It's been three years today since we moved to this house. After having grown up in the same house for nearly my entire life, I never thought this would feel like home. I never thought I would feel so settled and safe in my room here. And yet its been such a blessing that it has felt this way because they've definitely been three of the most difficult years of my life. The summer after we moved here there were a lot of family issues going on that made life almost unbearable. We were rejected by our neighbors because we weren't "good enough Christians", my dad almost committed suicide, and there was a huge cloud of emotional and spiritual darkness over our house which remained for quite some time. The next spring and summer was a huge time of transition in my life, trying to figure out what I was going to do, and then that fall mom fell down the stairs and broke her femur. Most of her care and the housework fell entirely on me during those months while I watched my sister waltz off traveling and doing fun things with friends. Needless to say it was an extremely stressful time, so much so that those at the library who didn't even know me were concerned about me. And then it was only six months later that I was in the car accident and the results of that have drastically shaped the last year of my life, though all in good ways I believe. Its continued to be a year of turmoil in our family with my sister's secret engagement adding to the difficulty my parents have had adjusting to having only older children.
The fact that it's been almost exactly a year since the accident is making me see so very clearly who I was a year ago and I am now. It's not a change that I know how to describe yet, but it's amazing to see how God can take something that was so traumatizing and difficult to go through and use it to make me more of the person I was meant to be. And that's what's keeping me going right now, through all the uncertainty of what the future will hold, is knowing that God can take all the difficulties of the past three years and turn them into something beautiful.
3 comments:
*hugs* i always see a beautiful piece of glass that way, you have to take the raw materials and put them through fire, manipulate and shape them for a good while before you get that beautiful piece, i have loved watching you grow, it has been an honor to stand by your side through the small part i've been allowed, i look forward to seeing all you do with it
It is odd, and amazing to look behind us and see that we're not the same anymore, because of those hard, hard things that came upon us - but to see that we're made better people because of it is touching. ((hugs)) Thank you for sharing this Katie; may God continue to give you hope and peace.
all those hardships you described are still so vivid to me, i'm *so* glad that you see the ultimate effects of them as being for good, and so glad that you've held on through all of them. we could not do without the person you are today. :) *hugs*
Post a Comment