HOPE.....

I’ve been asked on more than one occasion about HOPE. Where I found it, where do I continue to find it after my world has been shattered after losing my son Brian 5.5 years ago in a car accident. How did HOPE become the key word for me when I started my leadership support group which helps other parents after they have lost a child. Hope was not easy to find. Here I am five and a half years later clinging to it like a child holding onto their mothers shirt as he walks. I have to search for it every single day.

Hope...... The moment I realized there was hope for me on this journey was the fist time I laughed. A real, loud, belly hurt laugh. In that moment, I knew I might survive. I still was not sure exactly how, but I knew I might. I knew, I had a forever road of healing ahead of me. I knew, I had no other choice.

Hope has brought me many things along the way. On those dark days that I continue to have and, will for the remainder of my life, where the grief knocks me down to my knees as I hold my stomach crying out loud for Brian, and begging God for the pain in my heart to end, I know hope will be there to pick me back up.

Hope - showed me that I WILL laugh every day and that’s okay

Hope - showed me that I WILL cry every day and that’s okay

Hope - showed me that the love I have for Brian can be shared with others, even though I now lived with a completely broken heart

Hope - showed me how to embrace the beauty and nature around me. To truly see it, enjoy it and take it all in

Hope - showed me that I am still a mom.

Hope - showed me that life does not always turn out the way you plan it but, if you work really, really work hard you can find a way to live again, just differently.

Hope - showed me all the signs I needed to see from Brian that allowed me to know he is okay

Hope - showed me that I could through my own pain help other mom’s with their broken hearts

Hope - showed me that I will never be the person I was when Brian was alive and that I am just going to have be okay with that.

Hope - showed me that in order to survive I was going to have to find new purposes. I needed to figure out who I was in this life as a mom to a child gone.

Hope - showed me that only I define how I navigated through this world without my child. Some will not understand and that's okay. It is your journey, not theirs.

Hope - showed me how to be grateful for the 17 years I had with Brian which were wonderful.

Hope - showed me that a mother’s bond to her child never dies even in death

Hope - showed me that no matter what I do, no matter where I go I always bring Brian with me. In my heart, in my mind, or by something creative I come up with (never thought I see my son’s name attached to so many things) that I know makes him say in heaven “you see that crazy lady again coming up with ways to have me remembered and honored, well that crazy lady is my mom”

Hope - showed me to always #DOITFORBRIAN