12/04/2025
🌿 What I Didn’t Realize I Had Lost… Until God Slowed Me Down
For more than 26 years, I worked in a profession where I believed I was being my best. I worked hard — 50, sometimes 60 hours a week. I kept promoting. I earned well for a woman in a small town. On paper, I was thriving.
But inside… something was shifting.
Once my kids graduated, I moved into a higher position that kept me away from home more than I was home. The promotions kept coming. The awards kept coming. The recognition kept coming.
And yet, every night in another hotel room, my chest would ache.
I’d cry myself to sleep.
I’d wake up at 2 or 3 a.m. with my mind racing… and then open my laptop to start working again.
I had success — but I didn’t have peace.
Then my mom passed away just before her 52nd birthday.
Not long after, I found myself in the ER multiple times with what felt like heart attack symptoms. It turned out to be severe anxiety.
That season forced me to look honestly at my life —
the pace I was running,
the weight I was carrying,
and the quiet isolation I didn’t even notice happening.
I realized how disconnected I had become… not just from myself, but from God.
My spiritual health had been pushed to the back seat, and it was affecting everything — my physical health, my emotional health, my mental health.
And somewhere in the middle of grief, exhaustion, and stillness, something inside me began to shift. I found myself longing for God in a way I hadn’t felt in years.
Not the quiet background faith I always carried…but a rooted, steady, life-giving relationship.
That longing became the beginning of my returning.
My rerooting.
My healing.
If any part of my story feels familiar… take heart.
You’re not alone, and you’re not lost.
Sometimes God allows the pace to break so He can gently bring us back to center.
That season was the start of my returning — slowly, quietly, daily.
And it may be the start of yours too.
