For over twenty years, I have worked with kids and adults with learning disabilities and ADHD. They are often used to making mistakes and people focusing on their challenges. I started telling them a long time ago that everyone has challenges, and everyone has gifts, or powers, and the goal is to find your powers and to use them for good.

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I have learned that family, faith, and keeping a sense of humor is vital to dealing with the little and medium stresses as well as persevering through the big ones. As an adult with ADHD and fibromyalgia, life seems to “happen” in hi-def around me and I find myself frequently sharing what we now call Barto Moments, those moments when life “happens” to me and I realize that my choices are to either laugh or to cry. I always try to choose to laugh; I find that laughing is much better on the sinuses - and the mascara (though not always)! I find that sharing Barto Moments often provides a little comic relief to others and, sometimes, even a little inspiration to help them laugh their way through their own moments when life is “happening” around them. Just one way I can use my powers for good!

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I started Using My Words for Good in 2020 to use my powers of writing to provide some words of inspiration - and some comic relief - for people with breast cancer and invisible disabilities like ADHD and fibromyalgia.