Living with chronic pain can change you. You can become someone you hardly recognize—physically, emotionally, spiritually, and every other which way. [...]
I wasn’t ready any time soon to try again, even after my doctor told me I could. I’d always wanted to run a marathon, so I thought it would be a good goal to work towards—run my first marathon before turning 30. [...]
My days were long; my nights even longer. I felt hopeless. I feared getting older. If I felt this badly in my 30s, how in the world was I going to function in my 40s, 50s, and beyond? [...]
Though physical pain and emotional pain are two very different things, they share many similarities. Both are brutal… both are very personal hells no one else around you can see or feel. [...]
Every spring it happens. Then, every fall it doesn’t. We’ve come close a few times, but it’s inevitably ended in disappointment every time—for 108 years. [...]
We believe everyone has a role to play. Your role may not look like mine, but you have an important role to play in the lives of children locally and internationally. [...]
In 2011, we reconnected and started writing letters to one another that gradually shifted from platonic pleasantries to romantic odes reminiscent of the stuff in movies. [...]
I went to Braum’s for milk and eggs and cried over the receipt in the car because the total was more than I expected—eggs had gone up. A dozen eggs was now more than a gallon of milk and I hadn’t noticed before. [...]