I’ve been staring at this screen trying to formulate a great opening sentence for about 20 minutes now. Actually, I’ve started this post several times over the last week…and by started I really just mean more staring at this screen trying to formulate a great opening sentence. I don’t really know where to begin.

Oops, how could I forget my manners?

Hi! Hello. How are you? I hope you’re doing well!

Great, that’s done. Moving on.

As I was saying, I don’t really know where to begin. The last four and a half years of my life have been…crazy. I’ve faced a lot of challenges, but I’ve also had a lot of triumphs. I’ve been desperately discouraged, but I’ve also been beautifully blessed. I’ve cried a lot of tears, but through those tears I’ve found countless reasons to smile and laugh. This doesn’t even begin to cover the ups and downs, the ins and outs, or the whats and whys and hows of everything that has happened.

If you have no idea what I’m talking about, I will get to the details in later posts. For now I will sum it up in two words: chronic illness.

So what is the point of all this? Is it all just rambling? Well, I do love to ramble and I happen to have quite the knack for it, but I do have a point here.

Through all of my health issues over the last little bit, countless people have been offering up prayers for me. When I say countless, I am not exaggerating! I am lucky enough to be connected to so many communities of faith-filled people (including a group of 300 nuns in Nashville) who have been carrying me in their hearts lately. I am beyond grateful for this. Anyhow, several of these people have said that with all these prayers going up for me I must have a miracle on the way.

From the get go, I recognized that the miracle coming my way might not be the miracle we all wanted or would expect it to be, which would be restored health. Earlier this year, on my last night of a two week hospital stay, I was feeling overwhelmed by everything that had happened, both good and bad, and in an effort to make sense of it all I sent my mom an email. To explain where the name of this blog comes from I’m going to copy part of the email below:

We often reference waiting for my miracle, but I have decided that it’s not one big miracle coming my way, it’s a whole bunch of little miracles – the lovely Christmas we had, the good people in our lives, my great team of doctors, meeting all these beautiful people in the hospital, the joy I got to spread with my crocheting, the people we made laugh, and the kindness everyone at school has showed you. And I also feel like the peace and gratitude I feel right now is a miracle. I could be so despairing, but I’m not. Maybe the fact that I have been able to take a step back from school and work and notice all of these miracles is the miracle?

Maybe just recognizing all of that is the miracle.

I guess we will never know for sure, but I think if we get to choose between waiting for a big miracle, or finding a miracle in every day, we should probably choose every day.

With that, I’m making an effort to find the miracles in everyday life, to find the good in the bad, and to find the lessons in the hardships. I’m writing this blog to share some of those miracles, and to share some of the hard stuff, too.

I guess I’m writing this blog just to share. Everyone has their story. This is mine.