Let’s face it, life can be hard. And, sometimes we start focusing on all the obstacles instead of the gratitudes. It’s easy to do. But we should be reminded that even though something is extremely difficult, there’s hope on the other side. For us, the first traumatic experience we had was Hudsyn’s brain injury during her birth in 2010. We didn’t understand it right away, and both of us even resented the way she arrived. Her caregiving then (and now) was much more difficult than either of us had ever anticipated.
We had to dive deep into the sadness and really experience the loss of who we thought our daughter was going to “be” in order for us to begin appreciating and feeling real gratitude about the amazing girl that arrived so graciously in our life…and the young lady she continues to be as she exists in a body that is broken.
Our family motto, “The only way to it is through it,” was created by Dan to remind us that on the other side of something hard, we find a deeper sense of hope, gratitude and love. If we can really go through the hard thing…and truly taste the bitter lemons life sometimes gives us, we will not only survive…we will thrive. This is what we call Post Traumatic Growth.