"I'm singin' and dancin' in the rain!"

It's World Mental Health Day and ironically I've had a 180 in the last 24 hours, much like the weather actually. 

Yesterday was sunny, beautiful, perfect weather. My boyfriend and I went on a movie date for the first time in a long time to celebrate our 3 year anniversary a few days early.  I was so happy all day, giddy even, and went to bed feeling so happy and grateful for life. 

Today, however, some dark, heavy clouds rolled in over night, and an internal storm began. 

I slept SO BAD last night, the worst I've slept in years. I was up many hours later than usual, I slept for 2 hours, was awake for 2 hours, slept for 2 hours and had terrible nightmares back to back, was awake for 2 hours, then slept decently for 3 hours. Every awake spell my mind was a reel of negativity, and every time I was asleep I was in stressful dreams or nightmares. 

I feel exhausted.
My mind is a mess, I have emotional chest pain, and my body is not happy about the restless sleep. 

Thankfully, I haven't felt this way in a very long time. But it's crazy to think that my life was this way fro so many years. It makes me feel so much more thankful for how I've come and that I have a huge majority of good days now.

I've struggles with mental health off and on for many years now and hard work and determination is how I've gotten to where I am now, which is the happiest and most myself I've ever felt. 
You can't give up when you have a bad day. You have to find heathy outlets to pour your emotions into whether it's good emotions or bad. You have to find ways to nurture your mind, body, and soul everyday. 

I'm also very thankful that over the years I've learned how to cope really well with bad days like this. 
So, to nurture my soul today I have old classic jazz playing (my favorite genre), and I'm spending some time organizing my closet and tidying my room because a clean room for me means a clean mind and soul. Puppy and kitty cuddles always really help too.😊💕

While looking out at the dark, stormy clouds "Singing In The Rain" came on and made me smile. When it gets stormy or rainy it doesn't have to stop you. You can always make the most of any kind of weather. 
I could've stayed in bed and wallowed all day, I've done that many times in the past and that's okay! Sometimes that is the best you can do! But a bad day is a bad DAY, not a bad life. Storms never last forever. The clouds will break and the sun will shine again. ☀️

Today I'm choosing to "sing and dance in the rain" and take care of my soul. 

I truly believe that the people who thrive the most in life are the ones who learn to dance amidst the storms too. 
And anyone who really knows me, knows that I've always been one who literally will go outside and sing and dance in the rain. 

I can think of so many occasions growing up back in school where it would be sprinkling, raining, or even pouring, and no matter how light or heavy the rain, everyone would run to get out of it as quickly as possible. But not me. I would walk, I would skip, I would twirl, I would splash in the puddles, I would dance, I would sing, I would throw my head back and smile up at the sky, and every once in a while someone would come join me and would happily get soaked in the storm with me. 

Past and present, literally and figuratively, thank you to those of you in my life who have danced in the rain with me. 💙🌧👯‍♀️

You are everything.

And hey! For anyone who's never danced in the rain, I highly recommend it! You'll be amazed by how much fun you can have in a storm. 😉  

#worldmentalhealthday

(...and right on queue, as I'm posting this blog, the sun came through the clouds for sunset, lit up the sky beautifully, and the sunlight also hit the crystal in my window above me and shined rainbow speckles ALL around my room. ⛅️🌈💖)

(Scorll side to side to read on mobile. This post uploaded very oddly and I don't know why. I tried to fix it but it's just being stubborn. Sorry that it uploaded with many fonts and that you have to scroll weirdly to read it. :/ )

A Much Needed Vacation

Well, yesterday evening I got home from my first real vacation I've had since I got sick 6 years ago.

My boyfriend and I went to Newport Beach for a week, just the two of us, and it was absolutly wonderful. The weather was perfect, we had an amazing room and a beautiful view of the ocean both from bed and from the living room. We went to Laguna Beach, Balboa Island, Fashion Island, we explored the giant resort, and some near by little areas. We sang and danced and laughed for a week together and it seriously feels like a dream!

I don't think it's all fully set in yet just how HUGE of a milestone this vacation was for me. I did SO MUCH! I cooked all my own meals for a week, and was able to do most of my own dishes too. I was able to take care of myself and do all my needed daily things, AND I still had energy to go on spontaneous little drives and adventures. That's HUGEEEE for me!

Just two years ago I couldn't even walk across the house without help. I was just completely drained and exhausted in every way, and I was done. Not only was I 100% sure that I wouldn't live much longer, I didn't even want to fight or live anymore. I was just tired, and not a kind of tired that sleep even remotely helps.

I also had crippling anxiety, panic attacks, ocd, and depression at that time too, and during this entire trip (from planning, to traveling there and back, and everything in-between) I was not stressed, I was not worried, I didn't overthink, and my mind didn't hold me back at all! I was happy and present and just enjoying every moment, and I'm super thankful and happy that Justin was able to do the same too!

He and I met 3 years ago, so he's only ever known "sick me", and he's seen me and stuck by me through my absolute lowest points in this chronic illness journey. For any that don't know, since we met he's become a lifeguard then an EMT and the last two summers he worked as an EMT. He's planning/working towards becoming a firefighter or paramedic.

He essentially has been the perfect person for me to be in a relationship with because when my health would take unexpected dips and we'd have to rush to the ER, he handled it incredibly well, and I need my partner to be able to handle both the good days and the really bad ones.

To be able to live any kind of a normal life I do need that kind of protection and safety net in not only my partner but also just whatever person I'm with. The friends I hangout with away from home are briefed with essentially a "What to do if I suddenly tank." I don't currently drive so when I leave the house I'm always with at least one person, and essentially I have to be able to trust my life in that persons hands. That is a lot of pressure to put on any person, but I have tanked suddenly countless times and living this way has saved my life on many occasions. I have safety nets for good reason.

I know not everyone can handle that kind of pressure, and thats why I don't have a lot of friends, and haven't since I got sick 6 years ago. Not many can handle that kind of pressure or seriousness, and even more than that, many can't manage act normal or natural if they know the seriousness of my health history. So, I'm incredibly thankful for the friends and people in my life who do handle it and are willing to go the extra mile to be a friend to me. My boyfriend most definitely is a person who has always been willing and happy to go an extra mile or two just to make me happy or make my life a little easier. Words just don't put my gratitude to justice.

Being sick for so many years, its easy to feel like a burden to the people around you. At many times I've felt like a burden or a job to Justin, because he literally is an EMT, that IS his job. But amazingly, this whole vacation he said he wasn't worried or stressed at all, neither of us were, and that alone says a lot about how far I've come.

It is sad to me sometimes to think that he's never even known what I'm like or who I am as a 100% healthy person, but the blessing about him only having known "sick me" is that our entire relationship has been built upon finding the absolute best in even the hardest times. It doesn't take a ton to make us feel really happy and fulfilled in the time we spend together. Genuinely really enjoying each others company and our conversations IS what our relationship's foundation, and I love that about us.

Having this trip and being able to do so much went so far above and beyond our expectations. It truly was amazing, and I'm so thankful to have shared such a big milestone with a person who has been such an essential part of why I'm still alive and here on this planet.

There were many moments on this trip were I forgot about all the hell I've been though the last 6 years, I felt normal, I felt like the old me, "healthy me", and that rarely ever happens to me!

As I'm healing and getting better and better, it's been a re-awakening or a re-birth of me and who I am as a person. This whole journey has been such a transformation and metamorphosis. I've grown and learned so so much as a person in the last 6 years.

There are so many parts of myself that I had long thought died and had come to peace with never having those parts of myself again, but so many things just keep waking back up. It's been amazing for me to be rediscovering parts of myself that have been dormant for so many years, and it's incredible to get to see Justin get to meet and love all these new healthy sides to me too.

He met and loved me so wholly even when I was just broken pieces, and I'd found peace and happiness in that state too. All of this is just bonuses and blessings and miracles and gifts from... idk someone out there who loves me.

I'm blown away with how far I've come in two years since that time, and how far I've come in even just the last year! There's no way I could've done this trip even just 6 months ago!

Yes, I am still held back physically, and still have a ways to go until I'm "healthy." But this trip was such a big accomplishment and such a huge milestone. It's a true testament of how far I've come and I am just beyond grateful for my progress and that I'm still continuing to heal.

This whole post I've been trying so hard to put all of these feelings into words and this still doesn't even come close to expressing the amount of gratitude I feel. To put things as simply as possible...

I am the happiest and most fulfilled I have ever been.

I am grateful. I am humble. I am blessed. 

Thank you Justin for loving me through good times and bad. You truly are one of my biggest unsung heroes. You mean the world to me, and I know this is just the first of many vacations we will get to take together. ❤️

Thank you to my parents for making this trip happen, and for all of your love and support and your continued help in getting me healthy.

Thank you to my family and friends for sticking by me and being happy to be my safety net.

(and last but not least)

Thank you to all the "someones out there who love me."😇 I see you.😘 I love you too. Thank you for everything. 💖

6 Year Anniversary Of Being Chronically Ill

As I said in my last post, it's been so long since I've written about my life that I'm gonna have to break it all down into smaller parts. In my last post,  5 Months, 6 Years, and 7 Splinters,  I talked about the loss of my friend Alex, whom died from the same chronic illnesses I have (Lyme, Co-infections, and MCAS.)
If you want to hear more of the story of my 6 years of chronic illness then you should check out my Vlog playlist "Lyme Diaries" (<-click to watch.) I talk all about my health journey, I talk about what my illnesses are, what it feels like to be sick, and I even share some of Alex's story too.

In my last post I also said that in my next post (this post) I'd talk more about how 6 years of chronic illness has effected me, so that's what we're doing here today!

Every year of this 6 years of being sick has been so vastly different on every level - physical, mental, emotional, spiritual, etc. Like I said in my last post, the only real consistent thing about the last 6 years of my life is how inconsistent everything has been. Everything is always changing, but I guess thats just life huh? Nothing ever stays the same for long. Thankfully though that's how the world and nature is designed, it's supposed to change. Look at the seasons for example, look at how different summer and winter are, or spring and fall, but look at how nature just adapts and moves with the changes and not against it. 

A huge thing I've learned over the past 6 years and gotten pretty good at is to not fight change. "Why stress about things you can't control?" That's something I've always said. I've learned to adapt, and thankfully I'm actually learning how to thrive in my quickly ever-changing life. 

But even though I've come so far and now am a good 80% better (which is the best I've done in, 6 years), I still have my moments of struggle. About a week before the official 6 year anniversary, I completely fell apart. After 6 years I've noticed that I do have some patterns, and one pattern is that I always break down around the anniversary of when I got sick. So I fully knew I was going to have a breakdown, I expected that much, but every year it's so different, so I never know when exactly my breakdown will be or how it will effect me. 

I thought that since I'm doing so much better and I'm so much happier that I would breeze though the anniversary this year! But I thought wrong. Sadly, it hurt more than ever this year. It seems like every year the pain of everything I've lost only has just gotten more and more painful.

I was disappointed that it hurt so badly and that I had to re-greive over everything all over again, and not only was I grieving all of my own pain and losses, but I felt the guilt of having my family go through so much too, and I grieved the loss of Alex too. I kept wondering why her? Why me? Why did she die even though she'd only been diagnosed for a year, but I've been sick for all these years and I'm the one who lived?

Playing the guessing game of "why" or "what if" never goes well, and spoiler alert, you never get those questions answered. Sometimes we simply just don't get to know "why." But even though I already know that I won't have those questions answered, I still found myself asking those questions anyway...

I cried, a lot, and I let myself go through the whole rainbow of emotions because another thing I've learned in the last 6 years is that emotions will always be felt, and tears will always eventually be cried. You can wall yourself up, and hold it all in all you want, but eventually you will feel it all because emotions demand to be felt and you will go through the 7 stages of greif at one point or another. I learned those lessons the hard way too.

But I think the reason the anniversary hurts more each year has a lot to do with the fact that I'm still in this fight after 6 whole years. Yes, I'm in remission. Yes, I'm 80% better and still steadily improving. Those are both incredible things that I'm SO grateful for too! But I work very hard at my healing every day and it's a delicate balance that I've just gotten very good at, I'm still limited and held back, and I'm not healthy or back to living a "normal" life. This time of year always makes me very acutely aware of all of the things I'm unable to do too.

For example:
-Over summer everyone travels and posts pictures of the amazing places they go to. I used to be like that, I was that person who traveled and I loved photographing my travels. But I haven't been able to fly for 6 years, and later this month I'll be going on my first real vacation in 6 years. (I'm going to Newport Beach, CA for a week with my boyfriend.)
-People go to concerts, parties, events, adventures, road trips, and all sorts of things and I used to live like that, but I just can't anymore, not with my health as fragile as it still is. (I was able to go to 2 concerts this summer, but I used to go to TONS, and I miss that.)

-Everyone is going back to school currently, and I can't go to school still. I did independent studies all through high school, and I had to drop out of college 2 years ago because my health tanked and I almost died...again!
-Lots of people my age have jobs too, and I can't work.
-I don't drive because I haven't been healthy enough. I'm just now at a point where I can start leaning.
-People my age are even starting to have kids and start families and that absolutely is something I want, and even that I can't do because my body isn't healthy enough to create or carry a child, and for sure I don't have the energy to raise or financially support a child on my on either!

I see so many people doing things I've been wanting to do for years, and I see myself in what feels like the exact same place, and it sucks! Plain and simple! It sucks!

The only people I know who truly understand how difficult and triggering certain times of year are, are other chronically ill people. It's just tough, and sadly a lot of people don't even understand why you're sad. From their perspective they don't think you're missing out on much, and I've had so many people tell me to "just move on, leave the past in the past."

It's not that simple.

I've been sick (which by the way has at times been excruciatingly painful, on every level) and my life has been abruptly halted for 6 years of my life. 6 YEARS!

To put that in perspective for you, I got sick when I was 14, and I am now 20.
6 years total - which hasn't been a walk in the park! It's consumed of being house bound, with head to toe pain, plus neurological symptoms like depression and panic attacks, I had no friends (for most of it), and as we just talked about, I've been extremely limited in what I can do. Ya know... just to list some of it.
6 years of that.
6 years out of my 20.
6/20 = 3/10 = 30%
30% of my life I've spent sick.
One third of my life!
This has literally consumed and taken up one third of the life I've lived thus far, and not just that, it's almost killed me on a few occasions!

It's. Been. Hard.
And sometimes you just have to re-grieve all of the hard times you've faced.

Don't get me wrong, I am extremely grateful for my progress, that I'm so much healthier, that I'm doing more than I've been able to do in 6 years, and that I'm genuinely the happiest and most myself I've been maybe ever. But I want more than this, and by that I mean that I don't want to be held back by an illness! I don't want to feel like I'm stuck on the sidelines just watching life go by! I want to live.

To clarify farther, I don't want to go out and be wild and reckless. I just want to live without walls being in my way. I want to go out and do things and have fun and not have to constantly worry or stress if something is going to bottom out my health all the way back down to zero. I want to make a life for myself. I want to be able to live on my own. I want to have a family. I want to be healthy enough to do these things and even just to be able to do simple things like going to the grocery store on my own! It's not all big things that I'm unable to do, there are still simple little daily life things that I'm unable to do, or that I need help doing.

I was born a strong independent woman, and I want to be able to stand on my own two feet!


During the breakdown, my vision was 6/20. - I could only focus on the hard and painful truth that I've been sick for a 3rd of my life. I saw struggle, and pain, and what felt like failure after failure.

Post breakdown, my vision is 20/20. - I now am focusing on the fact that it is a straight up miracle that I'm alive, and that I'm incredibly blessed to have lived 20 years with all the highs and the lows too. I see strength, determination, a plethora of successes, and bounds of growth on every level of my being.


A breakdown will make you re-live your lowest lows, and yes that sucks, but once you rise again you can move forward with so much more perspective about how far you've come because you get to re-live all your highest highs.

I have been on such a long, tough journey, and there are not enough words for me to express how grateful I'm am for everything I've learned along the way. Yes, I've lost a lot, but I gained so much that I never would've had unless my life took this detour. I've met amazing people, I've helped amazing people, I found my purpose in life, I found faith and hope, I found love, I found...me.

I'm truly, genuinely, deeply happy with where I am right now!

For the first time in my life I learned how to be happy with where I am right now, to live in the moment and enjoy today for what it is without thinking of the past or the future. But I also allow myself to feel emotions and I don't beat myself if I do feel sad about the past or if I worry about the future. I do my best every single day, and I'm happy with that.

And yet, even with all of that, I still know how to dream and hope for even better days, and I have faith that they surely do lie ahead!

I found balance.

I don't know when exactly this detour will be over and a more "normal" life will resume, but until then, I'll do my best to enjoy the ride, enjoy the scenic route, to keep learning, and I most definitely will be counting my blessings. 

The moral of the story and the message of all of this is to allow yourself to feel highs and lows without guilt or shame or beating yourself up. You're human. You feel. It's okay to not be okay sometimes, and it's also okay to be super happy and confident and proud at other times. Life just has it's ups and downs, but life is designed and meant to change, and so are we.

Don't fight the waves of change, ride them. 🏄

5 Months, 6 Years, and 7 Splinters

Yesterday was a totally average day for me - laundry, cooking, yoga, playing with my fur babies, etc. - I was in an average mood, just doing my normal daily things. It wasn't until almost bedtime that I realized that it was the 6 year anniversary of when my chronic illness officially began. -- August 24, 2012 ... Nothing has ever been the same since that day.

In realizing what day it was, I also realized that yesterday marked 5 months since my dear friend, Alex passed away from the same chronic illnesses I too have. -- She passed away on March 24, 2018 ... Nothing has ever been the same since that day too.


Some may have noticed, or maybe not, that I haven't been blogging as much this year. I've been journaling more than I ever have before, so it's not like I've run out of thoughts or things to say. But I've been struggling to write publicly for a while now.
A huge part of that is due to me losing a friend to the same illnesses I have, but also, it's due to the fact that every year of being sick is just so different for me - emotionally, mentally, physically, even spiritually. No year has been the same. Honestly, the only real consistent thing about the past 6 years of my life is how inconsistent everything has been.

It's been a pretty crazy year though, and even just this week has been crazy! There's been lots of emotions, a huge emotional breakdown, and I randomly got 7 splinters on my knuckle from God knows what?! Like what does that even mean?! 7 splinters?! Does it mean after the 7th year this will be over? Was this some crazy 7 years of bad luck thing??

Since it's been so long since I've written about my life I'll have to break it down and resist from writing about everything all at once. In my next post (whenever that may take place, hopefully soon) I'll talk more about the 6 year anniversary and how it's effected me this year, but today I really feel most compelled to talk about Alex and her impact on my life.


Losing Alex really tore me up to say the least, and 5 months later, I still have waves of grief and sometimes even survivors guilt.
Yes, we only knew each other for a little less than a year and only ever met in person once just in a brief passing, but she was one of the truest, kindest, most genuine and caring people I have ever met. She didn't have a mean bone in her body.
But even more special than that, she understood me. She understood my illnesses, she felt what I had felt, and even if we couldn't perfectly put it into words, we silently knew that we knew exactly what the other felt and what we were going through. When we met a year ago, for the first time in 5 years I had a person who completely understood my illnesses.

Sure, I know many people with Lyme now, but she was the first girl I'd met who was close to my own age and had Lyme, the same co-infection as me, AND she had MCAS (mast cell activation syndrome.) I didn't know any other people who had MCAS! I went from feeling so alone in my suffering to suddenly just having this amazing, super optimistic friend who had been living an extremely identical life to me!

I was told for years by the medical community too that I was just some medical mystery and they'd imply that I was crazy or making things up, and so to meet a girl who'd gone through that too and for us both to have lived and felt the same things, it was extremely validating for us both! I wasn't alone. We weren't alone.


As I've now shared with Alex's family since her passing, once I got sick I never prayed anymore, especially not for myself. The only thing I always prayed for was to just have one person, one friend who just understood everything I was going through. I can't even tell you how many sleepless nights I would cry and just beg the universe to send me someone. Just one person, that's all I needed, and I was so desperate to have that. Just one person...
When I met Alex that prayer was finally answered.

No, we didn't know each other for long, but she was the answer to my prayers and a huge hole that had been a part of me for 5 years was finally filled. She brought me so much peace, and happiness, and light, and love, and just bounds of inspiration because my god that girl just glowed with such a palpable radiance of love and hope and faith and all things good. I mean, if I ever could imagine what an angel would be like if they lived here on earth, that was it, she was it, that was Alex!


Losing her is beyond tragic, for everyone, but how lucky am I to have had such a pure hearted person in my life, even if it was just for a flash. I had a beautiful friend, and someone who truly understood my biggest struggles in life, and what a miracle and blessing is that? That's priceless.

She may be physically gone, but she is still so present. There has not been a day that I haven't felt her with me, and that girl is just a master at sending signs from heaven too. I've spoken to her family too and ALL of us get lots of signs from Alex, and most commonly in the from of happy little birdies.

All of the amazing things she radiated when she was here on earth have only just amplified now that she truly is a full on guardian angel. She truly radiates just this incredibly palpable level of love, light, hope, positivity, and faith that I honestly could ever imagine, and when I met her I was a person who hadn't had faith for years, and had long ago lost my hope. The only people I've seen who's every radiates that much love and light was when I spent a week with the monks last summer. It was such a palpable energy. I could feel God shining through them, and I can feel God shining through Alex.

It is downright the most awe-inspiring thing I've ever been a part of or witnessed or felt. I feel honored to be a part of it. It's just been so life changing and so inspiring.


As I said earlier, I do struggle with survivors guilt sometimes, but Alex always goes out of her way to remind me that "everything happens for a reason." That is a phrase that I always would say when I first got sick, and I still believe it to be true.

Last night I listened to music and "I Hope You Dance" by Lee Ann Womack (click to listen) came on and it just felt like Alex speaking to me. She was reminding me that everything happens for a reason.
Much like the song, she inspired me to reconsider my faith, give heaven more than just a passing glance, and to just let in the love and light, and let it shine out of me.

I don't know why she had to leave so soon, or why exactly I'm the one who's still here, and maybe I never will fully know "why." All I know is that I trust that there is a higher purpose, I have hope that maybe someday I'll understand, and until then, I have faith that I will be guided and helped along my journey by kind people in this world, kind souls who are beyond, and whoever or whatever is the higher power that guides us all through this crazy journey of life and beyond.



Thank you, Alex... for everything.
I promise to give heaven more than just a passing glance, I'll always give faith a fighting chance, when I'm by the ocean and feeling small and humble I'll smile and think of you, I won't fear the mountains in the distance, I'll never regret loving, I won't let bitterness win, I'll never take a single breath for granted, and I promise if I get the chance to sit it out or dance, I'll dance, and I'll smile because I know you'll be dancing right there with me too.

I miss you.
I love you.
But I know we're always together in the heart.

"Together forever, never apart, maybe in distance, but never in heart."

All my love,
Savannah💖

2 Years Since My Graduation!

2 years ago today, I graduated as Valedictorian of my class and I gave this speech. 

Believe it or not, I've had terrible stage fright my entire life, and still to this day I'm amazed I was able to deliver such a strong speech. It's the first speech I'd ever given too. AND I was having such a bad health day that day! But I somehow managed to look and sound totally normal! That's a HUGE win for a chronically ill person!

One and a half years ago, just 6 months after I gave this graduation speech, I was dying. I was back down to the absolute my sickest point again, and I was barely hanging on by a thread. 

I didn't think I would make it. 

For the first time, I actually just told my mom earlier this week that when I got to that point I started to write letters to everyone because I didn't think I'd live much longer, and I didn't want to leave things unsaid. 

I had been on death's doorstep before then, and I'd never written anything or planned my life for after I'd die. But, a year and a half ago, I was doing those things. 

Writing those letters is hands down the hardest and most painful thing I have ever done in my life, and that's saying a lot too. 

It deeply changed me as a person... 

Writing letters to the people you love most in the world talking about how "I'm sorry I didn't make it" is extremely hard and painful, but not just that, I really, truly believed and 100% felt I would not live much longer beyond the point that I started writing those letters. 

It's a feeling I barely know how to put into words, and it's a feeling I hope most people never experience...

I never finished writing my letters though. I only got through a few of them and I had a "come to Jesus" type moment where I realized, "What am I doing? Why am I doing this? Why am I giving up? I don't give up!" 

I realized I had come back to the point of needing to choose if I was going to live or die, and acting that way, I was choosing death. 

After 5 years of battling terrible illnesses, I don't think anyone would've resented or blamed me for being exhausted and throwing in the towel, but I did...I resented me for it. I don't give up. That completely goes against who I am as a person, and not just that, but many many years ago I made my mom a promise that I would fight til the end and never give up. So long as she fights for me, I will fight too. I realized though, that within that promise was another flaw in my plans. 

A year and a half ago, I could no longer live just for the sake of my family, I realized I had to want to and choose to live for ME. 

I knew it was the only way I could survive. 

I balled my eyes out, I left those letters in the past, and I chose to live, for me. 

I slowly began to rebuild and redefine my life, yet again, and I'm now in a place I never could've imagined. I'm such a different person that who I was 6 years ago, and even just 2 years ago, and I couldn't feel more proud or grateful for the amount of love, support, growth, and life changing inspiration I've encountered on my journey. 

It is a flat out MIRACLE that I am alive today, and that's something I know for sure and something I never take for granted anymore.

5 years ago, I technically should've died from being undiagnosed and untreated for a year. 

That, plus the amount of times I've almost died over the years due to my illnesses, the pain, exhaustion, not sleeping, my heart struggling, my gut failing me, the completely mind altering depression, depersonalization, or being suicidal, or so many other things I've struggled with!

I'm sure it's easy for people to look at me and say "I always knew you'd make it." Or they see me healthy now and just never think I could've lost my life to these illnesses. But the people who really saw me and were with me through this illness know... My family, my boyfriend, my doctors, my medical "team"... they know how much of a miracle it is that I'm alive. They saw how much of me died when I was at my lowest and darkest moments. 

As many know, I lost a friend of mine, back in March, to all of the same illnesses I have/had. Our stories are so paralleled, and losing her totally tore my family up emotionally, not only because it was a tragic loss of a beautiful soul, but because it was a true testament to how close we were to that being me. 

THAT is another feeling I hardly know how to describe, and wish people never have to experience that either because yes, I am still alive, but we know how much of me truly did die along this journey. It's such a deep pain for all of us...

...

Yesterday afternoon, my second to youngest cousin graduated high school. 

Our dads are identical twins, and so genetically she and her two brothers are actually my half siblings. That's a theory I mentioned at a family BBQ at their house a few years back. Since then, a few of us have done genetic testing, and sure enough, genetically they are my half siblings!

So really, she's not just a cousin to me. 

How fitting too that we graduated 2 years apart and almost exactly to the day!! Just one day off!

AND

The girl who's name was called right before her, her first name is Savannah! The only Savannah in her whole class! 

Coincidence? I think not. ;)

I was on the verge of tears for most of the graduation, not just because I am so proud and happy for her and her family, but because watching her graduation had me reflecting so much about my past and how far I've come since my graduation. 

More than anything, I feel so incredibly blessed to just be alive.

I felt so blessed to just be there, to witness that huge milestone in her and her family's lives. I also just feel so grateful for how far I've come in the 2 years since I graduated. Little by little I am carving out a whole new life, and a new normal that I love and am so proud of. ❤️

What a big chapter of our lives ending...

I'm excited to see what the future holds for us all, and I feel so blessed and grateful for this journey. ❤️

...

Today, I woke up and watched my Valedictorian speech for the first time in a long time. I had tears in my eyes, chills covering my body, and an overflowing amount of gratitude in my heart. Afterwards, I sat there and out loud, I said "Thank you." to the universe, god, the guardian angels, and whoever all is out there and has been looking out for me and has helped me get to where I am today. 

Thank you, to those of you who have been a part of making me into the person I am.

A HUGE thank you to the people who have actively helped me too. 

Most of all, thank you to my family, and my boyfriend too. Justin, you're an unsung hero I don't publicly give credit to nearly often enough. ❤️

I'm grateful for all of you though and for everything you've done. 

After living through being on death's doorstep more than a handful of times, I'm just unbelievingly grateful for life. It's something I'm never sure I'll ever be able to accurately express. I mean... I was given more than just a second chance at life, I was given...9 lives!

(For those of you who know me well, you'd know that 9 has been my lucky number my entire life, I've always loved cats, I have lots of cats, AND I've always said that if I were an animal I would be a cat of some kind. So my 9 lives are so fitting!😉)

What a life...

What a crazy chapter...

Thank you to everyone who's been a part of it!

On to the next chapter!!! ❤️ ❤️ ❤️ ❤️ ❤️ ❤️ ❤️ ❤️ ❤️

One Year Later... Happy 20th Birthday To Me!

As you have probably noticed, I haven't blogged nearly as much this year, and if I'm gonna be honest, it's not just the blogging that stopped. I stopped writing altogether for a while there in 2017. For a long time I had nothing good to say, no new updates, and I just couldn't bring myself to write more about my "doom and gloom." But even when my luck changed and my life started coming back together, I still couldn't write. I still don't know why that is.

From where I was one year ago at this time, to where I am now, it's like two completely different worlds. Everything has changed! I have written and vlogged a few times talking about the positive changes I've had in a year, and how much my health has improved, but there is SO MUCH that I haven't even begun to share.

I have been at such a loss of how to put it all into words, but I want to share the crazy journey I've been on. I still don't know how exactly I'm going to word it all and share it, but I'm working on that.

For starters, I wanted to just write this, say hi, tell you all that I miss writing and I'm starting back up on it. The holidays, New Year's, and then my birthday all happening very close to each other always spark a lot of emotions for me. I get very introspective and reflect very deeply into my life, my past, and myself. Last year, it broke me to reflect on how everything had changed for the worse. This year, it still hurts me to think back on how far gone I was a year ago. I've found myself going through a grieving process over my past, and I'm actually okay with it. I'm happy to be feeling real, genuine emotions again, and to be processing them in a healthy manor. I'm acknowledging how it makes me feel, I'm processing it, I'm going to write about it, and then I'm going to move on.

Along with mourning my past, I'm also extremely thankful for where I'm at now. There are not enough words in the world to accurately express the amount of gratitude I have for the progress I have made. I did try my best to sum up last year though and express some of that gratitude in a letter that I wrote and called "Dear 2017." You can click on that and read the written version, or if you'd like you can click here and watch the video I made for my YouTube channel of me reading that letter.


As for it almost being my birthday, I really want to talk about the article I wrote a year ago for my birthday. It was so depressive, but I was being honest about where I was at in life. I'm going to include some quotes of that post because I really want to update on this.


"It breaks my heart that my birthday is tomorrow and I'm so unhappy and so strongly not wanting to be alive."..."It's all so heartbreaking and disappointing and unexpected that I don't even know how to really cope with it."
...
"4 years ago, I was sleeping in a room that wasn't mine, in a bed that wasn't mine, in sheets that weren't mine, in a mind and body that didn't feel like mine either. 

4 years later, nothing has changed. I'm back to sleeping in the same room and bed and sheets that have never been or felt like mine. My body and mind feel foreign again. I feel lost, deeply unhappy, and suicidal once again. I want to disappear and I find myself wishing I'd never existed. I lose hours staring blankly at the same old curtains that I used to stair at, that, and every night I watch the clock that still is broken and motionless, as if it will suddenly miraculously tick for the first time in years. It never moves, and yet every night I find myself watching it and waiting for a miracle that I know isn't coming. 

I realized tonight that just like the clock on the wall that one day just suddenly stopped ticking and froze in time, I did the same. My life stopped abruptly, and 4 years later I'm literally in the exact same place. Literally!"

...

"It's extremely hard to keep living when your body and mind both stop wanting you to."
...
"I'm still desperately trying to hold on and all I can feel is myself and everything just slipping farther and farther away."
...

"I'm in the same room and the same bed and the same sheets that all aren't mine. I'm stuck in a body that hasn't felt like mine for years, and a mind that is back to feeling frighteningly foreign. I stared at the same old curtains that I used to stare at 4 years ago, and now I'm staring at the clock... The clock that hasn't moved in 4 years. Still shining, hung perfectly, and infinitely motionless, and now I can't seem to decide if the clock that's forever frozen in time is either starring down at me or watching over me. 

At the beginning of this I felt like the sudden random turn of bad luck events that brought to me to be sleeping in this room again was the universe hating me. I felt like this was some kind of seriously sick joke, that all this time later while I'm going through hell in life right now and it's just fucked up for me to have to sleep in here. I was not amused. But now I'm just looking up at the clock wondering if maybe I took it wrong. Maybe the universe doesn't just hate me. Maybe there's some kind of hidden meaning I'm supposed to understand from this. 

I know it can't just be random that I'm sleeping in this room again for the first time in 4 years, and it can't just be a coincidence that health wise and mentally I'm doing just as bad now as I was then. It can't be. The universe can't hate me that much. Can it? 

I hope not. 

I feel like I'm supposed to understand something from this. It has to mean something..."

Firstly, I want to just say that I'm doing great now, all around great. If you want to hear more about how I'm doing now, you can read my last article or watch my last video, "Dear 2017." I'm very happy with where I'm at and I'm very excited to be turning 20 and to have a pajama party game night with my family. I can't imagine a better way to spend my birthday. I wouldn't change a thing. 

The reason I wanted talk about this article and the thing I want to update on is ... I am still sleeping in this room, even though I never meant to stay in here so long. I'm currently writing this from the bed, and sheets, and room that aren't STILL mine. But I'm happy to say that for the first time in many many years, I actually feel like myself again. My mind and body no longer feel "frighteningly foreign." This room may not be mine, but I did find a way to make it feel like home.

I am planning to move back to my room soon, but I found it SO symbolic that I ended up staying in this room for a full year. As you can tell by my writing a year ago, I was not happy to be back in this room, in the same place as I was 4 years prior. But at the end of the article you also can see that I suddenly started to question "Maybe I took this wrong. Maybe the universe doesn't actually hate me. Maybe this means something and I just don't understand it...yet."

My last thoughts were correct. I did take it wrong...at first. The universe doesn't hate me; it was a lesson. There were many reasons I was in this room this year, and I'll have to talk more about that at a later date.

I am a firm believer that everything happens for a reason, and I fully believe that I was meant to  be in this room, and for a full year too. I was forced to make peace with this room and the bad memories it once held. I had to quite literally face my demons, and take back control over my life and my surroundings. As much as I hated being in the EXACT place I started, I needed to be exactly here. I did need to start over. It just wasn't the type of starting over that I initially thought it would be. My health didn't have to start it's 4 year journey over, like how I thought it would. No, it was ME that needed to start over and go on a journey I'd been avoiding my entire life.

Like destiny, I got pushed to the edge of a crazy spiritual journey, and as always, I froze and thought about running away. I stood on the edge, afraid of the vast unknowns that lied ahead of me, and as I talked about in Dear 2017, I met two women who changed everything. They empowered me to jump right into the deep end of this crazy journey, and I've never looked back. It's been the most incredible journey. I'm embracing "the wonder that is me", as one of those women would word it. I'm enjoying the ride, and man oh man do I have some amazing things to share and talk about sometime soon... I'll be writing much more this year, so stay tuned for LOTS more to come.  

But the moral of this story is, yes, everything does happen for a reason.