What Starts as a Bonfire, Ends up as a Forest Fire

It's like the saying, 'when it rains, it pours,' but in keeping with the fire theme, I went a different way.

Going through a crisis is never fun and anytime you hit a rough patch in your life, whether big or small, you hope your people rally around you and lift you up. Sometimes though, that's not the case. With each life changing crisis I've gone through, I've weeded out those who I thought were my people and had my back only to find out that they'd leave me the moment I fall. The same thing happened this time.

I never thought that being at my lowest after losing my house and a pet, that people I considered family at one time or another in my life could just completely ignore the fact that it happened. Turn that around though and I had some acquaintances become friends and some friends become better friends and step up to be there for me and my boys during this whole disaster. To those of you; I thank you from the bottom of my heart! 🩷

I wanted to share with you though, a few ways to BE THERE even when you don't necessarily know how to BE THERE.

• Send a text with a simple, 'you got this!' or 'let me know how I can support you through this.'

• Offer to buy them dinner or give them a gift card to eat. Make them a meal to freeze even. One tiny thing off of their overfilled plate will help immensely.

• Just SIT and listen. Let them vent, let them cry, let them just sit in silence with you there. Sometimes that's really all they need is to know someone's got them.

• If you're not local, or even if you are, send a card with an uplifting message inside to brighten their spirits. (I'm old school and this would make my day!)

The night I found out we lost our condo, everyone kept calling and texting and asking what we needed. What we needed was our home, what we needed was our Nala. It's hard to answer a question like that immediately after a disaster and I'll be honest, after a couple days, it gets frustrating with everyone asking - even though they mean well - I'm guilty of this too.

All I ask is that you keep this reminder with you the next time someone you know is going through a rough patch. Don't push them to get out of it, let them get through it at their own pace and just BE THERE even if you can't BE THERE.