Remember that . . .

During this season of gratitude, my heart is overwhelmingly grateful for something in particular.
The other night, as we sat down to dinner, my daughter looked at what I had dished out on her plate.  Then she said this:

"If I'm still hungry can I have more?"

In my hurry to get dinner on the table, that miraculous moment passed me by.  A little while later, I had a quiet moment to myself while doing the dishes, and my thoughts drifted back to what she had said.

Have we REALLY come that far???

Meal time's influential force used to be fear, NOT hunger.
She was so afraid to eat.
No matter how much I dished out, she ALWAYS left something on her plate.
We reasoned with her.
We begged her.
We bought nutritional shakes in a futile attempt to make up the difference.
I had to sew the waistline on all her pants to make them smaller.
Our hearts ached with worry.
We sent our pleas to God as we traveled this path.

Fast forward 2 years.

"If I'm still hungry can I have more?"

What?  What happened?  How did we get here?  How did we get through that?
I don't even know how to answer those questions.  There have been so many guided steps.  So many important and necessary pieces to the puzzle.  So many prayers that felt unanswered, yet here we are.

My small soldier is still climbing her mountains.  She still has physical symptoms that we have not yet found relief for.  Still questions we don't have answers to.  She must still put effort into every day to "be okay."
I get so focused on trying to have faith while navigating the path in front of us,
I forget to look back and see how God guided us through the path behind us.

This summer was HARD.  The past two years took it's toll on me and my emotional strength began to buckle.  I felt unable to be the rock that my daughter needed me to be.
But as summer drew to a close, the things we were doing to heal her body, started to also heal her mind and spirit.  She was finally in a position to take the reigns and work towards overcoming some of life's challenges.  I asked her to write about her experience with a challenge she worked to overcome.

GUEST BLOGGER: My daughter
(Written October 1st, 2016, age 11)

Two years ago I was scared all the time, nonstop.  I used to worry about:

winter is coming

germs are every where

where are my parents?

zombies

monsters

the dark

Right now I feel calm.  I worked very hard to get over all those worries.  We prayed.  We've gotten so far.  I believe we can climb mountains, if we work hard and want it bad enough.  
I earned a doll I had been working hard for.  I stayed calm and ignored my lump.  This summer I learned a lot.  We figured out that sugar gives me a lot of anxiety.  We've learned we can distract ourselves from fears and do something else.  I've learned we can trust Heavenly Father and have faith, and we can believe that he will help us because he loves us very much.  Remember that . . .