Sincerely, Amy Lee

In the midst of brokenness it is hard to feel anything other than shattered. There are the stages of grief that we have all heard of: the stages that we go through at different rates depending on the severity of trauma, and the way our brains and hearts are wired to heal.

• Denial
• Anger
• Bargaining
• Depression
• Acceptance

Denial is a tough one for me. It’s a stage that is hard to get through and one I relapse and revisit even long after acceptance. Sometimes, events in our lives are so traumatic that our self-talk can try and reason our minds out of believing tragedy ever happened. We think, “I must be mistaken, I got it all wrong”, or that someone will come back and tell us it was all a huge misunderstanding.

In college, I had a friend who was brutally killed in a murder suicide. Nearly twenty years have passed and yet I regularly I replay the events in my mind and thinking, “surely not”. She must be living out her dreams somewhere with a lovely family of her own. I replay the events of that night when the authorities did get the information wrong. When we were told one friend was killed and we grieved over her life for hours, only to be told that she was okay and it was another friend of ours whose life was lost. Those are strange feelings of gratefulness for one friends life, and immediately and forever grieving another friends death that I will never be able to put into words fully. There is a strange guilt associated with being relieved and horrifically grieved simultaneously.

Grief, tragedy, trauma, and loss touches all of us at some point in our lives. Nobody is untouchable this side of heaven. This world is not our home and unfortunately there was never a promise of perfection and peace while we are here. However, the promise of heaven where there will be no more pain or grief is what gives me hope, and what offers remnants of peace while I am here.

My life has been no stranger to the chaos of trauma and tragedy. In fact, I feel like I have had an unfair amount in my forty years. Death, abuse, melanoma, infertility, divorce, betrayal, anxiety, just to name a few.

Like most people who have been through great trials, I have become exceptionally resilient. With great trials comes great strength. In the crushing, in the pressing, new beautiful things are created if you rise up and don’t allow it overtake you. It is a choice, and it’s not an easy one. Sometimes it does require help, intervention, and community support.

Over the years I’ve often thought of my life as a beautiful mosaic. Each time hardships arise, I am broken into fractal pieces. However, I brush myself off, stand up, and evaluate at the brokenness that is waiting to be rebuilt. I gather the pieces of my life and I rearrange them them into something more beautiful than before. The mosaic forever shows evidence of where I was shattered. You can see the fine lines, the sharp edges, and the jagged corners that will never go away. Healing doesn’t cover the past, but it pushes you on in new healthy ways. You learn. You grow. You move forward.

The fractal pieces now fit together differently. Beautifully. Artistically. Forever changed.

Life isn’t over. I will continue to have hardships, but I will continue to pick up the pieces and make art out of brokenness. My life is a mosaic.

If you find yourself struggling through loss and hardships, I encourage you to find the strength to rebuild, and allow yourself the room to call it beautiful.