Every Pearl Starts as a Grain of Sand

Growing up in Raleigh we were always a few short hours from some of the most beautiful beaches in the country. This was something I really took for granted as a child. My grandparents had a condo in Pine Knoll Shores and we would go down there a few times a year. When you're young you don't understand how big the world is or that a place to stay at the beach is not always easy to come by and a privilege to be sure. It took me moving halfway across the country for me to realize just how much the beach meant to me and more specifically "my beach" - the beach I grew up going to. I have great family and childhood memories on one little beach in North Carolina. Without even realizing it, it was a place I had hoped to bring my family one day.

Just before my husband and I started dating, my grandparents sold their condo. At a later date I realized he would never get to experience this special place where I had so many family memories; a realization that made me a little sad. We still got our trip down to that beach - though in a different condo. Even though we have only been there together that one time, it still proved to be a memorable trip. One evening while we were walking on the beach we stopped at a beach bar for a drink. Cahill was very excited to talk about buying a house. Mind you we were still "just dating" at this time and I, quite frankly, was not really interested in buying a house with someone I was "just dating." So, I told him, "I'd like to buy a wedding dress before we buy a house." He smiled and said, "Okay." Four months and a Christmas bonus later, we were engaged. We bought our first house together later that year and, as it turned out, by then I had already bought my wedding dress ;-).

Cute little story aside, the questions still remained, in what places would we make our family memories together? What special moments would we create for our (future) children? What places would we love together?

A few years later when I was pregnant with our first daughter we headed to Raleigh for my hometown baby shower. After the party we planned to stay the following week and make a trip down to the beach - this time to Wrightsville Beach. My in-laws were coming to North Carolina for the shower and would be joining us at the beach also. I am not sure if this is true for all people but North Carolinians seem to have one preferred beach area where they go year after year. Wrightsville wasn't "my beach" but I was happy and grateful to have a beach week with my family. It would be a new experience for all of us together and there was something really special about that - new family, new place.

Our trip did not seem particularly significant at the time other than the fact that our parents got to know each other a little better and we were all excited about the new baby on the way. But what really makes this trip and ultimately this place special to me is the little God wink it provided us.

You all know the story that follows this: a beautiful baby girl and a cancer diagnosis. Somehow, just six weeks before all this life changing news, the six of us were together and most importantly my mom and my mother-in-law had the opportunity to become more friendly with one another. After visiting us in the hospital on "dx day", my mother-in-law was right there with my mom, stayed the night with her, was there for her and made sure she was not alone. A few weeks later my mom moved to Texas for the year to help us through my treatment however she could. She and my MIL, without hesitation, teamed up and provided the extra childcare and support we needed. Grandmothers of the year!! During that year they became great friends and I consider their friendship to be one of the best things that came from my diagnosis.

Had we not all been together for that week in Wrightsville, I know my mom and mother-in-law would have still become friends. Something about sharing a common heartache with someone just makes you closer. But this little trip in 2019 really started something special for our family. Not only was it the beginning of closer relationships and better friendships but it has become "our" place that we now come back to yearly with our family. This will be the image of the beach my girls think of and remember as adults. It's not the same place I dreamed about taking my future family one day, but that's okay. There is something special about making new memories in new places together.

When our picture of the life we thought we would have changes, it can be difficult to adjust. Of course, this adjustment is always much bigger than finding a different beach house to spend your family vacation. It's much easier to look at life in reverse and see where God had our backs all along. Whenever I'm back in Wrightsville Beach I think about that week in 2019 and know that that week was a gift to our family in more ways than we knew at the time. Places that hold meaning are about so much more than vacation. They're new beginnings, sweet family moments, rights of passage, turning points, comfortable environments, and transitions. They make up the story of our life.

Time's a thief, as they say, and even the transitions you're excited about can be difficult: a new job, becoming a parent, moving, graduating college. Not to mention the transitions and transformations we hope we never have to deal with: death, disease, divorce, etc. I have realized over the last few years that absolutely no one is protected from grief - from saying goodbye to people, places, expectations, and things we thought we knew. So how can you move forward and embrace the life ahead of you when you know you can't escape tragedy?

That's a question we're all trying to answer. The only answer that makes sense to me is through love and community. Through the people that you love and they love you in return. That is what gets us through. Jamie Anderson said,

“Grief, I've learned, is really just love. It's all the love you want to give, but cannot. All of that unspent love gathers in the corners of your eyes, the lump in your throat, and in the hollow part of your chest. Grief is just love with no place to go.”

You have to find a way to give that love a place to go.

I have been amazed by the Breast Cancer community from the minute I became part of it. Everyone I spoke to had so much grace and love to give because we all had all lost the same thing - a former version of yourself that we were not ready to let go of. We all wanted to give our past self a little love but could not. So instead, we gave it to each other.

I cannot relate to everyone's grief. Our losses are not the same (even among those who have similar experiences to mine) and it wouldn't be fair to pretend that they are. But I do think the answer to life after (any) loss lies somewhere in between love and community. Finding the right combination of that is not easy, but I know there are people out there that want to give you a place for that love to go. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Lean into your vulnerabilities a bit and the right people will come your way. Little by little you will find somewhere for the love to go and eventually begin to feel connected again - to new places, new things, new people - even though you never stop missing the things of the past.

Wrightsville Beach is one of those new places where my grief started to turn into love. None of us realized it at the moment. At the time I thought of it as a different type of new beginning. But now I know that God was there with us in 2019, bringing my families together and preparing us to support each other through the year(s) ahead.

I have said this before and I will say it again; the God I believe in does not cast heartache on us or "test" people with hardship. The God I believe in gives us the tools we need to get through the shit (let's call it what it is) that comes our way. And when we're finally on the other side, we have new places, new relationships, new friends, and little gifts that help us remember every pearl starts as a grain of sand.

Wrightsville Beach, NC 2019-2023