Kaitlyn on the wall that she first climbed to the top on and also had her first fall on. Would you believe me if I said that grief can inspire you? I don’t mean like inspire you in a happy way, but it can inspire you and change you positively, if you let it. I’ve said it before and I’ll said it again, when you are faced with tragedy, death and hardship, you can walk one of of two roads; giving up or choosing to live on. Facing death and tragedy has definitely changed Kaitlyn and I. Some of these changes have been negative, but I want to share with you one of the ways that death and tragedy has inspired us and helped us grow stronger. I know I’ve shared how fearful and hesitant I was before Darren died. I had so many fears, I would have to start a new blog to share them all. I lived afraid. I hated sleeping in a house alone and would often contemplate the worst case scenarios in my life. My fears impeded my life. They negatively affected my relationships, including my marriage to Darren. They affected how I parented, what kind of friend I was and almost each and every choice I made. Kaitlyn was also very fearful. She didn’t like trying new things if she didn’t know the exact outcome. She constantly questioned everything. While many kids played different sports and rode different rides, she would hold back until she was absolutely sure she wouldn’t get hurt. The night that Darren died, all of my fears came rushing to the forefront of my mind, they paralyzed me. I couldn’t imagine how Kaitlyn and I would survive this tragedy, let alone be stronger and less afraid. The changes in us did not happen overnight. There were LOTS of restless nights, tears, screaming, cursing, anger and questions. However, there were also LOTS of prayers, love and support from everyone around us. Eventually, we begun to change and grow stronger. We sought help from counselors. We made the hard choices that included leaving a job I loved, taking Kaitlyn out of a school she loved and recently selling our dream home. The old Amy would have been so paralyzed by the fears and what ifs that she wouldn’t have been able to handle all of these changes. The old Kaitlyn would have never accepted homeschooling, making new friends and moving to a much older, smaller home. Yet somehow, with God’s help and with a lot of support from those around us, we find ourselves much less afraid as we move, get ready for an international mother/daughter trip in November and start a brand new chapter in our story. We are choosing to not let these new versions of ourselves to be guided by fear. This last weekend, we decided to try going to an indoor climbing place and we joined it. Kaitlyn and I were looking for some kind of physical activity we could do together and climbing sounded like a great option. A few minutes in, while we were doing our required training, I was questioning our choice. Would we really be able to overcome our fears and do this brand new, scary activity? After a few slow starts, Kaitlyn began to climb the largest and hardest wall she had done yet. She soared to the over halfway point and then without hesitation started to repel down. Even after seeing all the amazing changes in her and myself over the last seventeen months, I was still shocked as I watched my child do something without fear. The thirteen year-old Amy would have never done such a thing, especially without hesitation. We’ve returned everyday since to climb and I’ve seen her grow even more confident and fearless. Yesterday, she reached the top of one of the walls. She was so proud of herself and I was beaming with joy for her. She attempted the same wall again and actually fell and hit the wall a little. We were talking about her fall and my very wise thirteen year-old, said to me, “Mom, I thought it would be scary to fall, but it really wasn’t a big deal, it made me a better climber.” We continued to talk about falling after we finished climbing. We both decided that overcoming our fear of falling made us a much stronger climber. It made us take risks, it made us look for the routes that weren’t always the safest, but would get us to our ultimate goal of scaling the wall. Wouldn’t it be incredible if we all lived our lives that way? What if you and I weren’t afraid of falling? What if we kept the ultimate goal in mind and made the hard decisions? Wouldn’t that bring incredible freedom? I’m going to continue to climb with my daughter. I’m going to continue to let death and tragedy be an inspiration to me and not allow me to be paralyzed. I’m not going to pretend that I’m not a little (or a LOT) afraid of the next part of our journey or what our future holds, but Kaitlyn and I will continue to climb, knowing that there is nothing to fear in the fall.
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Amy C.A young widow searching and sharing God's goodness. Archives
June 2018
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