a daughter's journey to forgiveness and peace...

Well, the time has come that I am feeling pushed to head in a new direction on my journey with our Father.  Lately, I have been feeling more and more pulled to begin a blog for all the different "trades" that I have been embracing lately.  "Trades" that I feel I was taught by my mother.  Today I want to share with you the journey that God sent me on to heal after losing the mom that I was just beginning to see how to truly appreciate.

2012 was a very difficult and exhausting year for myself and our family.  We spent the first 7 months treating my mother for her terminal Breast Cancer and she lost that battle in July.  During that time we tried to come together as a family and grieve and find closure for so many different things that come with having a very headstrong group of females on one family tree.  I had personally never went through anything like fighting Cancer or any terminal illness.  This particular diagnosis was shocking even to her wonderful doctor.  There were a whirlwind of emotions that swarmed through my body that I just began to feel so overwhelmed and weighed down by.  My days and nights ran together as if it were just a dream.  I didn't have the most ideal relationship with my mother either so the pain that came with trying to come to peace with this was undeniably excruciating on multiple occasions. 

The last weeks of her life though I will cherish forever.  They were the most difficult for myself, but they brought the most healing. Throughout my life I saw my mother as too emotionally driven, difficult to handle, and violent with her words.  In the end of her life, God showed me how He saw her.  He created his daughter, my mom, to be passion driven, a vibrant personality that was never scared to be herself, a friend who knew no boundaries with her love for them, and a mother who in the end truly loved her children to the best of her ability.  My mom taught me so many amazing qualities and talents.  These are things I know God blessed me with in having her be specifically my mom.  I may have had a very hard time seeing the good when she was with us, but as I have healed and grown through this trial I have realized that without her in my life I would not be the woman I have turned into today.  I learned so much from both the hard times and the good times we both went through the past 29 years.  We need to learn to take the good with the bad and focus on the things that really matter.  She brought so much joy to other people that I know her life here served a deep purpose. 

Forgiveness is healing.  Healing brings peace.  Peace brings joy.  Joy brings a lasting impression to your life that you can share with everyone when you choose to find it. 

Have a blast spending eternity with Jesus, Mama.  I will miss you tremendously until the day I get to see you again... 
I love you 2 boo-Aimee Kono