Enter Sicas.
One day our family was gifted a service dog for Nico.
Sicas was her name and she became my life savior.
I first started taking Sicas out for 10 minute walks. And a few days after I started these walks, something magical happened: I started to crave these walks!
I realized that ever since Nico had been diagnosed, I had not been on a walk by myself, or been alone by myself for that matter.
I had not taken a single minute to relax from the chronic stress of being a full-time autism mom and caregiver.
None!
And for the first time in a very long time, I had this precious ''me time'' that gave me the mental space for self-reflection and allowed me to detach from the chaos.
I was so hooked by this new activity, that I decided to start jogging.
So I bought myself some proper running shoes and became a runner.
I started jogging up and down my street, not being able to run more that 2 minutes continuously.
But I persevered. These micro jogs turned into 5 minute runs which then turned into 1k runs, then 3k runs and so on until I was able to cross the finish line of my first 5k race in 2009.