One year later...

This day a year ago changed our lives.

On this day exactly one year ago, we left our friends in Salt Lake City in order to head to Nebraska. John had a meeting scheduled for the next morning in Hastings, so we were hoping to get as far as Sydney. We were on I-80 a little past Rawlings, WY when a semi truck forced us off the road and onto the sloped median. Our car flipped three and a half times and I remember distinctly thinking, “This cannot be happening, this cannot be real.” I just kept praying, that when this car stops rolling, we would all still be alive."

We were all still alive. The pumping adrenalin made it feel like we got out of this in pretty good shape. A broken tooth, a hemorrhaged eye, scrapes, cuts, glass and so on. We were alive, without broken bones or any gaping wounds. Finley worried us the most. He got pummeled pretty badly by things flying around. He was listless, threw up, and seemed very, very tired. They airlifted him to a hospital that had a children’s E.R. in order to do some tests. This all was extremely nerve-wracking, but worth it to know that he had no brain swelling or bleeding. It was rough, physically and emotionally and logistically as Finley and I were taken to a different hospital as John and Elea.

The day after, I was in more pain than I had ever experienced in my life. Every muscle was screaming, and anxiety was high. That day passed in a blur, cramped in a car with six people.  I was in constant pain. My hand began swelling up like a balloon. I thought I would not make it through the next night when I found myself lying on the bathroom floor of a hotel room, trying not to pass out. Infection was spreading through my body causing sepsis and I had no idea it had gotten so bad so quickly. On the second day after the accident we made it to Kearney and I got help at a hospital, which was good for me physically, but terrible emotionally, as it separated me from the one thing I wanted to protect the most; my kids.

The next few days consisted of lots of antibiotics, surgery, a few whirlpool treatments and painkillers that completely wiped me out. Days in pain on the couch, days away from my kids, days full with tears of sadness about the things I did not get to do, friends I did not get to see, cancelled plans, meetings, activities and trips. It was the least fun I had ever had. And worries.  Lots of worries about insurance, bills, liability, all of it. But through it all, I also had peace. There was a sense of peace that I cannot explain. The sense of peace, knowing that it’s in God`s hands. The same peace I had at the beginning of our trip, when we were at the airport and my green card was not in my wallet, but an hour’s car ride at home. The same sense that carried me through while waiting for a miracle to unfold as God took hold of the situation and guided us through. There is nothing He cannot do; there is nothing out of His reach, out of His sphere of influence. He takes the broken and makes it whole again. He can mobilize people and traffic and make the impossible possible. He can speak peace into our hearts and minds even when our whole world gets flipped upside down three and a half times. He can send his angles to protect us and pediatricians to the side of the road and caring nurses and police officers who pick up a little girl’s coloring books that got sucked out of a shattered window and strewn across the median.

He’s got this. When crying out to Him is the only option you have left; when your hands are broken, there is no way to clench them; you have to give it all into His hands. There is no other way.

I know now, that all I want in life is to have that peace. His peace. All I want is this feeling, that no matter what this world throws at me, it is in His hands. I want my life to be full of situations where He shows up, where my hands are broken and I have no other choice than to give it up to Him, into His very capable ones.

These scars will last and I hope they will remind me of what he has done for us. How he turns tears into joy and grows new life from ashes of despair.