Dreams, surrender, and when your son initiates moving out with Theresa Noye

In this episode we explore what it means to parent with humility, surrender, and unconditional love while also equipping children with disabilities to live fully and independently.

What happens when your child with disabilities starts dreaming about their own future? In this powerful conversation, Valerie sits down with Theresa Noye  an ordained minister and a radical self-love coach. She trains women to authentically master the life changing skills of self-love, self-acceptance, and self-compassion on a deep soul level. Theresa is also the author of Hello Autism. Today she talks about her son Regal’s dream of moving to Arizona and what it looks like to prepare him for independent living.author of Hello Autism, to talk about her son Regal’s dream of moving to Arizona and what it looks like to prepare him for independent living.

Theresa shares her journey of learning to surrender control, honor her child’s voice, and embrace the process of helping him imagine a life beyond the family home. Together, they discuss the courage it takes for parents to let go of fear, the importance of equipping young adults for independence and preparing young adults for independent living.

This is a conversation filled with hope, faith, and practical wisdom for parents preparing their own child’s forever home.

Key Takeaways

• Honoring Dreams: Supporting Regal’s vision of living in Arizona shows the importance of listening to our children’s goals for their future.
• From Fear to Freedom: Parents often cling to control, but real transformation happens in surrender.
• Equipping for Independence: Steps to help young adults with disabilities live confidently beyond the family home.
• Unconditional Love: Acceptance is the foundation of trust and growth.
• Spiritual Wisdom: Our children can be teachers if we are willing to listen.

Encouragement from Theresa

"A special needs child is not a life sentence. It’s actually an opportunity. There is a bigger purpose unfolding — one more beautiful than you could ever imagine. When Regal said he wanted to move to Arizona, it stretched my faith. Trust that journey."

Connect with Theresa Noye

Website: https://www.theresanoye.com/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/theresanoye/  

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@theresa_noye/featured Bedtime Stories for High Achieving Women

Book: Hello Autism: How to Love Like And Learn From Your Special Needs Child  https://www.theresanoye.com/book

Free Sacred Self Masterclass: https://theresanoye.com/sacredself

Connect with me:  

info@foreverhomeconsulting.ca

Music Acknowledgement: Audio Coffee - Denys Kyshchuk

Editor: Scott Arbeau

Link for book: The S.H.I.N.E. Principle: The special needs mom's path to strength, hope and happiness by Valerie Arbeau

https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B0CW18ZXGX (Canada)

https://a.co/d/03hFdZI4 (United States)

Learn more about your host at:
https://coachingwithvalerieanne.com/

Transcript

But we're preparing him. Things like he doesn't have a car, he doesn't know how to drive. So my husband is teaching him how to drive. Things like with his grooming, I'm like, you can't do that if you're going to be living but with other people that are not your immediate family, they're not going to deal with that. You know, so we're just preparing him with things that he needs to do so that he can live independently.

Hello and welcome to Forever Home for our kids with disabilities.

I'm Valerie, mum to two with disabilities, one visible, one invisible. I'm a life coach and an author.

This space has been created to help you navigate the journey of creating a secure, sustainable forever home for your child.

We'll chat with parents on this path, realtors, financial planners, and other experts who can make the process easier.

Why am I so passionate about this? Because seeing my eldest thrive living independent of us was a gift I didn't always know I could give. I want you to have the opportunity to explore giving that gift to your child.

Welcome everyone to today's episode of Forever Home for our Kids with Disabilities. I'm your host Valerie, mom to two with disabilities, one visible, one invisible. Today's guest is Theresa Noye. Theresa is the radical self-love coach you've been waiting for. She empowers high achieving women to rewrite the rules of their lives through radical soul care. Her countercultural approach is both playful and profoundly transformative. She trains women to authentically master the life changing skills of self-love, self-acceptance, and self-compassion on a deep soul level. This allows them to reclaim their time, embrace unadulterated joy and experience true freedom. Theresa is an ordained minister, coach, best-selling author of ‘Hello Autism’ and Forbes featured expert. Theresa's radical soul care method proves that when you love yourself first, everything else falls into place. 

Welcome Theresa. Wow. That was amazing. I'm like, what are you talking about? 

You my sister!

Me? Absolutely. Wow! You're, you're, you're so gifted. You should be doing voiceovers or something. 

Thank you. 

Yeah, that was great. Thank you. Thank you, Valerie. I'm so happy to be here. Thank you so much. 

Yes. Well, I'm so happy to have you here as well. And I just want you to tell us a little bit about your special need mom journey. 

Yeah, well, similar to you, I have two children, two with disabilities, one that's visible, one that's invisible, right? I think the invisible disability is, was harder for us to navigate than the invisible one. But, so…

I have two kids, my son is 23, Regal, and my daughter Nia is 21. And I had children. I didn't really want children. I'm a great, ‘I don't like kids.’ And I definitely wasn't like, you know, sensitive and compassionate and caring, any of those things prior to having children. I was the type of person that would kind of frown at kids that were flailing in the supermarket and look at the mom like what's wrong with you. And then, I had my son Regal and everything changed. And I'm so glad for that shift because he was such a gift to me, just for me, and my own personal transformation, and my soul's evolution. It totally shifted everything, totally shifted how I viewed the world.

He’s been, both of my children, he was the start, then, and Regal prepared us for Nia's journey, which we didn't know until…. Regal was diagnosed with autism when he was three.

My daughter Nia was diagnosed when she was in middle school with ADHD and some Emotional dysregulation.

And then later on in her freshman year college, DID. So I wasn't, we didn't see any of these things coming. But the journey that we had with Regal prepared us to not even be bothered by what was going on with Nia. We just knew that it was just a different expression of who she was.

Love how you say that, just a different expression of who she was or who she is. And I think sometimes, yeah, we get sojudgmental on ourselves, people are looking at us and you know, and then, I don't know about you, but when I realized for us, our disability for our oldest is like in your face. She was born via emergency c-section, was on a ventilator initially. And we were told she wasn't going to probably live past the weekend. And then when we got past the weekend, it was, you know, she'll probably pass away in a year. So she is total care. And so her disability is so very visible. And so when you know, you're kind of looking, you kind of go through, hmm, ‘What did I do?’ You start cross examining yourself and analyzing and all the rest of it. So it was really hard. So I appreciate that you said with your son, you were able to prepare yourself for when Nia came. For us, it was a total shock that our second one had a disability because we were used to sort of the visual thing, everybody can see when you look at Melody-Anne, you can see she has a disability. She's in a wheelchair, G-tube fed, uses a communication device. And so with our second one, she did everything just great. She was reading at the age of three, very bright child, and you know, into sports and things. And so it wasn't until she was grade five, I'm going to say the end of grade five, beginning of grade six, that we realized, you know what, she’s just not responding to discipline. I'm from the Caribbean, not saying that I beat my kids, but….

I understand. I understand

So, she wasn't sort of following along with what we were anticipating, right? Because with Melody-Anne, it was a different way of parenting because she doesn't respond the same way. And so with this child, it's like, ‘What's going on?’ And so I knew there was something. And messy, oh, my goodness! Everything was a mess. Her place, there was space with a mess. Eating at the table was a mess. And at school, she was being told that, you know, her writing was messy, her desk was messy. Turns out she has ADHD. 

Yeah. 

So that was kind of diagnosed then. So we're just thinking, okay! Almost three years ago now we got hit with the ‘Do you think she might be on the spectrum?’

Okay, no, we didn't realize that. But when we look back at her early childhood, it's like, oh, right. But for us, our situation was we kind of missed it because we were focused on the older one. 

Right. Yeah. Yeah. 100%.

I was gonna say I did you know, feel like that a little bit with my daughter, like, we were so focused on Regal, how could I not have seen these things, you know? But at the end of the day, I'm like, we did the best we could. And now we're seeing it. So let's let's go. Let's go with it.

Yeah. Yeah. And I love, I love that you're able to say that, you know, we did the best that we could. And that's one of the things that I've had to teach myself to take on board is that I did the best that I could with the knowledge that I had and the resources that I had. 

Right. Yeah. 100%. You know, I learned that through the program that I did with Regal. So we did a I was listening to Angela O'Brien. Is that her name? Good for me? Yay!

And guys were talking about how what we're experiencing now is not even going to be an issue 18 years from now. Like, things change and evolve, and we're becoming more aware and development. So, when our son was born, back in 2001, so what we're experiencing now, it wasn't even an option back then. And we were, on the internet, combing the internet, like hours and hours at night and just trying to figure out how we’re going to navigate this. And we landed on a home program, it was called the Sunrise Program. And it really spoke to me because it was built on unconditional love and self-acceptance, radical self-acceptance. And that really resonated with me. And it was a playful, loving approach with your child, the parents. They train the parents and the parents run the program. And you build a whole community around you in order to support you and your child. So we did a very non-traditional model.

 But one of the tenets of the program was everybody's doing the best that they can. In order to eliminate the judgments that we carry judgments, you know, we're always judging either we're judging ourselves, either we're judging other people, or we're judging our circumstances. And, and the one of the mantras was everyone's doing the best that they can. And so from that, I was really able to release the judgments that I had on myself about, you know, how I was navigating the journey, because it's really messy.

In your head, you think you're going to do it a certain way, but in real time, it doesn't go that way. But we're all doing the best that we can. And then releasing Regal, knowing that he's doing the best that he can. Right. So releasing him from progressing at a certain rate or comparing him to other children or comparing my life to other moms, everybody's doing the best that they can. 

Yeah.

That was so healing for me. 

Mm hmm. Love that. So audience, I hope you're grasping that and you're feeling that. And I just want to echo you are doing the best that you can. 

So Theresa, tell me about the concept of loving and forgiving yourself on this parenting journey. 

Yeah, yeah. Yeah. We'll never get it right Valerie. 

You're right. 

We will never get it right. So you said it best. You said doing the best you can with what you knew at that time. And I think that's something that we have to constantly remind ourselves that we're doing the best that we can with what we know. And you don't know what you don't know. So why are you judging yourself for what you didn't know? 

Yeah. 

Right. I believe all of life is a divine invitation for our souls expansion. Our children are invitations for us to understand ourselves, to understand each other, to connect more deeply with your source, your Creator, God, whatever you call your higher power. All of those are invitations. But at the end of the day, it comes back to how are you evolving as a human being. So when you are engaging with your children, and you're punishing yourself for things that you had no control over, for ways that you responded, when you felt like you could have did better. There’s so many situations, a host of things that we constantly pile on ourselves. But the reality is they're all invitations for our growth. And if you can embrace and surrender to that, and see the opportunity, the invitation for you to grow, for you to connect more deeply with your child, to connect more deeply with your community, you can let that go and forgive yourself. And, and move on. Basically move on and be in this moment now, with whatever it is that you're experiencing.

Beautiful. I love that. Just recognizing that we are ever evolving. I'm a different person from when my child was born to where I am right now. 

Right. 

And you know, as you say, and we can only operate with the knowledge that we have. And like you said, we don't know what we don't know. And you can spend hours combing the internet, but it doesn't mean to say that you're taking it in and even able to apply some of this stuff that you're learning, right? So I think just giving yourself that grace to stop for a minute, I'm just thinking, my children are older now, they're 23, almost 23, and almost 20. And so, you know, there's some

level of independence for them. But just that being able to step back and just let them be. 

Yeah, 

Without me trying to sort of control everything and be, you know, on top of everything and making sure that this is happening, and that's happening and just take my head out of the trenches long enough to actually let it be about me for a minute. 

Yeah, 

I struggled with that when they were younger. And now I'm at more of a place where I can appreciate what you're saying in that we need to give ourselves grace, that we need to forgive ourselves. And as you say, you know, bringing up the word forgiveness, I'm at the stage now with my almost 20-year-old who is starting to question about how things were when they were growing up and their concept of their growing up. And it's just interesting to see what they perceive, what they're growing up was like, which is kind of different to how I feel it was.

Yeah. 

And so that, you need to sort of step back and think, okay, I just did the best that I could, but I'm just feeling like I feel, like I need to be apologizing all the time for what I feel like I didn't do right, according to my child. And I don't blame them because they are seeing the world differently. They're at a different place. And I am now at a different place than I was. So now I can see, yeah, totally missed that you had autism. 

Mm hmm. 

Sorry.

Sorry, I didn't know. Yeah.

It's an opportunity for both of us, right?

For the parent and for the child, because I’m in that place too, because my children are in their 20’s as well. So, you know, particularly with my daughter, similar to you, and she's like, no, that's not how it went down. This is what I experienced. And so, me taking that posture of humility.

Yeah. 

Even though I know what I thought the experience was and what I was doing, I still have to honor her experience. Right. And so I don't even try to justify it. I’m like, you're right. I’m sorry. I did the best that I could. Yeah. And thank you for telling me that. 

Yes, yes. And I love that our children are at a place where they can come to us and talk to us about it. 

Right. 

Which, to me, I'm just gonna pat myself on the back. I'm gonna give you a pat on the back too. We've done something right. If our children are actually able, feel comfortable enough to bring it up. 

Right. 

100%. That's actually what I focus on, like, okay, but we're having these conversations. And it's not, you know, combative. We're just having a conversation in love. And she's sharing her experience. And I'm able to, to listen and that means we laid a great foundation, right? So we're winning. We're still winning. 

Yes. And as long as they're talking to us, we are winning. 

Yes. 

All right. So, you mentioned the word surrender earlier. Why is it important to surrender?

Man, because when you don't surrender, it's a hard way to go. I mean, it's just the fight. I mean, it's exhausting. It's exhausting. It's exhausting to keep that up. Here's what I do know. Either we're

living from a place of fear, or we're living from a place of love. I always say there are two, only two things. And I got this from Elizabeth Kubler Ross.

And she says, you know, either there's only two emotions, there's fear and there's love and everything else, I'm paraphrasing, everything else is cousins, it just falls underneath one of those two buckets. Right. And so, in the earlier days of my journey with Regal, I just kept trying to force things and trying to make it happen. And no, it has to go this way, it has to go that way. And I'm trying to control all of these pieces to this ever-evolving puzzle, because I was afraid. 

Yeah. 

Because I was afraid. And that's important to just own, “I'm afraid”. 

Yeah. 

I'm afraid of what is going to happen to my child. I'm afraid of how people will perceive him. I'm afraid of the quality of life he's going to have. I'm afraid that I'm going to mess things up. And he'll be messed up even more. I’m, I'm scared here. 

Yeah. 

So when you can surrender, first of all, to the feeling, to the emotion of being afraid, and name that and own it and allow yourself to experience that, that's powerful. Right. To own that acknowledge that. And then when you can surrender, when you can move from a place of knowing that goodness follows you.

And, you've heard the saying the ‘universe has your back’, like, really, even as messy as it looks, and as incompetent as you feel, goodness really does follow you. And your child has a purpose.

So if I can surrender to this experience, now I have the space to see and to hear more clearly, and to be able to move from a more creative space with more insight, for how do we navigate this together instead of how do I control it and make it happen.

Yeah.

Right. That's the most beautiful place to be. Right. And you receive more guidance when you're moving in that way. And that comes from the power of surrender. 

Yeah. 

Yeah.

It sounds to me like you're opening yourself up to receive. So that you can then be led and guided to where you need to be. 

Right. Beautifully said. Yeah. 

Wow. Okay. So earlier, you mentioned about unconditional love. And I'm just gonna say, and this radical self-acceptance, the unconditional love, I didn't understand that growing up, my parents love me, they care to me, they did what they needed to do. But it wasn't until I got married that I actually understood what unconditional love was. And by this time, I was a Christian as well. So just trying to I know, it was just a baby in Christ, just sort of learning about this unconditional love. And so a tangible example of that was my husband, and how he treats me and how he is with me. And so then when I became a parent, and we were seven years trying. Lots of fun trying, but you know, it was a little disappointing every month when Mother Nature came to visit. 

Yeah. 

You know, just then when my child came, just to be able to experience that. I was actually just talking with my husband just a couple of days ago about that bond, when you have your child. For me, because we had a traumatic birth. So I had a prolapse cord. So the umbilical cord came out first. And then I was rushed to the hospital, had emergency c section. And she was put on a ventilator. But so, because I wasn't encouraged to do the skin on skin, like like what they do in the NICU, the neonatal intensive care unit, I think they thought she was going to die. So they didn't want me to bond with her. And I remember we were able to take her home after a week with palliative care, because they seriously thought she was going to die. And I remember it took three weeks. Three whole weeks for me to actually feel that rush of love for my child. And that's because I didn't have the ability to bond with her for those first few days. And so just that unconditional love, that's what it felt like this rush of unconditional love for her and just coming to that acceptance of, okay, so I'm a mom for the first time. And now I'm a mom of a child with special needs. Just kind of coming to that place. So that was kind of my experience of unconditional love. So I just want you to talk a little bit about that unconditional love and radical self-acceptance, because one of the other things with the radical self-acceptance was accepting that this is it, right? I didn't do anything wrong. I didn't, there wasn't something I did do. There wasn't something I didn't do. This is just me and my baby and I have to accept that this is it. So just talk a little about that.

Yeah, let me first of all, just say that when we're having these conversations, I want to emphasize that it's in retrospect. It's not in real time. 

Yeah. 

Right. So it’s so important to be honest about the journey that is messy and circuitous. And, you know, you're figuring it out. And it's not like you just wake up with butterflies and, you know, it's not like that. I'm having all these wonderful insights. I'm 57. So I mean, okay, but in the process,

it takes work. It takes, it takes work. So I really wanted to say that, that just came to me. But there are very few people who experience unconditional love because of what I was saying earlier about the judgments like we live with a judge and we’re born, babies are born without any filters, and are just ready just to give unconditional love. And then, we get our hands on them. Sorry, babies. And we bring all of our judgments, all of our life experience, our fears, our concerns, our worries. And we herald those on our children. And then, you know, the behaviors that are expected, you know, the performative acts are coming from love, but it is from a fear that if my child does not do these things, they won't have a good life. 

Yeah.

Love with conditions is modelled either subconsciously or consciously. All right. So with Regal, the Sunrise Program really emphasized loving and accepting your child for who they are right now. And being able to appreciate who they are and what they bring to the world, not constantly longing for them to be something else or someone else, longing for you to have a different experience. But can you be present in that moment and see the beauty and the wonder of who your child is? And that was a daily practice. They taught us how to play with our child, to play with Regal, to play with him in a way that wasn't trying to get him to do certain things and reach certain goals, but just to let him lead the way and join in with him the way that he played. And in that joining in with him, I'm communicating to you, I accept you just for who you are. I'm not trying to make you play with this toy. If you want to line up the toy, line up the toys and I'm going to line them up with you. And I'm not even going to try to make you give me eye contact. I'm just going to be right here with you in this space lining the toys. If you don't want me to touch you, I won't touch you. I'll just let you be. 

Yes. 

And I'm communicating deep love and acceptance to you without any conditions. And that was so powerful, because what began to happen, he started to automatically give us the things that we desired to see. He started to make eye contact. He started to begin to talk. He started to show interest in wanting to engage. Right. But that came first, when Imodelled, I love you unconditionally, I don't want anything for you, I just want to be with you, I just enjoy who you are. 

Yeah. 

And that’s unconditional love and radical self-acceptance.

Thank you so much for walking us through that. That's something that I wish all parents learned. It's something that I think most of our children, if not all of our children could benefit from. Just that feeling of being totally accepted just as I am. I don't have to perform. I can just be who I am. And you're gonna love me anyway. 

Right. 

Because I'm who I am. 

Exactly. That isn't that what we all want? 

Yeah. That's what we all want. 

Yeah. Love it. Thank you so much for sharing that. Yeah. So as parents of children with disabilities, Theresa, it can sometimes take us a little longer to withdraw from directing them and directing their lives. So, as I'm listening to you share with us and giving space for our children to be able to communicate with us however they can communicate at whatever phase they're at. So can you share with us why it's important to listen to them, even if they are nonverbal, because my oldest is nonverbal? 

Because they have wisdom. 

Hmm.

It's about appreciating who they are and seeing beyond the outer trapping. The essence of who we are is spirit. And God lives in all of us. 

Yeah. 

So within, housed within every human being is God, is the divine in every human being. So if that is true, then I want to be in tune to what expression of God is seeking to be expressed through that person. So you won't know if you're not present and if you're not listening. If you're focusing on the packaging, you know, if you focus on the behaviors, and you know, the rocking and all that and like, Oh, what's happening with this child, you won't see it. You miss it. 

Yeah. 

But when you get quiet, and you start to look for it and you're looking and you're listening, and you're discerning, you'll see it. 

Yeah.

You'll hear it. And it's going to come in a way that you don't expect it. But when you're listening for it, you'll be able to receive it. 

Yeah. 

I remember one time I was in the kitchen. I was eating. You know how we do we're all on the run, trying to get this done, then let me grab something and eat or whatever. Now I was standing up, I was eating. And my son, he was doing something used to do a lot of stimming. And he was doing something. And then he just stopped and he looked at me. And he said, ‘Why are you standing up, sit down and eat!’ I said, Thank you. He's teaching me to take care of myself. And then he went back in his own world. And, I didn't even know he was there. I didn't even know he observed that. I didn't know he was taking all that in. And he was like, Sit down, eat, sit down.

And we get those all the time, but we miss them. So that's why it's important.

Absolutely. Thank you for sharing that. We are so geared to move through life quickly. Everything is instantaneous. We got to get here, we got to get there. We're multitasking more so than we ever used to. And I'm just realizing at my tender age that I need to slow down. I can't keep up this pace. And I love, I love our children. So I'm just gonna get a little emotional here. So my oldest, both my children are on the spectrum. And younger one is just mildly the, the older one a little more. But I remember thinking, wow, her world, she's just in her world. She doesn't rush. She doesn't fuss. She just lives in the moment. And I remember her saying she's a Jesus girl, that she hears Jesus singing over her. She communicated that to us somehow. And I just thought to myself, how beautiful is that that she can be still long enough to hear Jesus singing over her. So as you're right, our children are teaching us all the time. 

All the time. 

Yeah. 

Oh, gosh, I remember one time, my son just to listen to him worship with so much passion and

inhibitions. It's just the most beautiful thing in the world. It's the most beautiful thing in the world.

I feel with our children that have special needs have disabilities. They have that connection, because they're not so cluttered up in their minds like we are. Their minds are so much more open, that I truly believe that she has a direct connection that the Lord can just download into her. And she just can be in His presence and just enjoy being in His presence.

Amen. 

So you're saying that you love how your daughter can just be still. One of the experiences that we had with the program was in the joining piece. It really helped you to enter into their world. So when you're taught how to play with them, but to, you know, join doing whatever it is that they're doing, without any expectation, just joining. So I remember one time, there was this way that Regal would move his hand and look at it. And so I'm on the floor looking at it, looking at my hand the same way. And as I'm doing it, I just went into this space that was so peaceful. And I can see the light shining on my hand in a certain way. And I saw shapes. And I was like, this is really cool.

And I was like, wow, this is amazing. And I just got such an appreciation for who he was because it wasn't just, oh, I'm just shaking, but he was really having an experience. And it was one that was filled with this awe and wonder that I never would have had if I didn't have that practice of joining in with him exactly the way that he did it. 

Yeah.

They're having their own experiences that are incredible. If we take the time, yeah, to really enter in with them and seek to understand it. 

Yeah, love it. Love it. Thank you so much for sharing that.

Theresa, I am curious, because your children are in their 20s. Are they still living with you?

So, my daughter is not, she has her own apartment in Philly. And she is a singer, songwriter, model. So she wants to move to New York to pursue that. So she's going to be moving in May. Not to New York, though. She's moving to North Jersey, which is right over the bridge. But she'll be living with my sister. So I feel okay with that. Right. But she's going to pursue her dream. She has a vision for her life. And we are just so thrilled to support her in that.

So my son, he is a senior in college, he has, he graduates in December 2025. He has been saying for the longest, like since, high school that he wants to live where it's warm, where he can wear shorts and flip flops every day. And so he picked Arizona. So he has a desire to live in Phoenix, Arizona one day. And he talks about it every single day. This is the beauty of kids on the spectrum. They repeat themselves over, you know, Regal, he will repeat himself over and over again. And early on, when I realized that, I said, let me leverage this. And I taught him affirmations. And I taught him about visualization. So if you're gonna be monomaniacal about something, let's put it in a way where you can leverage it in order to create the desire that's in your heart. So every day he talks about moving to Phoenix, Arizona. In the mornings, he writes it out, he has his affirmation, he visualizes and he embraces feeling being in a hot place where he can wear shorts and flip flops every day. And so I knew I had a cousin, but you know, sometimes it just clicks. And I was like, you know, cousin Mark lives in Phoenix. And so I talked to Mark and he was like, I'd love to be there and support regal and host him if he really wants to move here. He said, let's have him come visit. And so they've been talking, and he's gonna visit him in October. And, he really wants to be in Phoenix, Arizona. So, I believe he will land there at some point in his life. So I'm, I’m looking forward him having that experience. And I'm looking forward to having my home all to myself.

I hear you on that one sister. I hear you on that one.

So let me just dig a little deeper with Regal moving to Arizona. So, logistically, what's that gonna look like? 

Yeah, I don't know. I don't know what that's gonna look like. I don't know. And I guess we'll figure it out when it comes to that point. Right now, we're just building the desire and the dream. And so he's gonna go and he'll be with my cousin and I'm sure he'll take him around. I'm not going with him, they're gonna go and he'll have that experience. And then he'll come home and he'll have that experience of actually being there. Right. And once he graduates, because we're telling you know, you got to get a job, you got to, you know, you just can't go live there.

So we're talking with him about what that would look like. What do you want to do? His major is strategic communications, and with a minor in environmental science. So, he's a very good writer.

I don't know Valerie. I don't know what that's gonna look like. But I know that things will fall into place. I'm not trying to figure it out for him. But we're preparing him. Things like he doesn't have a car, he doesn't know how to drive. So my husband is teaching him how to drive. Like you can't go to Arizona without knowing how to drive. Right. So teaching him how to drive.

Things like with his grooming, I'm like, you can't do that if you're going to be living but with other people that are not yourimmediate family, they're not going to deal with that, you know. So we're just preparing him with things that he needs to do so that he can live independently.

The job, we'll see what happens when that comes around. Yeah, but he has a part time job. So even with that, I'm like, you have to save your money. You know, you want to be on your own. So helping him even learn how to manage his money and look at his account, things like that. Like ‘How much you have an account?’ ‘I don't know.’ ‘Well you need to know. How often you look at your account?’ So we're doing those types of things.

Might I suggest that you're doing a lot. I don't know. I don't know. You're doing a lot. You've identified where he needs help. Right. And that's the biggest thing. And so what I call this, as part of my work is a needs assessment. So you're looking at what his needs are, his current needs are and what his needs will be in the future. So you're doing the work, right? You're just not kind of putting the language around it. And so you obviously identify that he needs help with grooming, he needs help with financial literacy, he needs help with, you know, learning how to navigate getting from A to B. And so for him, that's going to be learning how to drive. And I love, love, love, love the fact that you have been teaching him affirmations and visualization. Because unless we have the vision, because it says it in Habakkuk, write down the vision, right? And then we can work with it. And so that's one of the things that I like to do with my clients is write down the vision, what is it that you want for your child, you can help architect your child's future. And that's what you're doing for Regal right now. You're helping architect his future. Yeah, there's definitely other things that you can be pulling into that, but you've started. So I just want to say, thank you so much for sharing that. And just to our audience, you know, you don't have to have a plan all in place, ready to go right now. And there's no time like the present to start thinking about, hey, what could it look like? And just exploring, right? And I love to the fact that you're involving Regal in the process. Because I think it's very important for his voice to be heard and what it is that he wants. So you're doing amazing, Theresa, you're doing more than you know.

Yeah, I appreciate that. Yeah, thank you. 

All right. So where can our audience Theresa, where can they go to find out a little bit more about you? 

Oh, I'd love for you to connect with me. I'm on LinkedIn. So you can find me on LinkedIn under Theresa Noye. And I also have a YouTube channel. It's a really cool YouTube channel. I tell bedtime stories for adults. They’re unique stories all curated specifically for high achieving women to learn how to just let go and to surrender and to love themselves and accept themselves.

That's a beautiful, beautiful gift that I offer. I love doing that. And so that's again, YouTube under Theresa Noye. And my website, everything is under my name, Theresa Noye. 

Okay. All right. I will have that information in the show notes as well. So people can check that out. So before we conclude, Teresa, I'd love to hear some words of encouragement from you for parents who are raising children with disabilities. What would you like to share with them for hope and inspiration? 

Thank you for asking me that, which also reminds me, I have a book, Hello Autism, How to Love Like and Learn from Your Special Needs Child. And I wrote the book because parents were always coming and asking, you know, because Regal was thriving, and they were watching our journey, and everyone would send any parent to us. And so I wrote that book. It's been called a blueprint for hope and encouragement. 

Autism doesn't have to be a life sentence. A special needs child is not a life sentence. It's actually an opportunity.

Our journey, and I'm sure you can relate to this Valerie, there's so much that I discovered about myself that I never would have if I didn't have that gift. Regal was the catalyst. Yeah. And it drew out so many wonderful things for me, for my family, for the community, for my purpose. I mean, just so much that you can't even begin to fathom, if you're stuck through the lens of why did this happen to me? 

Yeah. 

And that's important for you to feel that and experience it. But also know that there's a bigger purpose. 

Yeah. 

And it will be more beautiful than you could ever imagine. Just know, know that. Know that. Yeah. 

Thank you so much for sharing that. So audience, I just want to say thank you for listening in. And I want to say thank you Theresa for being here. We really appreciate your words of wisdom. Thank you so much. We appreciate you. 

Thank you so much for having me and thank you for this work is so needed. And I want to say thank you. 

Appreciate it. Appreciate it. So audience, I want you to keep building your child's future. And I want you to Live with Intention and Embrace the Journey.