Phone calls at 3 AM rarely bode well. My sister called me at that time when they were driving through Texas on the way to their vacation. My nephew, Whittan, had 3 seizures and was being taken to an emergency room in a foreign city, with no family near by. My heart was racing and I couldn’t sleep for the rest of the night. I laid in bed, crying and praying.

This same week we said good bye to Dash and Cricket and we had court for Little Lion Man. I was in over my head. I had lost control. Not that I ever really had control to begin with, but I had the appearance of control for the most part. Not now, not anymore. Everything was happening all at once and I felt myself slipping. I couldn’t control anything that was happening. I couldn’t be with my nephew, though my heart ached to hold his hand and see him smile. I couldn’t do anything about the boys leaving, though I know them going with their grandma was the very best for them. I couldn’t do anything to make CPS, all the attorneys, or the judge see why my Little Lion Man is in the best place possible. All I could do was sit quietly in the back of the court room and listen as my chances of keeping him had more road blocks thrown up.

My life consists of broken pieces, broken moments, broken hearts, broken lives. We are all broken in some way.

I felt so broken, and I was looking at so many broken situations.

Fast forward a week, we have been at the beach with my family. My nephew is doing so much better, though I miss Dash and Cricket, I know they are where they should be and for now, I can hold my Little Lion Man and watch him experience the beach for the first time and fall in love with the ocean.

I was walking along the ocean one day, kicking waves and searching for shells. I only wanted the whole ones. I had a plan and I needed perfection. Then I started thinking, why does it have to be the perfect ones? Why can’t I take the broken things and make something even more beautiful? After all, the broken pieces make a whole. As the beach has a habit of doing, it blew things into perspective for me.

My life consists of broken pieces, broken moments, broken hearts, broken lives. We are all broken in some way. The beauty of life is not perfection, it’s all of our broken pieces coming together to make something amazing. It doesn’t have to look like a usual “shell.” It can look like whatever “shell “ I want, something unique and special. My project has changed. I’m trying to move forward with it, even though so much hangs in limbo. Life is not meant to be lived in limbo, it’s hard and makes hard situations even harder. So we do things to try and occupy our minds and our time from all the broken things happening,

Find the broken things in your life and instead of seeing them as imperfect, make something beautiful and perfect out of it. I’m going to take these imperfect, broken moments, lives and experiences and make something whole and completely useable and amazing with it all.

Cover Photo by: Razvan Narcis Ticu on Unsplash