is laying next to me and she is NOT impressed that I’ve just woken her up. 🐈‍⬛

I pick up my phone and see that it’s not even 6am, but my body has clearly decided it’s had enough sleep and it’s time to get up. So I navigate the house in complete darkness while Lily is still asleep.

The kitchen is COLD and DARK when I walk in.

I flick the light on and it blinds my eyes for a second while they adjust.

I grab my morning glass of COCONUT WATER 🥥 and head over to the exercise equipment.

Every morning since being back from BALI I’ve done some form of exercise before anything else.

It’s helped massively with my energy levels, my mental clarity and my physical abilities.

Movement first thing in the morning produces natural DOPAMINE, SEROTONIN and ENDORPHINS.

And it sets the tone for the ENTIRE day.

So I step onto the vibrating plate and look out of the window as the darkness slowly starts turning into light. 🌅

While the vibrating plate hums under my feet and my body shakes in all the right places, my mind starts moving through the list of things I want to achieve today.

Work things.

Personal things.

Things that need doing for the move to BALI.

It’s like my brain is quietly organising the day while my muscles release the tension.

At the time it just felt like a normal morning.

But by the end of the day I’d realised how much life had quietly CHANGED.

And standing there shaking on the vibrating plate makes me think of something...

Animals. 🐾

When animals go through something stressful or an interaction they don’t like, they SHAKE IT OUT.

It’s how they release whatever just happened to them.

Standing there vibrating, I suddenly wonder if this is what that feels like.

Is this the release they get?

Is this how they shake stress out of their bodies?

It makes me realise how UNDERUSED that response is for humans.

And I suddenly wondered something…

How many of us are walking around HOLDING STRESS IN OUR BODIES because we were never taught how to release it?

Animals shake it out.

Humans…

we tend to hold it in.

Maybe it shows up as the tight shoulders that never relax.

Maybe it’s the feeling of your brain running 100 miles an hour.

Maybe it’s the exhaustion that sits there even when you’ve technically done nothing wrong.

Lately my brain has been on fire in the BEST possible way. 🔥

I’m Driven. Focused. Clear.

Today there is a lot to do, but everything on the list moves my business forward and that makes it exciting instead of overwhelming.

So I go into the living room, pull the duvet over me because it’s still cold, switch the main light on because it’s still dark outside, open my laptop and start working.

I sit on the sofa zoning out from everything except the tasks in front of me.

And somewhere in that focus I completely forget to eat.

Lily wakes up around 9AM and comes into the living room.

She says good morning and asks if I’ve eaten.

When I say no she disappears into the kitchen to make me some breakfast.

A few minutes later she walks back in holding a bowl and smiling proudly.

She hands it to me.

And I look down to see…

THE SMALLEST PORTION IMAGINABLE. 😂

Honestly.

Ten out of ten for effort.

But there was absolutely NO WAY that amount of food was going to sustain me for the morning.

It wouldn't have been enough for one of the younger grandkids.

We both burst out laughing and I ask her if she can add a little bit more.

She says she’s done the same amount as I normally do.

And I say,

“Maybe… but my serving scoops are a little bit BIGGER than yours.”

She doesn’t take offence at all.

AND THAT IN ITSELF IS HUGE.

Anyone raising a child with RSD will understand exactly why that moment matters.

With Lily’s RSD she used to struggle massively with any kind of feedback.

Even the gentlest suggestion could feel like CRITICISM to her.

Now when she does take something personally we talk about CONSTRUCTIVE CRITICISM and how it helps us grow.

It’s not an attack on her as a person.

It’s helping her see a DIFFERENT perspective that could support her and the people around her.

This is an ONGOING process.

RSD doesn’t disappear overnight.

It takes REPETITION, CONSISTENCY and CONNECTION.

But open conversations and EMOTIONAL SAFETY are key when supporting any child with neurodiversity.

At some point today I completely lost track of time.

But it wasn’t TIME BLINDNESS.

It wasn’t HYPERFOCUS.

It was INTENTIONAL FOCUS.

I worked through multiple tasks and by the end of the day I’d actually achieved MORE than I planned to.

That left me feeling WARM, CALM and CONTENT in a way that’s hard to describe.

For dinner we made NASI GORENG together. 🍳🍚

Music playing.

Laughing in the kitchen.

Teaching Lily how to cook.

These evenings have become something we both really enjoy.

Cooking together BRINGS US CLOSER.

Sometimes it’s the radio.

Sometimes it’s a specific artist.

But we always end up sing at the TOP of our voices while we cook. 🎶

At dinner we watch a series together while we eat.

One or two episodes.

NO MORE.

Then we head upstairs.

Lily goes to play on her PlayStation and I sit down to decompress.

I also need to do some research for the family trip where we’ll scatter my dad's ashes.

I’m looking into campsites in the area and sending them to everyone so we can finally make a decision.

While I’m sitting there with my phone in my hand and my glasses off, the screen slightly blurry, my son calls.

He and his girlfriend are very much like me.They prefer decisions and CLEAR plans rather than endless back-and-forth.

While we’re on the call I send across the first campsite I’ve looked at and they’re both happy with it, but the girls need to be happy too.

So we add my OLDEST daughter to the call.

Then my SECOND daughter.

And finally, after THREE MONTHS of trying to organise this, we actually have a plan for scattering my dad’s ashes before Lily and I move to Bali permanently.

I end the day feeling something really deep.

CONTENTMENT.

HAPPINESS.

PRIDE.

Because when I look at where my life was a year ago compared to now, the difference is IMMENSE.

And I’m genuinely proud of where I am, how far I’ve come, and everything I’ve achieved to get here. 💗

Maybe that’s what REAL CHANGE actually feels like.

Not loud.

Not dramatic.

Just the quiet moments where you realise life is different NOW.

Connection instead of tension.

Laughter instead of conflict.