Tomorrow (January 29, 2020) will be 8 years since Trevor died of suicide at the age of 17.

As I'm writing this I'm thinking about how AMAZING my life has been and how many changes I've made in the past 8 years. I'd say the first 2-3 years I felt pretty stuck and horrible.😢😢😢

Then I learned that I wasn't crazy when I went to my first National Grief conference. In fact, there were other kids and adults that were eerily similar to Trevor that had died by suicide.🙄

And I found myself thinking “Some day, I'm going to have learned how to heal and move forward…then I'm going to be speaking here and sharing my story”. That thought pushed me to go figure it out.💥💥💥

I tried a BUNCH of things after I was done with therapy and stopped going to the support group.

I did EFT, learned to use the Kondo method, joined a Bright Line Eating group, started learning about how the subconscious mind works, listened to guided meditations, read oodles of business success stories, learned how to write and self publish books, learned a ton about manifestation and the Law of Attraction, and dug deep to find goals that would motivate me to keep taking the next step forward.☀️☀️☀️

I wanted to show my kids that they didn't have to get stuck in grief even though they lost their brother. I didn't want them to remember me as “The Mom that was depressed all the time”.

2019 was LIFE CHANGING. I was thinking that I had changed so much already, that there couldn't be that much more to learn or do.

But there was!

One of my business friends told me she’s proud of me. And I decided to OWN IT! I’m proud of me too:) 👏🏻

I finished my certification with The Life Coach School and got more hours of being coached than I ever had before in my life. ‼️

I also did more hours of coaching as a grief coach than ever before. And, I ran my very first weekend retreat for Moms who've experienced a suicide loss. ♥️

I made more money in my business than I had ever made in a JOB. 🎉

It wasn't always fun. It certainly wasn't easy. But, I've learned that it takes discomfort to become a better version of ourselves.

I choose not to stay the same. I choose to grow. It's exciting. I get to know myself so much better.

And, I learned to like myself this year. Even LOVE💓myself.

I spend so much time in my own brain now, thinking about my goals, and what I really want in life, and how I can inspire my children and my clients….it's just a lot of fun.😊

The biggest takeaway for me from 2019 is that I learned how to THINK at such a deeper level. My coach has taught me how to think about thinking. Which is strange, but fascinating.🤔

This new skill has helped me come up with better tools to help my clients to improve their lives. It's attracted new opportunities into my life.

And, I feel my marriage is better now than it was before.💑

If you would've told me on January 29, 2012 that in 2020 I'd have written 2 books (and have sold thousands of them), spoke at national conferences, held retreats, and was totally loving the life I was creating….I would've thought you were nuts. 🙃

I couldn't see the way on that fateful day.

Instead of making rash decisions and running away, I stuck it out.⁉️

☀️I cultivated the patience to stay in my marriage even though everything in me wanted to run away.

☀️ I committed to keep trying to be a Mom to my kids no matter how much I felt I must've “screwed up” with Trevor.

☀️I learned how to listen to my inner voice that was telling me that I had bigger work to do in the world than staying at the job I was in.

☀️I fought against all the thoughts about what I “should” be doing and what I should “want to” be doing. And instead, cultivated my own beliefs about the world and my life.

I finally feel free to listen to myself and my spirit instead of listening to all the voices around me and all the ideas that were given to me as a child as to how life is “supposed” to be.😀

I followed how life was “supposed” to be….and I lost my child to suicide. 😡

I'm now living the life I KNOW I'm here for….regardless of what anyone else thinks about it.🌈

And that is the best feeling ever. And it's the example I want to be for my kids and my clients.⭐️⭐️⭐️

So, THANK YOU Trevor. 🙏

💫For giving me the opportunity to learn so much about the possibilities in this life.

💫 For not taking it for granted.

💫For thinking about what I really want and how I can help others get through hard times.

I would never have wanted to lose you in order to be motivated to change my life for the better.

I miss you and think about you a lot. I wonder what you'd be doing now that you'd be 25 years old.

Your death was not in vain.

I have learned WAY more in this past few years than I had learned in the 42 years before you died.

Your untimely death woke me up to my life.

I can feel you sometimes in the work I do. I will always be grateful I got to be your Mom:) ♥️♥️♥️