Hope in the Half-Finished Places..
These past few weeks, I’ve been quieter than usual—both here on my blog and on social media—as my family and I walk through some very challenging times. Many of you know parts of Maddie’s journey, but the depth of her story isn’t mine to tell. What I can share is what it feels like to be her mom in this moment: to stand beside her as she faces her own crisis, while also walking through my own trenches.
Her crisis is hers—unique, heavy, and deeply personal. My trenches are different, shaped by my own exhaustion, doubts, and personal challenges that have nothing to do with her but still affect how I show up as her mom. And while the two aren’t the same, living through them at the same time is a challenge I was not prepared for, supporting her through her darkest days while also navigating my own struggles which often feels like carrying two storms at once.
Recently, a dear friend asked me how I was handling everything. My first response was simple: “I don’t know.” Because the truth is, I don’t. I am tired. I am frustrated. I feel the pressure of decisions where none of the options feel good. And I’m learning firsthand what it means to parent a child in crisis while also trying to keep my own head above water.
As a self-proclaimed serial avoider of emotion, I tend to stay busy when life gets hard. I throw myself into house projects—some finished, many left halfway—as a way to keep moving. Even Kyle knows my MO. For example, I had been saying all week that I wanted to purge the younger girls’ room. One afternoon, I went grocery shopping, came home, and instead of putting groceries away, I dove headfirst into cleaning out…our bedroom. Kyle’s immediate reaction? “It’s okay if their room isn’t touched until tomorrow.”
Why does he say this? Because he knows me. He knows that part of my coping is to distract both my body and my mind by taking on a million things at once. And if I’m being honest, I also get bored easily. You can imagine where this is going—our house ends up with more than a few unfinished projects scattered about. It’s a pattern that reflects exactly how I feel right now: in the middle of everything, with nothing quite tied up neatly.
And maybe that’s the real truth of being a mom in the trenches. There is no handbook. No perfect plan. No quick fix. Just the daily grind of showing up, trying again, and putting one foot in front of the other.
And that’s okay.
It’s okay not to know. It’s okay to admit that the road is hard. But even here, even now, I remind myself that every storm eventually passes. Every problem eventually has a solution—even if it takes time, even if it doesn’t look like what I imagined.
I don’t know what tomorrow’s trail will bring, but I do know this: Maddie and I are walking it together. And as much as I wish I could be the mom with all the answers, right now my job is simply to stay by her side. We will come through this—because love, perseverance, and hope leave no other option.
Sometimes hope is not about seeing the rainbow immediately after the storm. Sometimes it’s about trusting that the rainbow will come, even while you’re still standing in the rain. And in the trenches, that trust is what keeps me moving forward.
Just as I’ve written before about leadership, strength, and resilience, I am reminded that those themes aren’t only reserved for the professional world or for guiding a team—they are lived out here, in the hardest corners of life. Leadership sometimes looks like staying present when you want to run. Strength sometimes looks like admitting you don’t have the answers. Resilience sometimes looks like standing in the middle of two storms and refusing to give up. These are the same lessons I’ve leaned on before, but now they’re being lived out in real time, teaching me again that even in the trenches, growth and hope are possible.
