One Year.

August 7th marked one year from the phonecall that started the most life-altering time period of my life thus far.

One year of fear, tears, anger, depression, helplessness, jealousy, and pain. But also one year of growth, resilience, strength, learning, and hope. A year of obstacles and a year of climbing over them no matter how hard. A year of wanting to give up but persevering. A year of discovering who I really am under the emotions, the ego, the protective walls my brain has constructed to keep me “safe.” A year of dying, and a year of becoming.

This year has taught me there are two sides to every story. We can choose to focus on the negative and allow it to consume us, or we can search for the positive and strive to follow it. We can have a million things going well and allow one negative to completely destroy us. The choice of where to focus our energy is ALWAYS ours, even when it feels impossible.

None of us can control what happens, no matter how much we try (that’s the hardest lesson of all for me), but we can always choose how we respond. Even a story rife with tragedy and loss can have a happy ending.