You don’t need to do less this summer. You need a way to know, day by day, what your family’s nervous system can actually hold within your family’s capacity. Part 1 of this series named something most summer content ignores: summer doesn’t add capacity, it subtracts it. Heat, unpredictability, schedule disruption, and constant vigilance all […]
Understanding Summer Capacity Through a Nervous System Lens Read More »
Summer looks expansive on paper – longer days, flexible schedules, “more time.” But for military and neurodivergent families, summer capacity often shrinks, not expands it. Summer is sold to parents as the season of freedom. More daylight. Fewer schedules. Room to breathe. But if you’re raising a neurodivergent child, solo parenting through a deployment, mid-PCS
The Truth About Summer Capacity: Why It Shrinks Faster Than You Think Read More »
What sustained high-demand caregiving does to a parent’s nervous system – and why naming it matters. Published by Mindmental | July 2026 This is for any parent – any primary caregiver – who has been carrying an extraordinary load for a very long time, in a system that was never built to support them, without
When Parenting Is the Trauma: PTSD in Parents of Autistic Children Read More »
This is the final article in our June PTSD Awareness Month series. All month we have named things that do not get named often enough. Secondary traumatic stress in military spouses. PTSD in parents of autistic children. The trauma that military kids carry without anyone calling it trauma. Caregiver fatigue that goes so deep it
Published by Mindmental | PTSD Awareness Month | June 2026 You have probably heard of fight or flight. You may have even heard of freeze. But if you are parenting a military child – especially one who is neurodivergent – there is a fourth response you need to know, and a fifth that science is
May gave us language. It gave us permission slips, awareness ribbons, and 31 days of conversation about mental health. For military families and neurodivergent households, it gave us something rarer: a cultural moment where the invisible weight you carry every day was at least being named in the broader conversation. And now it’s June. The
The Mental Load Doesn’t Change When the Calendar Flips to June Read More »
As we move deeper into May and move from Autism Awareness & Acceptance Month and into Mental Health Awareness Month, the transition feels different this year for families like ours. Especially for military families and neurodivergent households where the emotional load never really gets the opportunity to reset. April asked us to see autistic people
When Awareness Ends, Capacity Begins Read More »
When I returned to an office role this spring, we reached out to the daycare our youngest had attended for a full year before the pandemic disruptions, before essential academics became our rhythm. We hadn’t re-enrolled back then because he was aging out of the pull-up-friendly classrooms and wasn’t yet fully potty trained. But now,
The Childcare Exclusion Crisis No One Is Talking About Read More »
As Autism Awareness and Acceptance Month comes to a close, many communities proudly highlight their “sensory-friendly” events – spaces meant to welcome autistic children, neurodivergent families, and anyone who benefits from reduced sensory load. But too often, what’s advertised as sensory-friendly ends up looking like the scene so many families know too well: booming speakers,
When Sensory-friendly Isn’t Sensory-friendly: A Call for Better Community Planning Read More »
There’s a moment that almost every military family knows. The orders come in. The timeline collapses. And before you’ve had a single quiet moment to process what’s happening, the lists begin. Schools to research. Utilities to transfer. A house to pack. A child to prepare. A community to leave behind – again. And somewhere in
The Hidden Load: What Military Families Carry during PCS Read More »
