Our Story

My husband and I have been married for 24 years, and together we're raising our two sons, now 16 and 14, and our 10-year-old daughter.

When our oldest son began experiencing a variety of unexplained health issues at six years old, life changed in ways we couldn't have anticipated.

It was a lonely and frightening season. No one we knew had experienced anything quite like what our family was navigating, and doctor after doctor struggled to explain what was happening.

As the years went on, our other children began experiencing symptoms of their own. Some were similar. Others were completely different.

There were appointments, specialists, tests, possible explanations, new diagnoses, treatments, setbacks, and countless rounds of trial and error.

At one point, bloodwork raised concern that our children might have a rare blood cancer, leading us quickly to a children's hospital for further evaluation. Thankfully, it wasn't cancer. The journey eventually led to diagnoses that helped explain why so many seemingly unrelated systems of the body had been affected and why continued ongoing monitoring would also be important.

But answers didn't suddenly make everything easy.

There were years upon years of uncertainty.

And somewhere in the middle of trying so hard to find answers, protect my children, make the right decisions, and anticipate what might happen next, I realized I had lost something important:

a genuine peaceful presence within my own life.

The uncertainty hadn't created all of the pressure.

Some of it was coming from how desperately I was trying to manage the uncertainty.

That distinction would eventually change far more than I realized at the time.

The Picture I Keep Coming Back To

The photo on this page was taken in 2024 after a year that included several trips to the hospital.

Everyone was feeling well enough that we decided to try something fun together, so we traveled to Asheville, North Carolina, and one day ventured up Lookout Trail in Montreat.

The hike was hard.

And the farther we climbed, the more my mind began moving ahead of us.

Did we overdo it?

Will everyone feel terrible tomorrow?

Did I make the wrong decision by suggesting this?

I could feel myself leaving the experience we were actually having and beginning to live inside all the possibilities of what might happen next.

Then we reached the top.

And it was beautiful.

Not only the view.

Us.

We had made it.

After everything that year had held, there we were together, standing at the top of that mountain.

For a moment, I allowed all my concerns about what recovery might look like over the next few days to soften.

I stopped trying to get ahead of what might happen next.

And I became completely present for what was happening right then.

We did it.

Look how far we'd come.

Look at the progress we'd made.

Look at the strength we'd found along the way.

The next few days weren't perfect. There were still times when people didn't feel well.

But it was an incredible and deeply meaningful trip.

And perhaps that's why that photograph still means so much to me.

It reminds me that peace doesn't require certainty.

It doesn't require everything to feel good.

And it doesn't require knowing what tomorrow will bring.

There can be pressure.

There can be uncertainty.

There can be limitations, adjustments, and things we wish were different.

And there can still be life to live within all of it.

That's the kind of life I continue learning to pursue.

Not a pressure-free life.

Not a perfectly predictable one.

But one in which I can remain present enough to notice what's here, adapt when something needs to change, appreciate what is good, and keep moving toward what matters.

A peaceful pursuit.

That's become more than a motto for me.

It's a way I hope to keep living.