Don't Let Some Hell-bent Heart Leave You Bitter...

 ...when you come close to sellin' out, reconsider. Give the Heavens above more than just a passing glance, and when you get the choice to sit it out, or dance? I hope you dance...

This was a weird week. It went well, but not without certain stressors, and I'm still not totally sure how I feel about it. This week, my oldest daughter, my firstborn baby girl, moved the last of her boxes out. She doesn't live here anymore.

For the first time in two decades, my child has a different mailing address than mine. Her bedroom is empty - and because it's empty, it's filled with echoes. Echoes of laughing conversations, arguments over stupid (and not so stupid) things. Picnic dinners delivered to her room, so that she still felt a part of things during the months she spent unexplainably unable to walk last year.

Her bookshelves are gone, and so are the artificial ivy vines she wove through the window blinds. Her beautiful paintings are gone, and the walls are as bare as the day we moved into this apartment.

Soon, that room will be filled again. The walls will someday be covered in framed prints of my book covers and matted quotes that motivate and inspire my writing. There will be a soft, crocheted rug on the floor (which will hopefully cover the spot where her bed frame left gouges into cheap peel-and-stick laminate), and I will burn scented candles that don't smell like coffee. I will line one wall with bookshelves of my own - and finally, I will gather my entire book collection in one space. I'll use the closet to make up for the lack of storage space in this apartment and at long last, my keepsakes and out of season decor will be stored out of sight instead of stacked wherever it'll fit.

It's bittersweet.

Life has a way of going on. The sun keeps rising and setting, the world keeps turning, and the days keep rolling into each other like crashing waves. So I'm following that example; I'm still moving, too.

STILL FIGHTING FOR FREEDOM is nearly a third of the way finished, and it's so much fun to watch Christine continue to grow and heal after those final moments with her husband, Malachi. The bruises have been gone for a while, but sometimes other hurts linger, and I love being able to coach and mold this character into the kind of strong, well-adjusted woman all abuse survivors should have the chance to become.

I'm so excited to be able to share this story, and I'm counting down the days until the rerelease of FIGHTING FOR FREEDOM - because as hard as it can be, I think every survivor should feel able to...

*song lyric from "I Hope You Dance," Lee Ann Womack