The Year That Knocked Us Down - And the God Who Carried Us
A story of refinement, surrender, and the God who met us eight hours from home.
I Get Knocked Down… Processing a Year I Never Saw Coming
You know that 90’s song by Smash Mouth where the chorus goes, “I get knocked down, but I get up again, you’re never gonna keep me down”?
That’s what this past year has felt like. And even more so, it’s what I felt moving to Boston.
These past few weeks - getting to this point - have been nothing short of God’s provision. Where the impossible was stacked against us, God did the impossible. He put the right people in our path, opened doors we couldn’t force open, and carried us when we couldn’t carry ourselves.
But the emotional roller coaster? It took its toll. The uncertainty. The devastation. The wreckage. It felt like a tornado tore through our lives, and we were left sifting through the pieces trying to find what was salvageable - what really mattered.
And the truth is:
What really matters isn’t material things or status.
It’s the people who love you through the hard.
It’s the community that rallies when you feel lost.
It’s the body of Christ lifting you in ways you didn’t know were possible.
It’s the wonder and awe of childlike faith through the eyes of a six-year-old.
It’s bold prayers to a God who does the impossible.
It’s mustard-seed faith that still moves mountains.
It’s the unexpected people who show up in the wreckage - and love you back to life.
Packing Up a Life in Days
How do you pack up your life - and everything you need for your extremely sick child - in a matter of days, with no guarantee how long you'll be gone?
How do you stay strong mentally while your body is exhausted and your heart is drained?
How do you hold space for the big emotions of kids who will once again spend a holiday season without their mom in the way that is familiar to them?
You just do.
You do the hard.
You do the suck.
You rely on the strength of God to get you from point A to point B.
You lean on every message, prayer, and voice cheering you on.
You trust that home will always wait for you.
And the irony?
All of this is temporary.
But so is this life.
And yet - what do we waste our days doing? Doomscrolling? Surviving? Going through the motions? I’m sure half a dozen things came to mind at that question.
Here I sit, eight hours away from the people who ground me, and I understand home now in a way I never did growing up.
I never understood what home was supposed to feel like. My childhood was marked by dysfunction - drugs, alcohol, abuse, manipulation handed down through generations. My body learned to survive, not to trust. It learned to rely on nothing but itself. Those survival patterns became my shield for years… until God began the long work of undoing them.
But God.
I wasn’t meant to carry that.
I wasn’t meant to live in burnout and survival mode.
But refinement is messy. It strips you down. It humbles you. It frustrates you. It forces you deeper into the wilderness and into surrender.
And all of it… shaped the strength I needed to be here. In Boston. As the sole caregiver for Logan. For however long this takes.
I fought for this. For him. For our family. I refused to give up on a system that failed us.
And God didn’t waste a moment of it.
Leaving Home
Leaving home hurt more than I expected - because home finally means something to me now that it never did growing up. Townsend Church became the first place I ever truly understood what it felt like to be loved without conditions, to be held up when I was running on empty, to be surrounded by family I wasn’t born into but was given by God. That kind of home is hard to walk away from.
When it was finally time to go, all it took was Jax hugging me for the tears to spill over. His sweet face told me it was okay to have BIG feelings - that I could go to the Well and leave them with God.
Then he asked if he could pray for me.
As I held him close, tears running down onto his head, he prayed the exact prayer my heart didn’t even know it needed. Addie ran along side the car to the end of the street, waving and yelling how much she loved me - her “soggy waffle". Logan and I cried as their faces blurred in the rearview mirror and the weight of the journey ahead settled in.
This was the beginning of our next chapter.
The beginning of healing.
The beginning of trusting God in a deeper way than I ever have.
And even though I am stretched thin and often feel like I have nothing left to give, there is still grace. Grace for the long days. Grace for the moments I’m not the friend I want to be. Grace for the parts of me still healing. And grace for the deep ache of missing home - because home is no longer a place of fear or survival.
Home is safety now.
Home is community.
Home is the people God hand-picked for us years before we knew how much we would need them.
And leaving that behind, even temporarily, has been one of the hardest parts of this journey.
Arriving in a Strained, Strange New World
Logan fell the first night we got here. His legs just gave out on the steps leading into the old apartment building we’re staying in. It’s one of the many reasons we’re here in Boston, and yet for him, it was devastating - 15 years old, in an unfamiliar place, trying so hard not to leave the burden of unloading the truck on me alone. He didn’t have to say what I already knew he was thinking. His legs just wouldn’t work. He had to think about walking. He had to think about every single step. He had to stop to breathe and regroup.
You take for granted the comfort of your own space until you’re forced into a new one - one with less-than-ideal sleeping arrangements, loud neighbors, and strong food odors. For a kid with chronic, uncontrollable pain, functional nausea, abdominal pain, and sensory issues, all of this has only intensified his irritability and frustrations, especially after long clinic days. He is being stretched, pushed and refined in his own ways right now, and as a mom, all I can do is show him grace and love, unconditionally.
The roads here are narrow and tight, and parking is a nightmare - and expensive everywhere you go. It costs me $25 a day just to park at the treatment facility where Logan is seen five days a week.
And the city…I used to love ... it's changed a lot in 15 years... it’s rougher. Less Kindness. Less Joy. Less Smiles. Less patience. Less Peace. Less Self-Control. Less Gentleness. Less Light…
I had a woman deliberately slam her car door into my truck and laugh as she squeezed out of her too-tight parking spot at Trader Joe’s. What she didn’t know was …
I had cried over frozen lettuce the night before and that was my reason for even being there.
I was exhausted.
I had been in the city for three days.
I was figuring everything out in sleet and freezing temperatures.
I was caring for a severely sick child alone.
That I have fought - and continue to fight - for his life.
And I was doing my best.
I chose to drive away.
I chose to speak Jesus over the alternative thoughts.
I chose to be a light in a really dark world on a really dark day.
You truly never know what someone is walking through.
What Our Days in Boston Really Look Like
So what do our days in Boston look like?
They are long. And they are full.
It’s only been a couple of days so far, and already it’s overwhelming. Everyone agrees we’re in the best place and hopeful they can help, but I can’t ignore the small, aching place of fear and disbelief inside me - the fear that he still won’t get the help he needs. There are so many precautionary words being used in clinic meetings, so much uncertainty, because Logan is so unique and complex. They simply aren’t equipped for all of his needs. So I’m learning to release that fear and trust that God didn’t bring us this far just to leave us.
My day starts at 5:45 so I have time to regulate my nervous system before I enter full caregiver mode. I hydrate, do a devotional, breathe, pray, and ground myself. Then I choose a little note from the jar Addie made me for my birthday - one message for each day we’re here. They make me smile, and somehow each one is exactly what I needed to hear.
I actually sit and eat breakfast - something I’ve never really done. I’ve always lived on “working breakfasts,” rushing from one thing to the next. But here I sit, in front of the Christmas tree, eating a warm meal. And it feels different. Slower. Sacred.
Then I get ready and prepare my bone broth and collagen for the morning meetings.
At 7:00 AM, I start waking Logan. Mornings are rough for him, mostly because of abdominal pain and nausea from his overnight feed. He needs supervision and constant prompts because of his cognition issues. We leave around 7:30 to drive the two miles to the hospital - a 15+ minute drive in the city, or an hour by train.
Once we park, we sit for a minute. We breathe. We pause. We pray. He always holds my hand when we pray, and I soak it up until he realizes he’s still holding it after we say “Amen.” He laughs, rolls his eyes, and we walk inside.
Depending on the day, I have family sessions for the first one to two hours with the various specialists working with him. On Wednesdays, I have caregiver support sessions in the afternoon too.
Once I’m released for the day, I walk back to our apartment (weather permitting) to decompress. I eat lunch. I try to tackle some work. Then I walk back again to pick him up at 4:00 PM.
That’s when our nights get tough.
His days are long and packed - every hour a new specialist, a new evaluation, a new stretch of mental and physical demand. His interdisciplinary team is huge and they work together nonstop. Right now it’s a lot of assessments and planning. It drains him.
By the end of the day, he struggles to walk. He’s irritable, prickly, overwhelmed.
And because I’ve taken time and space for myself, I’m able to stay more grounded through the meltdowns. I don’t match his anxiety. I stay steady so he can find steady. I offer reassurance, comfort, redirection - and it is so much less exhausting when I’ve had a break and someone else has carried part of the load.
At 5:00 PM we start a bolus feed - which he hates. His stomach and GI tract have essentially shut down and forgotten how to work. Everything is misfiring - his nervous system, his brain-body connection. He has to relearn how to eat again. We have to remind his stomach that food is safe.
I prepare dinner, hoping he might take a bite or two. I get things ready for the next morning because choosing my battles makes the day easier. The more I prep the night before, the fewer struggles we face when he’s tired and in pain.
By 9:00 we start his nighttime routine. When he’s settled, I sit with him and ask him to tell me three things he’s grateful for. I ask him what was hard. I ask what he wants to pray about.
He grabs my hand.
We breathe in together.
We let it go.
And we leave it with God.
Then it’s my turn to decompress - screen-free. Depending on what I need, I use my acupressure mat, stretch, read, breathe, or listen to a meditation or devotional. I settle in for the night and let the day fall away.
Sometimes, tears come.
But even then, God is faithful.
Sometimes tears fall, but through all of this, God has been faithful and constantly reminds me of His hand in every detail.
In the provisions.
In strength I didn’t know I had.
In the generosity of so many - near and far, known and unknown.
In the messages that arrive at just the right moment.
In the ornaments filled with love from our church family that I’m preparing to hang on our tree.
There’s a shift in perspective when you pause long enough to see what really matters.
And yes… it’s okay to cry over frozen lettuce.
It’s all part of the refining process.
If you feel led to support our journey…
Many of you have asked how you can help as we navigate Logan’s care here in Boston. Your prayers, messages, and love have carried us more than you know. If God places it on your heart to support Logan’s ongoing medical needs, travel, and housing during this extended stay, we’ve created a GiveSendGo for our family:
We are so grateful for every prayer, every share, and every act of kindness. Truly.
