Rooted in truth

Right now, it feels almost impossible to stay rooted in truth. Everything feels like shifting sand under my feet. I take a few strong steps forward, thinking I’m finally moving in the direction I need to go, and then wham - something knocks the wind out of me, and I’m flat on my backside, wondering what just happened.

It feels like war.
Not metaphorical, not symbolic.
Actual war.

I picture myself as someone who has carefully fortified a stronghold, stone by stone, prayer by prayer, discipline by discipline. And yet all it takes is one small moment - forgetting to take my meds, letting doubt slip in through a crack, taking my eyes off the truth for a second - and suddenly the enemy is pouring in. They were always at the gates. They were just waiting for the slightest opening. And the scary part is how fast fear and doubt can take advantage of a crack I did not even know existed.

So how do I fortify the stronghold?
How do I not only strengthen the walls but actually push the enemy back from the gates altogether?

Part of me wants a complicated strategy or some heroic spiritual routine - something that makes me feel powerful or in control. But the more I sit with this, the more I realize the approach is not grand. It is small. It is daily. It is stubborn. And it is holy.

I fortify my stronghold by returning to truth again and again, even when I feel wobbly.
I fortify myself by taking my medication because it supports my mind the way food supports the body.
I fortify by refusing to treat doubt like a roommate and instead naming it for what it is - an invader.
I fortify by worship, even when I do not feel it, because worship reminds darkness who actually holds authority here.
I fortify by making Scripture my anchor, not my last resort.
I fortify by community, because isolated walls fall faster.
I fortify by letting God fill in the cracks with strength I do not have on my own.

And maybe most of all, I fortify by remembering that the stronghold is not built to keep God in, but to keep lies out. The Shepherd is not pacing on the other side of the wall waiting for me to get myself together. He is already inside the stronghold with me - strengthening, guarding, whispering truth into every fragile place.

The enemy may still come to the gates. That part does not change.
But the difference is this: I do not stand there alone.

The opposite of anxiety...

 I heard a line on the show Brilliant Minds today that caused me to stop. "The opposite of anxiety isn't calm, it's trust."

At first glance, it sounds simple, almost obvious, but the moment those words were spoken, my heart raced. Something in me shifted. It was like something inside me untangled just a little bit.

I had to pause the show to let it sink in for a minute. The words rang true, not just in my mind but deep in my soul. 

Everyone always talks about "calming down." I have said it more times than I can count to myself or even to my children when trying to help them through panic or fear. But telling someone to calm down rarely works. It feels like saying "just don't worry," and for someone who struggles with anxiety, that may be the single most infuriating phrase in the world. 

Anxiety does not yield to force. It does not listen to commands.
But trust...trust is different.

Trusting that things will be okay, even if they are not okay right now. Trusting the evidence of my own lived experiences, the countless moments I thought the world would break, but somehow it held. Trusting that my next breath will come. Trusting that the urge to run will pass. Trusting that whatever feels unbearable in the moment is not the end of the story.

Trusting situations.
Trusting people.
Trusting myself.
Trusting God.

Anxiety doesn't get the final word. Trust is an invitation to lean into something steadier and stronger than my own fear.

Hearing that line today, right now, feels like yet another mercy. A quiet clarity. A solid piece of truth. 

Mid-life crisis

 People talk about a "mid-life crisis" like it is some dramatic unraveling, but I am starting to believe, for most people, it is not a crisis at all. 

I think it simply takes most of us this long to finally begin figuring out who we are and what we actually want out of life. It is the moment we wake up and realize life is painfully fleeting, but it's also not too late to hold on with both hands.

It feels like finding my voice after years of whispering, recognizing what truly defines me, and finally wanting the world to see me as I am instead of who I thought I had to be. 

It is a reckoning with clarity, a deep knowing of how I do not want to live anymore. I reject the ideas of being ruled by stress, anxiety, fear, or the need to carry everything alone. And it is the quiet, hopeful truth that I realize that I do want to love and be loved, to experience every joy God still has for me, and to finally unshackle myself from the mistakes and shadows of the past.

It's not falling apart. It's coming home. 

A light in the dark

𝐼’𝑣𝑒 𝑔𝑜𝑛𝑒 𝑏𝑎𝑐𝑘 𝑎𝑛𝑑 f𝑜𝑟𝑡ℎ 𝑎𝑏𝑜𝑢𝑡 𝑠ℎ𝑎𝑟𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑠 𝑏𝑒𝑐𝑎𝑢𝑠𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑒𝑚𝑜𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛𝑠 𝑎𝑟𝑜𝑢𝑛𝑑 𝑖𝑡 𝑠𝑡𝑖𝑙𝑙 𝑠𝑖𝑡 𝑜𝑛 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑠𝑢𝑟f𝑎𝑐𝑒. 𝐵𝑢𝑡 𝑎𝑠 𝐼’𝑣𝑒 𝑏𝑒𝑒𝑛 𝑠𝑡𝑢𝑑𝑦𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑃𝑠𝑎𝑙𝑚 23 𝑎𝑛𝑑 J𝑜ℎ𝑛 10 𝑜𝑣𝑒𝑟 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑙𝑎𝑠𝑡 f𝑒𝑤 𝑚𝑜𝑛𝑡ℎ𝑠, 𝐼 𝑟𝑒𝑎𝑙𝑖z𝑒𝑑 𝐺𝑜𝑑 𝑤𝑎𝑠 𝑛𝑢𝑑𝑔𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑚𝑒 𝑡𝑜 𝑤𝑟𝑖𝑡𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑠 𝑑𝑜𝑤𝑛, 𝑛𝑜𝑡 j𝑢𝑠𝑡 𝑎𝑠 𝑚𝑒𝑚𝑜𝑟𝑦, 𝑏𝑢𝑡 𝑎𝑠 𝑝𝑎𝑟𝑡 𝑜f 𝑚𝑦 𝑡𝑒𝑠𝑡𝑖𝑚𝑜𝑛𝑦. 𝑆𝑜 ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑒 𝑖𝑡 𝑖𝑠.

In December of 2020, our family walked through the kind of valley you never forget. Within the span of a few weeks, both of my grandmothers, Mim and Mammaw, contracted COVID. I still remember the two calls that came just days apart, the same cold wave sweeping over me each time. I hadn’t hugged either of them since before the pandemic began, and we are a very huggy family. Everything in me just wanted to embrace them. But I couldn’t.

Mim entered the Kingwood Hospital on December 3, the same day my mom rang the bell for beating cancer for the first time. I was able to talk to her 2 days before she died on December 13, and for that I’m forever grateful. My uncle, who had already recovered from COVID-19, was allowed to be in the room with her the day before she passed away, and all her children were able to be on the phone with her even though she couldn’t communicate at that point; something I will always see as God’s mercy.

Two days prior, on December 11, we learned that Mammaw had also contracted COVID-19. Over the following weeks, the hospital staff were incredible about helping her FaceTime my mom and her siblings. COVID shut the doors to visitors, but it couldn’t shut out love or prayer. Her children were on FaceTime when she passed away on December 30. That, too, was a gift.

I was angry. Bitter. Heartbroken. And the most challenging part wasn’t losing them, it was not being able to grieve as a family. Both funerals had to be outside because COVID was still a thing. On top of that, different family members had compromised immune systems, including my mom, who had been diagnosed with ovarian cancer earlier in 2020. We stood apart when everything inside us longed to collapse into each other. It felt like mourning scattered into pieces, like we had to carry grief without relief.

My parents…they amaze me. They’ve been together since 1975, and in less than a month, they lost both of their mothers. They carried every logistical burden while grieving, all while my dad tried to keep my mom safe through cancer treatments. Watching him care for her during that season raised the bar on what devotion really looks like. Their love is covenant-level love.

But even in all of that darkness, God gave us light.

One day, while Mammaw was having a difficult time, she was on a video call with my mom and her other children. Out of nowhere, she told them about a dream she’d had the night before. She said she saw angels surrounding her. And then, at the end of a long, bright hallway, she saw Bessie (Mim). And Mim was saying, “Come on, Bonnie, come on, Bonnie.”

Here is the part that still gives me chills:
She didn’t know Mim had died.
She didn’t even know Mim had Covid.

People can say dreams are random, or delirium, or the mind trying to cope. I don’t buy any of that in this instance. Everything in me knows it wasn’t a dream - it was God. Those two women were more than in-laws. They shared decades of life, love, holidays, kids, and grandkids. And I believe Mim came, one last time, to check on Mammaw. To tell her, “It’s okay. I’m here.”

After describing the dream, Mammaw began singing a song from her childhood, a song none of us had ever heard before. She couldn’t remember the title, just the lyrics. My mom and aunt searched and found it.

The song was called “Little Bessie.”
Bessie…Mim’s real name.
That was God showing off, not subtly, but tenderly.

As I’ve researched this old 1870s song, I’ve learned it’s more than a ballad. It’s a spiritual meditation on death, innocence, and the nearness of heaven. Families in the 19th century lived close to mortality. From their grief grew a theology of consolation, the belief that heaven wasn’t far away, that death was a doorway home.

Even the song’s imagery mirrors Scripture (the same verses I’ve been studying the last two months):
John 10: the Shepherd who calls His sheep by name.
Psalm 23: comfort in the valley, arms that guide, goodness that follows.
Reading the lyrics with that lens…I now understand why God sent that song to Mammaw. The song begins with a poignant portrayal of human frailty, “I feel so strange tonight…something hurts me here…”, evoking an awareness of our limits and a longing for comfort. Then it shifts, not toward fear, but to revelation:

A window opens.
Light pours in.
Children sing.
The Shepherd speaks.
The invitation is gentle, personal, and full of love.

And the closing lines, where a mother’s breaking heart holds the child who is entering eternal rest, capture that sacred intersection where grief and grace meet in the same breath. And in this case, not where a child leaves her mother’s arms, but where a mother leaves her children’s arms.

Death is not the Shepherd’s absence; it is His nearness.
It is the moment faith becomes sight.
It is the arms of Christ completing the love that began in the arms of a mother.
And then the wildest thing happened.

After digging through versions of the song, I wanted to find the original 1870s sheet music because that made more sense as to which version of the song Mammaw would’ve sung as a child. After running into multiple roadblocks with Google, I turned to ChatGPT, which suggested contacting the Ohioana Library Association as the best chance of finding the source. I emailed on a Saturday, thinking I might hear back in a month, or not at all. They wrote back Monday morning, with the scanned sheet music from 1872.

Everything just kept falling into place.

And I realized I needed one more thing: I needed to hear it played. I asked Sandy Farris if she could play it for me, and of course, she did. She found the right tone and feel, and then recorded it. It is beautifully haunting - like heaven leaking into sound.

I have no doubt God orchestrated all of this.
The timing.
The dream.
The song.
The Scripture.
The rediscovery.
The music.
The comfort.

And even now, in 2025, as I’m studying John 10 and Psalm 23, God brings this song back to me. The shepherd imagery. The light. The calling by name. The doorway into rest.

It’s as if He’s whispering:
𝐼 𝑤𝑎𝑠 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑛.
𝐼 𝑎𝑚 ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑒 𝑛𝑜𝑤.
𝑌𝑜𝑢 𝑤𝑒𝑟𝑒 𝑛𝑜𝑡 𝑎𝑙𝑜𝑛𝑒.

And neither were they.
I still cry when I tell this story, but not tears of sorrow anymore.
Tears of awe.
Tears of peace.
Tears of gratitude that my grandmothers, strong, stubborn, loving women, still had each other’s backs… right up to the end.

Even in one of the darkest months of my life, heaven opened a window. And light came through.
It’s taken me five years to get to a place of healing. For a long time, I couldn’t even begin to process what happened, much less sit still long enough to untangle the grief I had stuffed into every available corner just to survive. I didn’t have the margin, the strength, or the clarity then. But now, at the right time, in the right season, with the right tools, God has opened a space in my heart to finally look back without drowning. And for the first time since 2020, I feel something I never thought I’d associate with these memories: healing. Not forgetting, not minimizing, but healing. A gentle mending. A breath I didn’t know I’d been holding. And I’m grateful, so deeply grateful, that God waited until my heart was ready.

NOT FOR PUBLICATION

I found this in my drafts today and, at the time I wrote it, didn't plan to ever publish it...based on the title of the post. I left the title, though. I left the title because I was too scared to publish this six years ago, but thankfully, I can now. I don't remember even writing this post, but as I read through it just now, a flood of emotions and memories overwhelmed me. Thankfully, the pain and fear I had while writing this post have been replaced by a remarkable four-year-old boy. But I also know that others are still hoping and praying and may not end up with the same results that I did. I'm not sure of where I would be right now if I hadn't had my son, and I'm not going to make assumptions on how other people would/are handling going through the same struggle. But I'm putting this out there now because it's raw and it's real, and I'm so very thankful for the wonderful support system I had surrounding me during that time.

I hate platitudes. The things people say to make themselves feel better because they don't know what else to say in an awkward, painful situation.

Yes, sometimes we need to be told that things will be okay, that we will make it through, that no matter what, it's all in God's plan. But the thing is, sometimes it's not okay, and sometimes it's really not God's plan. We live in a fallen world. A world full of sin and evil. I'm not saying that God isn't in control, but I am saying that we suffer. Not because He doesn't love us, but because it's a part of life after the fall of man. It was never God's plan that we endure such hardships, but it is now, based on the choices of man.

So the thing is...sometimes you don't want to be told things will be okay, because they aren't okay, and at that moment you don't really know how they will ever be. I mean, I get that things will eventually have to be, because you have to move on, but in that moment, you just want to grieve, to fall apart, and have that be okay.

There are a few things in life that are so permanent and have no alternative. At this moment, I can think of three scenarios: the death of a child, something else bad happening to a child, and the inability to have one. There is no alternative in either of those situations. They just are. How do you deal with those? For the first...yes, death is inevitable, but the death of a child would be unbearable, and I hope and pray to never deal with the former, because I'm barely functioning through the latter. The absence of an entire person from your life that you inherently feel should be there is exceedingly difficult to deal with. You look at every moment, and there is a shadow there; a place where someone is supposed to be. Everything is affected, because that other person would change every moment.

But I don't know if I feel anything anymore anyway. I don't know if I'm actually dealing with things okay or if I've just shut down and am in a sort of denial/lost limbo. I feel like a failure. I feel like my body isn't functioning in the way it was designed to function. I feel like I have failed my husband, my daughter, my parents, so many people. I don't do well with the unexplained, and that is the abyss I sit at, looking out over the precipice, the depth and darkness, with nothing but unknowns staring back at me.

I'm good in a crisis. I'm good at looking to the future and understanding that God will carry me through, and ultimately, I will be okay, but I'm scared now because I have no guarantee that things will ever be okay. I was so sure the IUI would work. So secretly confident that it would take just the one time...and I was even a little excited at the prospect of twins. I looked at it as a reason, the process God had to take me through to get me to a place where I would be okay with that. But now I'm still searching. Searching for a reason. Searching for an answer. Searching for something that makes sense.

I find myself in constant conflict with emotion and reason.  I would describe myself as very much both, and that's exceedingly difficult because I feel like I sometimes get caught. I can't just completely break down and work through my emotions because the reasonable part takes over, but I can't just reason my way out of the situation because my emotions are too strong.

Usually, I like the balance I find in emotion and reason. I believe that God blessed me with that because if I were only extremely reasonable, I would lack my innate ability to embody deep empathy. And if I were only extremely emotional, poor decision-making led by emotion could've been more of a reality in years past. Now, though, I don't know how to merge the two. I just feel caught, stuck in a place where I can't be rational or emotional because they are both vying for dominance.

I find myself dancing around the edges of darkness I have found myself at before. Places where Satan assaults me with lies in an attempt to move me away from God. I start wondering if I'm paying retribution for past sins. And then the guilt weighs in. Every sin I've ever committed weighs on me. Even with the knowledge that God has separated me from those sins as far as the east is from the west...I keep going back to that place.

I find myself wandering throughout the day. Going through the motions because I have to "keep it together". I have to teach. I have to be a good wife. I have to be a good mother. I have to do all these things when most of the time, I just want to give up.  By the end of the day, I just feel numb...like drinking myself into oblivion wouldn't seem like such a bad idea...I mean I can't really feel anything anyway and at least that way I might could stop thinking.

I'm scared. I'm tired. I'm angry. I'm spent.

School shootings and Netflix originals

Both the Columbine school shooting and the movie Bird Box evoke some of the same emotions in me. 

Some people will read that statement and feel like there's no way it can be true, some people may view it as disrespectful, but give this mama's heart a chance to explain.

I was in my freshman year of college when the school shooting at Columbine took place. In that moment, much like later during 9/11, a level of blind trust and security was ripped away. I experienced my school years without a lockdown drill and never had even the most fleeting thought that I was in danger at school. School was a safe place.

Now, though, as a parent, things have changed. My children have bi-yearly lockdown drills. My children practice how to behave if a shooter enters their school. My children never attended a single day of school without me understanding this threat. 

I remember when Reily was in kindergarten and had her first lockdown drill. She told me about it when she arrived home that day, and she relayed to me how she was scared and crying. Now, there was never a real threat, and the children were safe, but how do you explain to a five-year-old that they need to be prepared? That they need to know what to do...just in case. How do you explain that sort of evil to them when they see nothing but goodness? 

In the days that followed, we talked a lot about how her teachers would keep her safe and how I would keep her safe if she were with me, despite the reality of limited control in those sorts of situations. And in those moments, when things got too serious, I lied. I have no regrets about lying and still do it to a degree now that she's older because I recognize that there are too many variables, that there are too many things out of my control, that ultimately I'm not in control and can't guarantee that she will always be safe, but she needs that promise. It's now the same promise I make to my son, has his daycare practices what to do in case of a lockdown.

And it's that inability to guarantee security that pushed me to tears while watching Bird Box. 

The movie wasn't particularly scary, more unsettling. I did appreciate the fact that they never showed what the "thing" looked like, as our imaginations are far more terrifying than anything Hollywood could ever produce, but all in all, it was a decent suspense movie without being particularly "scary". 

So why then did I find myself weeping during the last third of the movie and shaken for hours after it was over?

The movie embodied some of my greatest fears. Not suicide. Not death. Not violence. 

It was instead found in the moments where Sandra Bullock's character talked to the children, and the empathetic connection I had with the characters that followed. In those moments, I was forced to a mental place that I usually try to avoid. Within the confines of the movie, I was forced to recognize that there will be times when my children are afraid and when I won't be able to comfort them because bad things will happen outside of my control. It's an unnerving feeling that makes me feel both weak and inadequate. 

It's those moments in the movie that touched me and drew the images of children huddled under desks in a library at Columbine High School. Because in those moments, children were afraid. Children's parents couldn't protect them. Children were exposed to horrors they never should've experienced, and all of those parents felt helpless. 

Because that's the fear of a parent. That our children will find themselves in the last few moments of their lives, afraid...wanting their mom, and we won't be there. 

So every day, many of us experience something older generations never really did. I'm not saying they didn't worry, and they weren't afraid or even that they didn't have things to be scared of that we no longer do, but each morning when I pull up to the curb, and my child gets out of the car, I pray. I pray that she has a good day, that she learns a lot, and that no one walks into her school with the intent to cause harm. 

Because my child deals with a lot of anxiety and sometimes cries for hours at night, because she is afraid to go to school - afraid of what can happen - I somehow have to figure out how to tell her things will be okay, even though I know that's not something I can guarantee. The facts are, she still needs to sleep, and she needs to learn to live her life beyond fear and trust that no matter what, God is in control, and even if the worst possible thing happens, He has her. 

Next year, Mason will also start school. And for a little boy so brave and bold when it comes to adventure and play, he's terrified of the dark and incredibly shy. He loves fiercely, and I know that as he gets older, I will face many of the same questions I have and am facing with Reily. 

So I steel my heart for another day and live, but that fear...the fear that made me cry during a Netflix original thriller...is never really gone. It sits there and waits. Because it doesn't need the fuel of an actual event to let loose, it just needs an easy trigger to ignite into flames that consume because it's always atthe  edges of my thoughts.

Sticky situations: Lessons learned with a piece of gum

From an event that took place when Reily was in either the 3rd or 4th grade.

Reily was going on a field trip to Houston with her class the next day, and I went into her room to tell her goodnight.

As I was leaving, I noticed a stick of gum hidden under her clothes for the next day on the stairs for her bed.

I asked her what it was, and she told me it was gum to chew on the bus during the field trip.

I asked her why she was hiding it, and she told me that she wasn't supposed to have it on the bus and the teachers had told them not to bring any.

I asked her if she knew why the teachers would tell them not to bring gum on the bus, and she told me that it was because a kid might choke while on the bus or leave their gum under the seat...so she knew the why of the situations, which just left the consequences.

I told her she couldn't take gum because she needed to follow the rules, and I asked her what she thought her punishment should be for trying to sneak it onto the bus.

She came up with her own punishment, and it was far harsher than anything I would've doled out for the same offense.

She didn't think she should ever be able to chew gum again.

That was a bit extreme, so I used it as an opportunity to talk to her about how it's important that the punishment aligns with the crime.

After talking, she decided a month would be appropriate...still a little severe in my mind, but we went with it.

So for one month gum was taken away...and she loved gum.

Even when her grandmother offered her gum, she turned it down. Even when other kids were chewing it, she abstained.

I was proud of her...because in the end, this didn't have a whole lot to do with gum.

It had to do with being honest and obedient. It had to do with following through with the consequences of her actions. It had to do with her becoming a better person by learning a huge life lesson with something as harmless as a stick of gum.

Never ignore the silly offenses. Never belittle the consequences by determining that something really doesn't matter...because it does matter. If I can teach her lessons that have a profound impact and help her avoid dangerous situations later through lessons about a piece of gum...I'll take it every time.