The Divorced Mama Bear

I recently read a heartbreaking story about a woman who was murdered by a man she met on a dating app, and it made me stop and think about how safe dating apps actually are. While it certainly seems to be the way to meet people nowadays, there are some pretty important steps that should be followed in order to avoid finding yourself in a potentially dangerous situation. Don't ignore the red flags. Listen to your gut.  If something doesn't feel right, it probably isn't.  No one is perfect, and there will undoubtedly be some differences between you and the man you're talking to online, but if you find yourself making excuses for his behavior and chalking it up to him "just being excited" or thinking "maybe he'll be normal in person", think twice about the excuses  you're making for him and whether or not they are actually valid. If he's pushy on the phone, it's going to be even worse in person. Everyone is on their best behavior when yo

I started getting migraines when I was 15.  They were bad enough to make me hole up in my bedroom for the day, but they were manageable.  These "normal" migraines continued until I was 25....then I had my son and everything changed. I was okay after I first delivered him, but when he was a few months old, I started noticing I was having trouble driving.  I'd get dizzy on winding roads (we lived in the country at the time), and sometimes I'd have to pull over to sit for a few minutes until the spinning stopped. I mentioned it to my doctor and he said I probably had BPPV (benign paroxysmal positional vertigo), which is when small calcium crystals kind of float around in your inner ear and make you dizzy.  He gave me a prescription for meclizine and sent me on my way. I tried this for awhile, but it wasn't really helping.  Being a busy mom with a little one at home, I just dealt with it for awhile.  That was until one morning when everything changed. My son was about