Hope Still Wins

Each year around this time, I step away to celebrate the life Trent is living in heaven and to thank the Lord for all He’s done in my life since those tragic days at the Blue Lagoon on September 10th & 11th.

This year, my heart is also deeply gutted over the death of Charlie Kirk. I can’t stop thinking of his wife, Erika, and their two young children. Their journey ahead will be hard

As I sit beside the water to reflect—not only on Trent, but also on the healing I’ve walked through—I think about a God who never left my side, even in my hardest questions. He became my greatest healer when I thought I could never recover. And yet, by His grace, I haven’t just recovered—I am thriving. Not because of achievements, but because God has brought breakthrough after breakthrough. Some were painfully hard to reach, but I sit here today as a living witness: it is possible to keep breathing, trusting, and honoring God—even when life doesn’t go as planned.

The other day I turned off all the noise in my home—the one Trent and I built together—and let myself go back to the night we were given the keys. We had no furniture, so we laid on the floor as Trent prayed our home would always be filled with God’s peace—that everyone who walked through the doors would sense it. Less than two years later, I would be the one most desperate to feel that peace. God knew. He always knows.

So today, I honor this man of God who is more alive and thriving in heaven than I am on this earth, and I sit at the edge of the water—not broken, but grateful.

Trent, I think you’d be proud of the woman I finally became. I am free.