Revealing Grace

It has been five years, this December, since a judge declared my marriage officially over. It was the culmination of the worst season of my whole life. It was the end of something I had believed was forever. It was a season of bitter tears, struggles with depression and thoughts of suicide, and complete and utter hopelessness. Everything I had believed in had been shattered and in the end, I hadn't been chosen by the one who I chose to marry. I believed the false narrative that I hadn't been good enough, strong enough, or healthy enough. I was certain happiness would never find me again.  Over the next five years, I had to rediscover myself. I had to relearn my strength, my worth, my value. I had to heal from what had happened. I had to be angry and learn how to let that anger go. I lost my relationship with church and grew new relationships with a team of doctors when I got a cancer diagnosis just four months after my divorce was finalized. I had to figure out who God was, who

I've always been fiercely independent, a bird with restless wings, the human personification of a Viking River Cruise (if you watch PBS, you know what I mean). But when this restless bird settled into a quiet life, I wondered if my wings would be clipped. Perhaps my passions would be lost to duties, my travels replaced with "it's not going to work," my love for new experiences put neatly in a box of memories and placed in the back of the closet.  You see, my husband is tied to this land we live on. It is a tether of his time. For most of the year he has no flexibility to leave. There is no such thing as weekends, PTO, or summer vacations when you are a farmer. Jeff loves adventure like I do, but often he has to place his commitment to the land before his own desires or preferences.  I thought that this would mean that I would become tethered as well, but Jeff has never tried to tie me down. When we met, he learned that my people are spread from coast to coast and that

I have to tell you that our little farm town has one of the best pumpkin patches in the country. Run by some friends of ours, it is a treasure trove of joy and fun. For me and Jeff, it has been a stalwart location in our lives each year.  The first year I went to the local pumpkin patch, Jeff proposed in the corn maze. I was just a month out of active cancer treatment. Just one month from walking into a room full of cancer patients to have a needle stuck into a port on my chest as medicine flowed through my veins to try and cure an aggressive cancer. I thought, at the time, that I was handling it well. Looking back at the videos we took that day, I can now see how worn out I was, how weary, how fragile. You can almost see the pain bubbling right below the surface as I try to be carefree. I look exhausted, yet obviously relieved to have Jeff as my person. On the surface I was smiling and excited, but I can now see an unsteadiness I hadn’t realized was there at the time. Cancer treatmen

The moment Emma was born, the sun began to shine. She was brought into the world during a rainstorm, a precious gift, and when her first cries rang out, the skies cleared (true story). It took a while after they handed her to me to cognitively come to terms with being the mother of this human being that came from my body. I’ve wanted to be a mom for my whole life and with one last push, there was a baby now mine. Wild.  Each day I fall more in love with her. Each day becomes a little easier, a little more secure.  Each day I view as a precious gift, for I wanted this life for so long and now I have it. I never, for a moment, want to take that for granted.  It might sound weird, but I am acutely aware of my own mortality. It’s not morbid or obsessive, it’s just a product of being a cancer survivor at 33. I know that my old age is not guaranteed. I know my daughter’s old age is not guaranteed.  But I hope every single day that I will be at her high school graduation. I hope that I get to

 I thought it would be simple. After all, I had always longed for a baby, to be a mother, to have a family. And then the miracle happened and it was almost unbelievable. To this day, at 34 weeks pregnant, I still can hardly wrap my mind around the fact that my body is growing a baby. For years I never thought this would be possible. For years I longed for this and now it is here.  Growing a baby has been, I will admit, a magical experience for me. I have been blessed with a very easy pregnancy. No morning sickness, no swelling, no complications. Sure, I hated random foods in the beginning, my hips hurt when I lay down, and my body aches when I sleep, but generally I forget I am pregnant. . . until she gets the hiccups. Until I see my reflection in a shop window.  Seeing my reflection feels like a mirror at the carnival. Certainly that cannot be me. Where did that belly come from? I still am caught of guard when I realize that everyone can now SEE that I am pregnant. Most of the time, I

 The timeline is short. In fact, we once thought there would never be a timeline at all.  When my oncologist first told me about the impact chemotherapy could have on my ovaries, the ten years of hormone treatment post-chemo, and the medical menopause I would be in during chemo, I wept for a future I had always dreamed of that was now in jeopardy.  I remember looking at my friend with tears in my eyes and uttering four devastating words: that means no babies.  In reality, it didn't mean no babies, but the swift weight of how complicated life would now be hit hard.  Cancer makes many seemingly easy decisions a challenge. When I first met Jeff and he asked about my hot flashes (super sexy first date convo) I told him about the medical menopause I was in to try and save my ovaries from chemo and how I may not be able to have children in the future. It wasn't a conversation I ever thought I would have to have with a cute guy I was falling in love with.  Once we got married, I had b