Summer is quickly coming to an end, and in some ways, I am excited to get back to the structure and consistency of the school year. In other ways, I know I will miss the ebb and flow that summer allows; the slower mornings, the flexibility, and the ability to let our days unfold without always watching the clock

For the first time in almost five years, our family took a big family vacation. It wasn’t perfect. There were bumps, there were meltdowns, and there were moments when everyone, including the adults, felt overwhelmed. But, by and large, it was a good time. And for our family, sometimes “good” is more meaningful than “perfect.”

It has been an interesting summer as we have all tried to find our way back to some sense of normalcy. Our oldest tackled college applications, which feels both exciting and surreal. It is hard to believe we are at this stage already.

And our youngest? He attended ESY and had what was probably the most successful four weeks of his life.

That sentence still feels significant to me.

When we have our monthly services meetings with our community services board team, I often have to pause and remind myself just how far our son has come and, in many ways, how far we have come as a family.

I still see remnants of the storms we have been through. I still feel the storm brewing sometimes. I know what it feels like when the clouds start gathering, when the tension rises, and when I wonder how difficult the next few hours or days might be.

But more often than not, we get through things now with less damage, less chaos, and less debris left behind.

That is progress.

It may not always look like the kind of progress you can easily measure. There isn’t always a milestone, a certificate, or a big announcement. Sometimes progress looks like recovering more quickly. Sometimes it looks like recognizing the signs of escalation sooner. Sometimes it looks like knowing when to step back, when to ask for help, or when to simply give everyone some space.

And sometimes progress is simply getting through a hard moment without it becoming a hard week.

Those monthly meetings remind me to celebrate the small wins. They remind me to pause, even in the tough moments, and recognize that the storm isn’t as heavy as it once was. It doesn’t have the same impact. We have more tools now. We have more experience. We know our child better, and perhaps just as importantly, we know ourselves better.

I am also reminded that we are not navigating this alone.

That may be one of the biggest lessons of our journey.

We have been fortunate to have providers, educators, therapists, community supports, family, friends, and other people who have walked alongside us. Some have helped us understand our son. Some have helped us understand ourselves. Some have simply been there when we needed someone to listen.

It takes a village; but sometimes the village looks different than you imagined it would.
As summer comes to a close, I find myself looking ahead to the school year with a mixture of anticipation and anxiety. There will undoubtedly be challenges. There will be days when things don’t go according to plan. There may be storms.

But I also know something I didn’t know five years ago:

Storms pass.

We have learned how to prepare for them. We have learned how to weather them. And, slowly, we have learned that we don’t have to measure our lives by how many storms we encounter, but by how we recover from them.

So as we head into another school year, I am choosing to celebrate the progress. The small wins.
The successful days. The moments of connection. The vacations we weren’t sure we could take. The four successful weeks of ESY. The college applications. The ordinary days that would have felt extraordinary a few years ago.

I am choosing to notice how far we have come instead of focusing only on how far we still have to go.

Because sometimes, the biggest victories are not about changing the storm.

Sometimes, they are about learning how to weather it together.