Confession

If I’m being honest, I’ve been afraid to write. I’ve been afraid to see the words spilling across the page. Because there’s been so much to process in my life this year and because my writing is the place where I’m most vulnerable. But it is also the place where I release. And it’s time to release. Because I must heal. This is my year in a nutshell:

Jan If I’m being honest, this year started out rough. I launched this very website while I sat in an emergency room because I’d been sick for the entire month and just couldn’t seem to get better...and because whatever I was battling was heightened by the fact that just a few days before my launch date, I’d learned that I was getting ready to lose one of the most important people in my life - my Grandma. Feb - March If I’m being honest, I spent my days overwhelmed by anxiety...waiting for the moment that I’d get the news that she was gone. In between time, I spent as much time as I could with her. She passed on a Sunday in March, after leaving a service where I'd just served on the worship team. Right before the third service, I felt overwhelmed and I asked my team to pray for me. She passed on my way home. I am grateful that their prayers covered me. April If I’m being honest, I held it together as best as I could...trying to be strong...not realizing how much I was actually hurting. May If I’m being honest, eventually I realized that I couldn’t hold in my emotions any longer and that if I didn’t find a place to process my grief, I would explode. I finally sought help and started therapy. I’m now 7 months in. June-July If I’m being honest these months were hard. Anxiety kept me awake at night. I was learning how to feel my grief. To actually deal with my feelings for the first time in my life. And working through childhood trauma that had taught me to suppress my feelings. And I felt the tension in some of my closest relationships. Aug If I’m being honest, I reached a place of desperate surrender here. I knew I needed to see God move - spiritually, emotionally, mentally, physically, and even financially. I had felt God calling me to intentionally fast this month for breakthrough. I told him if all he did was shift my perspective, I’d be grateful. I’m still seeing his faithfulness. Sept If I’m being honest, I cried...really cried this month because it was the first time since losing my grandmother that I’d recognized that God’s grace covered me even when I was grieving. That I didn’t have to have it all together all the time. And then towards the end of this month, I lost another member of my family. I found more strength in my family in this second round with grief…and I gave myself permission and grace to sit with the pain of losing two family members within six months (thank you therapy). October If I’m being honest, I took time this month to get away and practice self-care by escaping and spending time with friends. I spent time reflecting on my relationships. I recognized that my heart is capable of great love even in grief...even in working through trauma. That I could love people. And love them well even while suffering. I’m still healing. But I’m committed to love people.

November If I’m being honest, I recognized the significance of dealing with trauma and its impact on my relationships. In one particular therapy session this month my therapist said something that resonated with me - “You are the recipient of generational trauma...but you are the last in the line. You are where it ends.” I cried on my way home from therapy that day as the truth of her words hit me. I knew it was necessary to confront these things in therapy, but it hurt like hell. Yet I choose to do the work now (therapy ain't easy yall)…so that the generations who come after me will be birthed into freedom. December If I’m being honest, I’m waiting for my heart to heal. I am remembering what it means to return to the heart of who I am - a worshiper. I am recalling what it was like to be the four-year-old me who worshipped God freely and knew the strength that came through worshipping God during darkness and despair.

The healing

If I’m being honest, I have seen God in new ways this year. He has shown me the intensity in which He cares about me. He is drawn to me. He sees me and He covers me. Even in my weakness. 

I have learned that the nature and the depth of God are two different things.

You can observe the nature of God from the outside…but you can’t understand the depth of God without intimacy. Otherwise it’s surface level.

The lessons I’ve learned this year have taught me that without question, love and loss are intricately intertwined.

They are both unavoidable parts of life.

Yet when everything feels like its falling apart…God is probably building something.

I don’t understand the entirety of what God did in my life this year…but I know this…something was birthed here.