A few weeks ago, celebrated my 26^th birthday. It was an unusually laid back day for my birthday. For the past ten years or so, I’ve done an excellent job at arranging my birthday so that I got to do many of my favorite things with my favorite people. I’d get a massage, make a hair appointment, go shopping, have a party, whatever I wanted to do that year. My husband graciously tried to make whatever I wanted happen. Sometimes it worked out, but often, somewhere along the way, the day ended up disappointing me. I wanted everything be perfect, just for one day. But life is rarely ever perfect, even for a moment.

I really thought that 25 would be my best year yet. I believed it. I counted on it. My birthday that year was disappointing and people let me down more than usual that day. I ended up crying half way through the day. I didn’t know it then, but that would be the beginning of one of the worst years of my life.

I fought for 25 to be a great year. I kept thinking “if I can just get through this (insert whatever current circumstance), I can still have a great year”. Well, I didn’t get through all those things, and it wasn’t a great year. That year chipped at me, pulled at me, knocked me down, and cut me open. It broke me again and again. I barely feel like the same person anymore.

Somewhere along the line, in the midst of various storms, I lost all expectation of life. I didn’t always assume the worst, but I stopped thinking that everything could be made great or that it would make sense one day. I stopped expecting things to work out. I missed out on some really really important things that year because of health issues, I watched my dreams fall apart, I battled demons I didn’t even know I had.

But yet, there is somehow something still a little beautiful in the falling apart.

I don’t expect big things in life right now. I don’t look forward to things because I don’t know if they’ll happen. Sometimes this feels like a sad place to be, but I’m finding some beauty tucked in the cracks.

I’ve learned to live in every moment. If here, right now, I am okay, with the ones I love, in a safe place, then that is a good moment. I don’t have the energy to worry about the next moments, because I don’t know if they’ll ever come. When nice things come my way, I am genuinely and happily surprised. I don’t feel like the most special person in the universe anymore. I always thought that somehow God would protect me from things that he didn’t protect me from. Or I thought things would just always work out somehow. Not everything has. At least not yet.

I’m learning to approach life in an open-handed sort of way.

I let what is happening happen. Every moment is it’s own space in time. I’m more present. I’m not always looking forward to the next break, the next phase, because I know now that those are not guaranteed, and they are definitely not guaranteed to be easier than whatever phase I’m currently in. So many times this last year I prayed for a way out and so often that way came with more pain. Nothing happened the way I pictured it happening – again and again.

I learned to start creating my own moments, not waiting or depending on other people.

Some of those I trusted the most let me down in the worst ways this year. It made me more independent. I learned to look for the small things that made me happy – buying my favorite drink while I wait in the ER, opening the curtains enough to see the sunset on another day of concussion recovery, looking at closed doors as opportunities to try new ones, or maybe even an opportunity to invest in myself more. I’ve spent a lot of time with just myself this year. I hated it at first. But now I love it.

I don’t believe I’ll always be in this place. I believe I’ll learn to hope and find my optimism again. But I think it’s important to keep learning from whatever phase you are in. I can’t find my hope right now, but I don’t want that to make me bitter and empty. This moment, right here, in the quiet of my morning with my blanket, coffee, and laptop, in this moment I am okay.

And really, this moment is all I have.

A good friend once told me “rock bottom is a lot further down than most people think it is.” I remember when getting a cold or having a close friend being mad at me were literally the worst things that could happen in life. And then this year hit.

Some day I hope to share with you the honest bare bones story of this last year. I hope eventually it is inspiring- both to myself and to others. I’m only now getting to the place where I’m not just really mad about it all. But today, I feel like being encouraged and encouraging, so I’ll share this:

A few weeks ago, I found myself alone in the ER. An hour and a half away, husband was packing up the last few things in our house because we were moving out the next day, to a new state halfway across the country. I was supposed to be there, it was our last night in it. But instead I was sitting in an ER, for a problem that was supposed to be resolved six months ago, completely alone, watching the hours tick by .

After a year of crushing disappointment and raging storms, I felt totally abandoned. I remember messaging this to a friend: “As I sit here completely alone in an ER, on the brink of this huge life change, here is where I finally give up hoping. I quit. I don’t care about anything anymore. I feel totally nothing.”

It’s an eerie feeling to not feel anything. I never thought I’d get there. But there, in the ER, that is where I finally fell apart. And I mean totally. I’d thought I’d hit rock bottom months before that. But then I hit again, and again, and then a couple more times after that.

I thought at the time that it was the worst place for me to be. But really, it was what saved me.

It was there that I lost all my preconceived ideas about God. I think sometimes you need to totally fall apart before you can really start seeing again.

Late that night, discouraged and exhausted, I called a friend to keep me awake on the way home from the ER. I told her:

“I don’t really believe that much about God anymore. What I mean is, I just don’t really have too many ideas about who he is anymore. People say God is a protector. I don’t feel protected. But I’m done letting that shake my faith. Now more than ever, I know God exists. Now more than ever, I’d have every reason to doubt that. I can’t explain it, but I can FEEL him. I want to mad at him but I’m not. Basically, all I know is this: That he loves me, and that he sees me.”

The next morning, people poured in to help us load the moving truck, I didn’t have nearly everything in boxes because I’d lost the entire last day sitting in the ER. I was stressed and panicked. I wanted to be all ready and put together so I could tell everyone exactly what to do and they’d all be impressed by how organized I was. It wasn’t like that at all.

Somewhere in the midst of the flurry, I got a text from another friend in a different state who had no idea about the conversations I’d had the night before. I’ll never forget the text that I opened. It still brings chills and tears to my eyes.

“You were the first thing on my mind when I woke up this morning. I asked God to give me something to tell you. All I got was this: Tell her that I love her, and that I see her.”

God loves you and he sees you. If that’s all you can believe right now, you are in good company.