Category: Uncategorized

Yep! That’s right! We are packing up to head back to the Pacific Northwest!

This past year has made me believe more than ever in a Universal power much greater than myself. The way everything has come together and we have ended up at the right spot at the right time on several occasions has been mind-blowing and life changing. Once again, we had one of those moments. We are currently selling Michael’s mom’s house (the one we are living in and fixing up) and I began to look for housing in the area for after it sells. The rental market here is just like Bend if not worse. And so a conversation started about what if we moved back…

But it didn’t really start there. It began when we first arrived and I was hired at a private practice pending my licensure approval. I spent my first couple weeks here scurrying around collecting what signatures and information I needed to apply. However, I missed one crucial piece of information… the North Carolina Board of MFTs goes on a summer break! Whaaaat?!?! Yep, every year NC board of MFTs takes two months off from approving licenses. So, I was not going to be able to get my license approved until September which was obviously too long for a busy private practice to wait. I decided to not send in my license packet, why pay $240 and wait 3-4 months for approval when I could just send it in when they were back from summer vacation. Very shortly after all of this decision was made, Michael’s mom died, and life took a huge unforeseen turn. Suddenly instead of just getting our life started here in NC, and oh yeah, remodeling a house, Michael was now managing his mom’s estate and working full time for his friend’s step-dad’s business. For 3 months I applied to MFT job after MFT job knowing that we were at a point in life where private practice would be on the back burner. I never heard from any of those places.

So in early August we began to joke “what if we were just supposed to be in Asheville to help Mommy L”, “wouldn’t that be funny if we just moved back to Bend,” “I wonder if there is a “2 cross country moves in one year” club that we could join.”

And suddenly in my inbox was an email from my friend and colleague with a job ad for the type of therapy I was doing as a part of my private practice in Gig Harbor. I applied, heard back very quickly, interviewed and BAM! Hired.  That’s crazy enough but then BAM! BAM!  They decide to hire Michael as well.

Now, as I write this blog, once again surrounded by packing tape, boxes, and a worried husky, I find myself once again astonished at where this past year has taken Michael and I. The many countries and cities we have visited have forever changed us. But most of all, I am happy to be back in a state of being ready to read the signs in life and ready at a moments notice to give up my agenda for a greater plan.

After reading through some past blogs and contemplating this past year, I realized it may be helpful for my fellow dreamers and all out weirdos if I did a post about the side effects of stepping into a counter culture existence.

I am sure many of you have put together that my partner Michael and I are not your average American statistic. We don’t have kids, we have moved 10 times in 6 years (the funny thing is NONE of those moves were military related haha), we built a truck camper in the driveway of a townhouse in a metropolitan area, we don’t have debt, and well… we are both psychotherapists for God’s sake! And just when I think we might somehow “normal out” or fit into society… we get weirder! Before I knew it I was meditating daily and trying to convert my brother in law to my theories about parallel universes and that Bigfoot is an extraterrestrial… I’ve said too much…

Anyway, all of this change and embracing the true inner weirdo was not easy. I continue to feel the side effects of living outside of norms. And while I am proud of being weird, there are days when I long for a steady paycheck and simply following societies collective rule book. Even though I have felt more joy, more alive, and more complete than ever before… I do wish someone had warned me of the side effects.

So without further ado….

The side effects of embracing your inner weirdness and being your authentic self:

1. It Takes Preparation:

Many of our cultures narratives about transformation and embracing your calling leave out this step. You may feel like you can’t take one more day at your job, but the reality is, you can. Taking steps like eliminating debt, saving a nest egg, and decreasing your living expenses radically improve your journey. For my partner and I, it took us two years of working more than full time to pay off a boat load of debt to make way for our dreams. In fact, it wasn’t until we cleared out the clutter of debt from our lives that we even felt we could dream. We knew we didn’t want to be normal because as Dave Ramsey says, “normal is broke and desperate” but I had no idea there was so much weirdness deep down until the debt was gone. Being debt free opened up a world of possibilities and I am grateful for it every day.

2. You will often feel alone, lonely, isolated, etc:

Don’t expect everyone in your life to understand or maintain close connection. There are strong narratives that are generations deep about what life “should” look like. More importantly, don’t expect an outpouring of sympathy when then going gets tough. I have learned that I am in a place that many view as a luxury and it is hard for them to have a lot of sympathy. It is a reminder that the transformation is all yours…. good and bad. I even have an incredible partner through this journey, but that doesn’t always cure loneliness.

3. It’s not “going your own way”… it is bushwhacking a new trail in the most dense and hazardous jungle in the world:

There is a tendency to speak of transformation from the perspective of feeling as though it is somewhat complete. The part about hard work, perseverance, loss, grief over your old life, and utter fatigue gets left out. Of course it is worth it. But the term “paving your own way” or “going your own way” conjures up the image of a paved road. This past year has felt more like bushwhacking every step. Looking at the narratives and patterns that kept you stuck in the past or held you tight to social norms will help you grow into your weirdness.

4. You Write the Rules Now:

Now that you are choosing to write the rules of your life its time to let go of the old rules. Do the inner work of paying attention to what is important to YOU. What values do you want to live by? What you want to say yes to may require saying some painful no’s. Be willing to look at this, it is essential to your reorientation to the world. Just like the side effect listed above, it is tough inner work but totally worth it.

5. It is Terrifying:

I realized quickly… ok that is giving myself too much credit… it took me a solid 4 months to realize the constant disappointment and pain I was feeling was because I was holding tightly to an idea of how I thought things should go. There is no predicting how life will go when you commit to embracing your authentic self. The only thing that went as planned was the day I left my job. I have realized now, how little of life is actually in my control and at first it was terrifying and liberating. There are definitely “oh shit!” moments and wondering if I have made the right decision…. but then again there I go pretending I have control and it is only my decisions that make up my life.

First, I want address the power and wonder of plants. As some of you may know, Michael and I went fully plant based (vegan) November 1st of last year. We call it plant based because that terminology comes from Dr. T. Collin Campbell who started a new movement toward a plant based diet strictly for health reasons. The term vegan has become heavily tied to animal rights issues and has been associated with militant weirdos who don’t wear shoes.

Basically, T. Collin Campbell did this study called the China Study (find the book here) and finds that people in China eat very regionally. So he studies the population’s health by region and begins to find, people who eat pork are most susceptible to this disease or cancer and people who eat a lot of dairy seem to commonly have this illness. He also found that large parts of the population didn’t eat any animal products and they had no cancer or heart disease. It isn’t a perfect study but T. Collin Campbell has since spent his career researching the effects of animal products on human health. He now famously claims he is capable of turning on and off cancer cells in rats. So to sum it up, there is a wealth of research now that highlights if you eat plants your body stays more alkaline which isn’t great for disease, if you eat lots of meat and dairy your body gets really acidic which disease thrives on. If you are interested in more about the science, check out the film Forks Over Knives.

After returning from Spain, Germany, and Ireland after eating hardly anything but meat and dairy, I was 10 pounds heavier and had a horrible acne outbreak. I decided then, “why not embrace the changes outlined in Forks Over knives and see what happens?” Michael decided to join me as we had watched the film together a couple of years ago. We have even owned the Forks Over knives cook book since watching the film, but we frequently added cheese to recipes. I really believed for most of my life I could never give up cheese. Now, 11 months later, cheese grosses me out! It’s an animals breast milk…. ewww.

About three months later I was running faster and longer than ever before. I have felt FANTASTIC since. And so has Michael, his psoriasis cleared up and he lost 12 pounds without trying. I on the other hand only lost about 5 pounds but with my skin clear I can’t complain. One of the biggest most unexpected shifts I have experienced is a sense of peace. My whole life I would have categorized myself as anxious but now I feel like I think more clearly and calmly. It’s true, I have always loved all living things. I’ve named squirrels, rescued animals, and believe that God has a plan for all living things. But I had no idea how important this was to me until I stopped eating my animal friends. I feel a deeper love and compassion than before for all things living. That focus has led to a more meaningful yoga practice, meditation, and seeking more of the spiritual world around me. It has brought me so much peace. Also, I have felt so great I quit caffeine. I didn’t intend to cut out caffeine but I began to hate its effects. It makes me anxious and draws my conscious focus away from what matters. I feel like my brain turns into a squirrel on cocaine 🙂 I prefer peace.

Over the summer I started to feel better and better. I started to increase my mileage and before I knew it I was running 13-15 miles with very little need for recovery. I would wake up the next day and want to do it again! So when I saw a post in an Asheville Vegan running group about an upcoming ultramarathon at the Biltmore Estate, I began to gently increase my mileage. The run was to benefit and raise awareness about horse abuse and neglect and not only would it take place on the beautiful grounds of the Biltmore Estate, we would be running with horses and riders. It seemed like the perfect merging of my love for animals, this diet, and running.

So I did it! I completed my first 50k (or 30 miles). It was a spectacular run! I loved every moment! I was so impressed with my bodies resiliency and ability to stretch to miles I have never completed before. I have never run a marathon and the most miles I had ever run before this race was 18. My goal was just to complete the race, be present with every footstep, and run with magnificent horses. Mission accomplished!

Over the past few weeks, I can’t stop reminiscing about all the places this time off has taken me. I mean, I set out for a 45 day trip in Europe and an out of state move, but I have experienced so much more. There have been some very scary moments wondering if an international trip and move were just too much, I find myself a year and one month later, so eternally grateful for where the year has taken me.

With that in mind, I began to form a list of things I would have NEVER done if it hadn’t been for the way that everything came together this year. There have been these very precise moments in the past year that acted as a map to bring us exactly where we needed to be. It has really strengthened my belief in the spiritual nature of life. We are spiritual beings having a human experience. And when you put down the cell phone and check out from the daily routines that fill time and occupy your mind, you can really connect with that spiritual self.

1. I would have never given up on an expedition. Not finishing the Camino de Santiago was a difficult decision and it was something that Michael and I would have NEVER done in the past. We both love goals and love to achieve what we set out to do, but there were so many miserable experiences that all lined up that made us decide to change our trip. There was the flea bite incident, the being treated shitty incidents, the over-crowdedness, my ankle swelling up, and lastly we kept meeting others that were having similar experiences that didn’t have the finances or the time to change their trip. It seemed everything began to resonate with the sentiment that if this were my last trip I wouldn’t spend another minute on the Camino. And that is when Michael and I decided to go to GERMANY!
2. Which leads me to the next thing I would have NEVER done, go to Oktoberfest. I know, I know, “but Joella you love beer and lederhosen!” Yes, I do love beer and Oktoberfest did look fun, but I would have never paid the airfare and booked a hotel all just to attend a beer drinking festival. There are too many places to visit in the world. But since we were in Garmisch, a place that Michael and I had always wanted to go together, and Oktoberfest was only an hour away by train, we figured “what the heck? Might as well!” I am so grateful we got to go! It was so much more fun than I had imagined!
3. I would have NEVER moved to Bend just to ski. When our marriage and family therapist licenses took 4 months to get approved, we were very disappointed. And the four months of waiting was driving us insane. We both just wanted to practice therapy. The only thing that helped us was skiing multiple times a week. If our licenses had been approved sooner or one of the jobs we had applied for had worked out, I wouldn’t have had the solid 5 months of skiing experience I have now. I have always dreamed of living a life more in tune with the outdoors and now, I have another hobby that helps me do that.
4. Which leads me to this statement, I would have NEVER moved to Asheville for real. I always thought about it. It is a really cool place. But the thought of being a full plane ride away from the Northwest is just insane to me. I still have a hard time accepting I am this far away. Not to mention, being so far away from what I call “real mountains,” but things lined up in such a way, that it really seemed like the best idea. Michael’s parents seemed to really need us and it looked like Michael was going to get a kick ass job at University of North Carolina Asheville. On top of that, when it worked out for us to live in Michael’s mom’s extra house, a chance to no longer be “renters” (which is getting increasingly difficult everywhere) it seemed foolish not to move to Asheville.
5. I would have NEVER realized how much I love running a private therapy practice. I know it seems on the outside that being your own boss would be nothing short of amazing, but it was really stressful. And when we left for Europe, I felt so burnt out. I just wanted to work for someone else part time. However, over the past year of applying for jobs and doing some inner work, I have come to realize I have always felt burned out at everything I do because of two reasons; 1. I call it “work” instead of my calling/life’s purpose and 2. I had fooled myself into thinking I have control over things I have no control over. In my newbie therapists brain I really believed if I read enough articles, books, and went to enough conferences I would be able to help everyone. But after this past year, I have realized I have control over so little. I mean, really, I have control over my thoughts and actions. Even then, there are so many chemicals and environmental factors…. but I digress. I can’t believe how much responsibility I took on believing it would help people. I am now in a place where I believe in other’s abilities. Client change has very little to do with me.
6. I would have NEVER taken a whole year off and spent most of the time working on myself. Sure I would have taken a year off to travel or DO something, but so much of this year has been spent on self reflection and improvement. I got to ski 50+ days and become a confident skier, I have worked on my yoga skills, meditation, writing, reading, journaling, and best of all eating a plant based diet. I don’t think I would have ever had the time to dive into these endeavors but they have shaped me in ways I would have never imagined. Like, really important, deep, spiritual ways that will resonate with me for life. And hopefully help my future clients 🙂

In the moment, I see and hear you clearly

In the moment, nothing else matters and the world pales in comparison

In the moment, there is no place I’d rather be

What are the silly distractions that keep me from this moment?

What could catch my eye, my heart, or mind strong enough to tear me away from that which matters most?

In the moment, I see you and I’m reminded that God is good and He has a plan

For only God could orchestrate such a moment

I never really had a problem with bugs in life. In fact, I have always loved being out in nature.

But North Carolina has ruined that for me. These bugs are aweful! And most of them literally haunt me in my dreams. I am sure if we had moved into a house that had been maintained I wouldn’t have felt as shocked. When we walked into this house and flipped on the lights it was something out of a horror film. Crickets, spiders, and ants scurrying around like they owned the place.

So in case you have been sleeping soundly with no worries on your mind…. Take a look at these creeps!!!

That spider is especially terrifying because he’s like “bitch, I am missing a leg and I’ll still kill you!!”

Sweet Dreams 🙂

I cannot believe it has been one full year since Michael and I took this huge leap into life. There is a part of me, as you might already know from past blogs, that wishes that I could post some neat and tidy conclusion about our journey…. but life continues to be an ever changing roller coaster. As my professor used to say sarcastically, “Oh boo hoo, you don’t know what will happen tomorrow and have nothing but possibilities ahead of you … just wait until you have a mortgage, kids, and a tenure track career. You will long for those days of not knowing.”

I joke with Michael that we somehow made it into our thirties (yes for the first time we are in the same decade haha) with the same open wild hearts we began our twenties with. And although there have been some major lows, some serious “holy shit” moments, and the dreaded “did I just mess up my whole life?” moment,  I woke up this morning so grateful for all the possibilites that we get to toy with each day.

What I am most grateful for and proud of is that we had the blessing of prioritizing us for 322 days. After being married for four of Michael’s eight year military career and two years of a master’s degree program, we spent 322 uninterrupted days together. I feel so honored to have had time with Michael and to get to know him in a new way. It is a bond that will forever strengthen us. We choose our relationship and becoming our authentic selves over the traditional path. We have choosen to really get to know one another outside of the military and all the other roles we play in daily life. And most importantly, we now know that both of us wake up a bit different each day. That we are in a constant process of trying out life and disgarding what doesn’t work. Gone are the days of assuming one another’s stance on one topic or another. We have seen each other change in very deep personal ways over this past year and I hope to continue to embrace change side by side. For as we have learned, it is about staying parallel to one another. Never holding each other back out of fear or trying to maintain some tradjectory we set out on years ago. Instead, its getting to know each other, again and again, day after day, and committing to the common goal of staying side by side.

I have also come to the realization that this past year has just been embracing a change that was set into motion long ago without our participation or consent. The house fire in 2013 was the true begining of this journey. The Universe stepped in that day and called us, and this past year was simply the begining of us responding.

We are contemplating yet more change and embracing more of our weirdness everyday… so watch out!!! Who knows what’s next?!?!

I certainly have no clue 🙂

I wrote this blog a few weeks ago… for some reason it felt too final to post then. But today seemed fitting.

One of our motivations for moving to Asheville was to help care for Michael’s parents. His dad now an 88 year old WWII veteran and his mom 71 with MS. When his mom’s house in north Asheville had become available to live in, we saw it as an opportunity to live close by and aid in their care. Aside from the shock of the state of the house and the urgent need to fix up the house as quickly as possible so  that we could live and work, we were also in shock facing the urgent needs his parents were facing. Michael’s brother David for the past few months was their only caregiver. Balancing full time work and shuttling two parents with limited mobility had nearly drown him by the time we arrived. Michael’s dad was facing a foot amputation due to diabetes complications, and his mom was a few weeks away from a hip surgery she needed 6 months ago. We divided our efforts the best we could. Since Michael was familiar with the VA he would take over dad’s care and since David had been working with Mommy L to get her hip surgery for the last 6 months, he would help her. That was around May 8th.

The next four weeks were a blur of appointments for the house and Michael’s parents. It felt like the situation changed daily. When Mommy L went in for surgery June 1st, she was denied because of concerns over her test results. They sent her home. We were all so dissappointed, it was clear she was in so much pain. The three of us worked hard to make her comfortable. A few weeks later, she was in so much pain she had to be transported to the hospital. Her nurse got involved and advocated on her behalf finally getting her approved for the surgery.

That ended up being the last time I saw her. 6 days later she died from surgery complications. It took us all by surprise. It seemed like everything was getting better. Michael, David, and I were all in a comfortable routine of checking in and getting his parents what they needed. It was devistating.

I feel like I have been in Asheville for lifetimes. Every day has been different. Every challenge has felt insurmountable. And since the passing of Mommy L, it hasn’t changed. In fact, these past 16 days have been the longest and most challenging yet. As if fixing up an 80 year old house wasn’t hard enough, without Joan it feels impossible. This house was her’s and was passed down to her from her parents. She grew up here. And with every change and every modification we got to hear her input. How old this was or that was. What was behind that wall or when that was added on. It was invaluable not only to morale to keep us motivated to finish but seeing her light up about having hope for this house. That it could be modern, clean, and well maintained was so positive for all of us.

I have been reflecting on the last time I really got to sit and chat with Joan. It was just a few days before my 30th birthday. She told me about her life at 30. It was one year after her horrific car accient. The accident occured early one morning as he drove to the school where she worked as a teacher. A highly intoxicated man ran a red light plowing into Joan. She recalled “I came to on the hospital bed and I looked down to see if my legs were still there, and I couldn’t see my feet.” There was so much damage to her feet they were pointed backward. After almost 30 surgeries and with extreme determination, at 30 years old Joan recalled trying to learn to walk again though most of the bones in her feet and ankles were now fused together. And Mommy L did walk again too despite doctors predictions. She walked down the aisle soon after when she married Charlie. I only knew her in the last 6 years and they were probably her most painful years as she had been diagnosed with MS and yet, I couldn’t help but feel inspired by her.

The struggles she had over come and the quckiest driest wit I have ever encountered. Honestly, she could laugh about almost anything. Her specialty though, was tradegy. She survived so much that when times got stressful or difficult she had an incredible ability to create humor. And I say create humor and not just laugh because that is really what she did. She was so creative and poetic. Over the past few weeks Michael and I have been surprised by how much we have grieved the future. Of course he has had a past to grieve as well. But it seemed things were getting so much better. This surgery was going to enable her to come out to the house and see all the progress we had made. We had made plans to have Thanksgiving out here this year. And she had been involved in every decision about the house, the paint colors, the flooring, and future decorating ideas. She was a very talented interior decorator.

Not only is the fate of the house we live in uncertain as we deal with the dessoloution of her estate, the purpose feels uncertain as well. I am so grateful we made it to Asheville the day we did. I am also so grateful that the last weeks of her life were filled with paint and flooring swatches and positive plans for a future with her son whom she hadn’t seen in a couple years and who hadn’t lived near by in 12 years. We miss you so much Mommy L

I’d like to take a moment for honesty. In case someone out there has read this blog and mistaken my brief highlights as some smooth sailing adventure often published on the internet. I know, I’ve read the stories too, “couple gives up everything to travel the world and are now better than ever” or “Guy quits high paying job to travel and now owns this company.” The stories are everywhere. And I know, I could keep posting highlights here and sound like one of them. I am sure too that if I post highlights long enough, eventually everything will make sense again and be better than before leading people to believe it was the simple act of quitting jobs and traveling that lead to success. But I don’t want to. I don’t want that to be my story. Those stories leave out the most beautiful part; the heart wrenching unsure moments in the middle. Those poignant moments when the dream feels within reach and so far away at the same time.

I started this blog in my head 6 weeks ago as I drove across Kansas. Michael and I had made jokes about how boring driving across Kansas would be. We even tried to plan driving down to the south to visit friends, adding hours of driving, and hundreds of miles to trip just to avoid it. But as I drove across Kansas I had a completely different experience. I felt so blessed to see everything I had always skipped over taking a plane. Since I was young, my family and I would fly to Georgia or Florida often to visit family. And here I was, driving each mile of that “boring middle part.” Instead I got to see miles of farms that grow the food that I ingest almost daily and I felt intimately connected to that land. On top of that feeling of gratitude and connectedness, we saw some of the most amazing thunder and lightning storms I have ever seen. It was the most thrilling day of the whole drive.

It made me realize how many problems stem from trying to avoid that painful middle part. And how much joy can be missed glossing over the turmoil. I saw it often as a therapist in parents who were baffled by their teenagers. It was like the second a child reminded their parents that they are free thinking sexual beings life was over. Parents had no control and suddenly they couldn’t relate. What are the teenage years but a perfect example of the essence of a painful middle on the journey to becoming an adult. I remember those days! Flooded by so many emotions and all the uncertainty. But it was all worth it. It shaped me and helped me grow.

As I reflected about this concept, I couldn’t help but link the epidemic of over medicating young kids and teens. It is so obvious that to medicate a child is to attempt to skip over that painful middle part. The time in life when experiences and behaviors really don’t make sense. And now we have a culture of therapists and doctors who instead of supporting parents in how to dig into those incredible uncomfortable emotions and cope, medicate children’s brains not to feel. They choose to numb out the uncomfortable years and behaviors. And that’s what it is, a numbing out of the uncomfortable. The worst part is that it is discussed in our society as a “fix.” At least numbing out feelings is well known to have side effects on development but a “fix” sounds like it will improve things for the better.

But I digress from the larger social picture. Here I find myself in yet another painful middle part of a journey. There is a part of me that still wants to report things like, the house is almost finished, or I love it here in Asheville. However, that has not been the dominant experience. Instead, upon arriving in Asheville, I have felt confronted with feelings of disappointment, depression, anxiety, and an overwhelming sense that things weren’t supposed to turn out like this. I have kept quiet the past two months in an attempt to sort through these feelings and to try not to offend anyone. And as I have done that, the feelings have continued to grow and gain power. I tell my clients in therapy all the time that what makes anxiety and depression feel so powerful is the expectation that one shouldn’t feel that way. The act of keeping those emotions tucked away fuels them. And for the first time since my tumultuous teen years, I am reminded of that fact. The days that I dig into life in the present moment I feel fine. But there are dark moments when I feel and fear I have made an utter mess of my life. And in those moments, I feel shocked to feel that way. After traveling this far, waiting so long, planning so carefully, blah blah blah, how can I possibly feel regret, despair, sadness, and so far away from myself? As I read that now, I hear the sense of entitlement. The conditioning from a society obsessed with A leading to B and equaling C. But that’s not life! Life is messy, uncontrollable, and always changing.

This journey has been such a reflection of the reality of life. It has felt so small and so enormous at the same time. I feel like I have been away for lifetimes and like I have grown a decade or more. Nothing about this time off has gone the way I had hoped, planned, or dreamed. The only thing that went as planned was closing my private practice and Michael graduating from PLU. At every critical point Michael and I moved from plan A to plan B to plan C to plan as we go to fumble around and freak out, and none of that worked. It has completely shifted my perspective of life. I can’t believe how much I used to think I could plan and prepare or how much control I had fooled myself into believing I had. I feel I have tapped into just how wild and free this life is. I’ve tapped into just how much our lives are shaped by the daily acts of reading the news, driving a car, going to work, living in a house, and the other daily routines that begin to grab ahold of our lives and disconnect us from the true heartbeat of life. The true shape of life. The ever changing powerful force of the universe.

About a year ago I heard a clip of Louis C.K. (a comedian) talking on Conan O’Brien about how technology disconnects us from life and fills the time in life we used to spend thinking. He talked about how he pulled up to a stoplight and started to check his phone but instead he remained present. He described how in that one present moment he was consumed by how utterly terrifying life really is and how alone he actually felt. I have felt so many of those moments over the past year. And instead of getting my shit together to see a client, or continuing to research or write a paper, I sat with it. Befriended it. And even now, amidst all the chaos and feeling that every plan has failed and I have no idea what will happen next, I am eternally grateful for it. I am grateful for every emotion I have felt, every pain I have experienced, every loss I have endured, and every failed plan because when I get down to it, everything I think I lost I never really had. A routine, a business, a contract position, a rented house, and familiarity in my daily life were not my possessions nor were they my life. My life is so much bigger and deeper than any of those things.

These past 10 months have been the most difficult task of my life. I have felt so much disappointment, rejection, isolation, and loss of direction. At the same exact time, I have felt so much joy, connection, freedom, and love. I have no doubt that in a few years Michael and I will laugh about this time. It will be funny how lost we felt even though every step we took was on the right path or at least helped us find the right path. But I don’t want to skip over this part. As painful as it may be or as homesick as I may feel, I appreciate this moment of the journey. The moment I could feel both joy and sorrow at once and began to truly build a life. Not a life built out of routine or things I should be doing at 30 years old, but a real life connected with God, in touch with the environment, and a loving force.

It was spring 2012. Michael’s last day in the Army was a few months ago and I was in the busiest semester of graduate school. It was a difficult time as our daily lives felt intensely different. Michael had just left behind a world where he confidently ran military operations and mentored soldiers. I was working at two internship clinics, PLU’s couple and family therapy center and Auburn Youth Resources. I was behind in client contact hours so I had taken 5-10 extra clients to make up the deficit. This lead to most of my days being 12-14 hours long. The adjustment was a struggle. Michael did great at filling his time applying for jobs and had already been accepted to graduate school set to start in the fall. But I think it was hard for him to spend most days alone during such a big transition. I myself was struggling with this point in school. I felt the lack of hours were a reflection of inadequacies and I feared I didn’t belong. It was a time of great stress.

From this stress an idea was born. Michael and I had one month off together after I graduated and before he started school. I got into learning about tiny houses and we both loved the idea. The tiny house revolution lead to me researching buying a camper or trailer. However, they were so expensive! So I then started researching building a truck canopy so that we could sleep in the back of the truck. And finally through looking up plans for truck canopies, I found truck camper plans. Not only were the camper plans only $15.00, the website also linked to people who were blogging about building the camper plans. The latest one was only a couple years before so we figured, they must still be sound plans. We were so curious and blown away by the idea of building a cab over truck camper. It was irresistible.

The plans arrived in May of 2012. We read through the organized list of parts and materials and began to budget. When Michael told his dad what he was up to his dad stated that he wanted to help by “sending the green truck.” We were so excited! Now we could just budget for shipping the truck and the building materials. We had plans and a truck!

We began to come up with ideas about where to take the truck. Maybe a west coast trip? Or south west? And as our camper plans developed, our trip plans developed. If we had a small kitchen, a bed, a heater, a bathroom…. Why not drive to Asheville North Carolina? A complete cross country trip.

Michael worked hard on the camper as I completed graduate school. There were days when I came home blown away by what he accomplished. There were other days when Michael labored away for hours, only completing a small part. And as my school schedule began to ease, the finish line in sight, I began to help build. We worked late into the evenings until we could no longer see. We argued, we celebrated, we laughed, cried, and drank a lot of beer and ate a lot of pizza.

We ended up working feverishly through the whole month we had off together. The trip never happened. At the time, I was devastated. I was so upset that we didn’t get time off together. Life felt so crowded by obligation. But the entire exterior of the camper was finished by that fall. And to be honest, it took us three months to take it anywhere after that. We were so exhausted by that year.

Fast forward to April 7, 2013. We arrived home to find the kitchen of our rental house in flames. I will never forget the moment the fire fighter came out of the house to us standing in shock in the driveway. He reported, “your house is unsafe to stay in tonight. And to be honest it may be a few months until you can return. Do you have a place to stay?” Michael and I looked at the camper and laughed. “Yes, we do have place to stay!” In hindsight, it wasn’t the best idea, but we lived in the camper at my moms for 6 weeks. We were so cautious of the insurance company we wanted to preserve our savings as much as possible.

The camper then served as a home again when we moved out of our home in Gig Harbor. We stayed in it the night before we left for Europe. When we returned from Europe we stayed in it again for a couple weeks before moving to Bend, Oregon.

Then it happened. We finally took the cross-country trip to Asheville we had always planned. After two years, a truck upgrade, and some finish work, it made the voyage, serving as our tiny home along the way. It wasn’t the long luxury trip we had hoped for but it was a lot of fun!

When reflecting on the camper I can’t help but feel it was a project much larger than us. It has been the one constant in a few tumultuous years of change. It has provided shelter, been a learning experience, and a continued project that fosters dreams. It appears the camper had known all along that it was destine to make it to Asheville.