Hurricane Harvey - How to Help

Whenever there are catastrophic events albeit natural disasters or some other force (domestic or international) leaving trails of mayhem and destruction the images and reports make our hearts hurt and soul's lament on how to help out. Whether we ourselves are directly caught in moment of needing assistance or a loved one or a neighbor  ... we just want to help. 

Take it from someone who has helped out with the relief efforts from Hurricane Katrina; Earthquakes in Haiti; Superstorm Sandy; Flint Drinking Water Relief Drive as well as other local - international crisis. It can be overwhelming of knowing what to do and how to help out. 

First let me challenge you to sign up for updates regarding the current and ongoing conditions of Hurricane Harvey. As much damage that has been done it is FAR from over! 

Second unless you're a trained disaster/catastrophe /crisis  responder please do not just get in your vehicle and head to the affected areas. Training is vital for you as well as those in need of your assistance. 

Here is a list of a few organizations offering training for Disaster and Crisis Management: (Just click the title and it will take you their site. This is not a comprehensive list. Just some to point you in the right direction.)

• Disaster Ready / Cornerstone OnDemand Foundation
• FEMA / Department of Homeland Security 
• Red Cross
• Salvation Army  

Third I know getting trained does little to assist now. However you can help out with those already on the ground. Below is a list of organizations already on the ground or sites to gather more information regarding the relief efforts and resources for Hurricane Harvey. (Just click the title and it will take you their site. This is not a comprehensive list. Just some to point you in the right direction.)

• Current Locations for Temporary Shelters or Housing (Information regarding whether the location is accepting pets, on stand-by, or at capacity is available through this site.)
•  National Voluntary Organizations Active in Disaster  (Information regarding organizations already on the ground in the devastated areas both National and Texas organizations can be found on this site. Individuals wanting to make donations can do so through this site.)
• The National Flood Insurance Program (Information on how to file a claim is located on this site.)
• Disaster Assistance (Information about resources for assistance during disaster can be found on this site.)
• Hurricane Preparedness (Information on Hurricane Preparedness Week as well as resources on volunteer organizations to partner with.)

Before You Give Check Out A Charitable Organization's Status:

1. Federal Trade Commission 
2. National Association of State Charity Officials 

City of Houston Information:

1. Houston Emergency 
2. City of Houston Government
3. Office of Emergency Management
4. Go Bag Preparation | Evacuation Plan Resources  

Weather Information:

• National Weather Service
• The Weather Channel
• National Hurricane Center

Texas Organizations seeking volunteers or donations:

• South Texas Blood and Tissue Center (The center says although O negative and O positive blood is at critically low levels, all blood type donations are welcome. The center says less than a day's supply is available. The center is asking the public in the San Antonio and New Braunfels areas to donate right now.  Call 210-731-5590 to schedule an appointment to donate blood. From the TWC 8.28.17)
• Texas Diaper Bank  ( "Diapers are not provided by disaster relief agencies," the TDB posted on Facebook Friday. To alleviate that need, the TDB is requesting donations of cash and diapers to provide emergency diaper kits for families that are being displaced due to Hurricane Harvey. From the TWC 8.28.17)
• Austin Pets Alive! (Austin Pets Alive! is an animal shelter and no-kill pet advocacy group seeking assistance to help with pets in the aftermath of the storm. From the TWC 8.28.17)
• Catholic Charities USA Text CCUSADISASTER to 71777

Texas State  Information:

1. State of Texas Emergency Portal
2. Road Closures
3. Texas Departure of Public Safety
4. Texas Department of Transportation

Louisiana State Information:

1. Lake Charles Hurricane Information
2. Governor's Office of Homeland Security & Emergency Preparedness
3. Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development

Fourth take a long deep breath get some oxygen flowing through your body. Let's get them endorphins and serotonin working. It is hard to be apart of a crisis let alone witness it take its toll on those we love, connected too, or are concerned about. Rebuilding can only happen after the recovery phase of relief efforts. If you are person of faith tap into your faith. If not find a quiet space to recenter yourself perhaps meditate. Take these moments moment by moment. Find someone to speak with and then develop a plan that will work for you.

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The Queen Has Spoken

Join me as I share my lumps, bumps, bruises, through light, love, and elevation.

The Queen Has Spoken

We are all entrusted with a gift to make this world a more positive dimension to meander.  As each of us transverse through life shedding the layers of growth via our stories it enables the next person to find their voice and use their inner strength. I have been blessed with many gifts and talents. I have outgrown the dimension of living of being ducked off and reserved well hidden in plain sight while I watch humanity suffer. This page is dedicated to revelation and elevation. Here is where revelation meets light and leads to enlightenment, empowerment, and intrinsic evolution of mind, body, and soul. I share with you what life, lumps, and love has gifted me via my prose and my voice. Unapologetically Liberated, Love and Light Rendering Loquaciousness, Poetical Proliferations in Prose, Mystically Mused through Meditation, and Unequivocally Elevated in Existence. I am the Queen and I am speaking! #theQueenhasSpoken 

Click here --> The Queen Has Spoken

Copyright. All rights reserved. No part of this blog may be reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embedded in critical articles and reviews.

Shhhh …… Shame, Shame, Shame, on ME! No SHAME ON YOU!!!

If you stare long enough at anything you’ll find something wrong. ~ Mothanmeetz Daeyez

Wow you completed a triathlon .. congratulations but weren't you 1. __ or 2. ____ or 3. _____ with all those people looking? It amazes me how negative people can be. No one seems to know how to give a compliment and just leave it at that. Nor do people seem to understand that projecting their issues onto others is not a way to remedy their need to do  self-work. These selfish innuendos lead to energy spent in thoughts, meditation, actions, or perhaps medication on fixing something many times which isn’t broken.  

First it was my hair. Is that your real color? Why won't you color it? Ever thought about a wig? ETC. ETC. ETC. Women literally came up to me and asked a series of questions regarding my hair color. Most of these women were older than me. They themselves either were not happy with their hair color or just afraid to live their truth. I used to color my hair but .... I stopped - I wanted to find a more natural way to have color without damaging my texture or the grade of my hair. I did not like the options available so I stopped.

Prior to that it was why did you go natural? Once again, etc., etc., blah, blah, blah. Even with me explaining that I have been natural for 17+ yrs  ….. Still more blah, blah, blah!!

At some point in our lives we just get tired of the endless pointless conversations. Especially about futile things such as image or at least the image others think you should have. I fought a battle of self-hatred for years. Many of them unbeknownst to me because I also lived in functional dysfunctional community with the IDEOLOGIES if you were to skinny eat something and if you were just really thick maybe you shouldn’t eat something. As harmless as the quips and quotes from my childhood and young adulthood were from loved ones they became an embedded critique I viewed myself through.

The battle to be able to look at myself in the mirror and not shudder at anything I thought needed to be adjusted before I could be seen publicly wearing this or that took a real toll on my life holistically. However the irony of this is I have never thought I was hard on the eyes and never needed the compliment of the opposite gender to feel good about myself. It was the words of my childhood/young adulthood on loop in my head rendering me shameful of my ever changing body.

Truthfully every single time I have set out to change my body for vain reasons I failed!!!! MISERABLY! Yup I got some great results but because they were rooted in a place of pain it didn’t last. Here is the kicker by the time I got over those vain prerequisites I was over forty and my body had developed a new attitude of existing ...... Menopause!!!! Menopause is so disrespectful!!! Graciousness is owed to GOD and a pre-menopausal lifestyle of not eating certain things of why I do not suffer as I have heard many other women share their stories.

I had finally become fully cognizant of process errors to gain control over my fluctuating weight. The physical ability to be able to do so was even more of a challenge. Now the real battle came to learn to really look in the mirror at my forty-plus body and not shudder. Not to enter into a matrix of moments relived or revisited where my body didn’t look like this. Where this didn’t bulge or wiggle or even the overarching fear of how can my king love these life lines in my body he didn’t help create!!!

Three years ago when I sought out to compete in a triathlon it wasn’t to be trend setter or garner a bunch social media hoopla. It would be a moment to grasp ahold of life fleeting and grapple with the evolution of what it would become. Even when I finally got into position to train hard once again I had to face my embedded voices about my body. Ultimately I actually stopped caring about it because I became more serious about surviving the swimming part of the triathlon than concerns about how I looked.

I am still a work in progress. Truthfully I can still look in the mirror and find plenty of spots that need IMMEDIATE ATTENTION but now instead of being paralyzed by it I embrace it. So here is my freedom and liberation moment from BODY-SHAMING and SELF-HATRED I pray it sets someone free. I am 5’10” and 45 years old and according to the BMI(Body Mass Index) Chart  I am grossly obese. However I was tested and cleared by a doctor to be able to compete in my first triathlon (my second is in September) and I refuse to live my life in box based upon charts that cannot determine if I am healthy or not. Nor will I live my life in the shadows of others whose ideal images include either starving or stuffing myself. So shhhhhhhh SHAME, SHAME, SHAME, on you if you’re still living in space not created for you or in vicissitudes of what others think.

These are pictures of me wearing two piece during my training at Lake Bennett and a one piece suit for my triathlon something just a few years ago I would have never put on. I challenge myself every week in my new level of existing to wear something I would never have done before and not let anything or anyone hinder my freedom in doing so not even myself.  I ask you to join my challenge and post a picture of you getting out your comfort zone. CLICK HERE TO ACCEPT THAT THE CHALLENGE!!!

Copyright. All rights reserved. No part of this blog may be reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embedded in critical articles and reviews.