It's Never Too Late

My Miss Birdie bought me a sign several years ago.

"It's Never Too Late to Live Happily Ever After."
Miss Birdie has seen me at my lowest.

She is the reason I was admitted to the psych ward ten years ago.

I had a very bad, un-diagnosed eating disorder.

(Addiction)

I had just survived a sexual assault by a stranger near my parent's home.

I was a single mom of four boys.

I was in the midst of a process addiction that had been going on since childhood that remained un-diagnosed until just last year.

I was a wreck.

I was broken down.

I was broken, period.

And, I was not the mama my boys deserved.

Although I was there, I was emotionally and mentally and sometimes physically not there.

This continued until June 24, 2019, when I began treatment and therapy and intense healing.

Those three things will continue until I leave this Earth, because that's how this works.

I have always hung the sign in my office.

I look at it daily.

Some days I would be angry with that sign... believing it was for everyone but me...

Believing that this "happily ever after" they speak of does not pertain to me...

Believing that I was never worthy of such a thing.

Until about a year ago, when I believed that no matter what my future held, I WAS worthy of a happily ever after.

This morning, I looked at my sign and I immediately thought of a prayer that Colton said Saturday evening before dinner.

"Heavenly Father, thank you so much that Mama and Mike got engaged and that we'll all live happily ever after."

Yes, Heavenly Father.

Thank You for my treatment, my therapy, my healing.

Thank You that among really hard decades, I was able to get the treatment that I desperately needed, and will always need, so that I could understand my worth and my value.

Thank You for always keeping Your promises.

Thank You for my path and my journey, which really was always leading me to You.

Thank You for my babies.

Oh, Father, thank You for my babies.

Thank You that Mike was also on a path of healing, and that he moved next door, and that without knowing anything about one another, we were both on our paths to healing, and in the end -

You allowed, and probably even illustrated, our journeys colliding.

Thank You that, in the end, no matter what our past has always looked like, there is a happily ever after for everyone.