Hi there! My name is Rika. I’m a full-time wife and mommy, and a hobbyist by night. I live in North Pittsburgh and have a loving husband named Adam and an energetic son named Blake. I’m a hot beverage enthusiast and enjoy hiking, gardening, knitting, curling up with a good mystery/thriller, and playing Disney Dreamlight Valley.
I’m also diagnosed with AuDHD, Auditory Processing Disorder, a Traumatic Brain Injury, as well as C-PTSD. After being a passenger in a fatal car accident, experiencing domestic violence from a narcissistic ex-boyfriend, as well as abuse from an emotionally immature narcissistic mother, I know that I’m a survivor and I try my best to smile and stand tall every day.
I hope to find and reclaim myself and the parts of me that have been shut off, silenced, and dismissed by my abusers (my ex-boyfriend and my ex-mother) for so long. I was never really allowed to have a voice of my own, nor was I allowed to make choices and decisions for myself. My abusers manipulated me and took control to make the choices and decisions for me. Then when I finally started to recognize what they were doing and started making choices and decisions for myself, they clearly didn’t like my choices and decisions. My abusers would invalidate me and claim that somebody was brainwashing me, simply because I was growing and changing, coming to terms with the reality that they had always made me second-guess.
So other than learning to manage and navigate my life with AuDHD, I hope for this blog to be part of my healing journey of rediscovering who I am and finding my own voice. I don’t expect everybody to like what I have to say, and that’s okay; at least I’m being authentic.
Keep it real.
~ Rika