Well, here we are on February 13th and I’m finally just now posting my 2024 yearly wrap-up blog post. I wrote the majority of it at the end of the year, but never quite got around to finishing it… so it languished on my to-do list until today, when my songwriting lesson was canceled and my work to-do list was caught up and I decided this was the perfect time to knock it out.

Honestly, 2024 was a hard year. It’s strange to revisit each of these months and what was happening at the time, because I can remember those feelings so acutely. This year was characterized by writing my book Still Good; by Windy passing away and by adopting Ramble and Rocco; by my fatigue/hypersomnia worsening and by how that affected my career and my finances. As best as I can summarize, here’s a look at what happened in my life in 2024.

2024, month by monthJanuary

January felt like it lasted an entire year all on its own. There were a lot of difficult, stressful, heavy things going on in my life and the lives of people close to me. I felt anxious and stressed. But I also worked on Spotify stuff and released my first original song (plus releasing two more later in the year). And probably my favorite memory from January is seeing the Aladdin tour at the Fox with Joshua, Josh, and Emma and then talking and laughing in my parked car until 1 AM because we just didn’t want to go home yet.

Notable quote (from my journal, blog, or other writing): “I have grown so much this month. Quite frankly, I’m tired of growing.”Art that impacted me the most in January: The Mystwick School of Musicraft, Jessica Khoury (book); As Long As The Lemon Trees Grow, Zoulfa Katouh (book)February

A good chunk of February simply felt like normal life, and that was really nice. My 25th birthday was on a Sunday and I enjoyed spending it with my church family. At the end of the month, Mom and I flew to Cleveland Clinic in Ohio for a week of appointments. I heard a lot of “this is just EDS–all you can do is treat the symptoms, and you’re already doing that,” plus some “yes, she will ultimately need an ostomy.” Fun!

Notable quote: “‘From dust you came and to dust you will return. Repent and believe in the gospel.’ And, unexpectedly, I started to cry. I felt such a great awareness of my sin, of how small and human I am–and yet, of the greatness of God’s love (so much so that He would think to send me Italian ice on my birthday). I felt an overwhelming sense of peace.”Art that impacted me the most in February: Check & Mate, Ali Hazelwood (book); Em Beihold (musical artist–particularly Maybe Life Is Good); Not Strong Enough, Boygenius (song)March

March is honestly pretty consistently my least favorite month of the year. This March continued in the tradition of being pretty not-great. I went a little crazy over a situationship I was in at the time. My body flared up into a major “weakness episode,” but I was bullheadedly determined to go to a Em Beihold concert and a childhood friend’s wedding (in Alabama) anyway. And I ended the month by going to urgent care on Easter. But there were also kittens and flowers and books about faeries.

Notable quote: “I’m happy with my life. But still, I feel like on and off the past few months I’ve just had this kind of yearning, or maybe just a wondering, of what is next? What do I want to have, what realistically can I have… God, what do You want me to have?”Art that impacted me the most in March: Coyote Lost and Found, Dan Geimenhart (book); Katie Lynne Sharbaugh’s musicApril

In April I went on sabbatical. I took the entire month off work in favor of spending time with people I love, working on personal creative projects, and resting–and it was the absolute loveliest month. Hannah came to Georgia on her book tour; Kristen and I went to Oklahoma for Annabelle’s National Guard graduation; Grandpa came to visit for a week. I unexpectedly started writing a new book about God’s goodness in my chronic illness journey. I read poetry, colored my hair for the first time, and discovered I love matcha. I am so, so thankful that I was able to have April. It was honestly one of the most wonderful times in my life.

Notable quote: “I love being on sabbatical. I’m never going back to work. I can do anything I want today! My brain is blissfully, blessedly uncluttered. But not empty–it’s full of words and thoughts and ideas and stories… I feel unspeakably happy and grateful and aware of the goodness of God.”Art that impacted me the most in April: If God Is Good, Randy Alcorn (book); Selfishly Inclined, Elle Coves (album); Fireworks & Rollerblades, Benson Boone (album)May

May found me jumping back into work and life with both feet. That worked for a couple of weeks that were productive and fun, until I was hit with another “weakness episode” that sent me to bed. And right around the time I got over that flare-up, my feeding tube started having issues. I ended up having a very difficult hospital admission the week of Memorial Day. Lots of things went down; they were having trouble fixing my tube, and I was extremely weak and sick. It was very hard.

Notable quote: “a five-foot statue of a saint is hanging on the hospital wall. his gaze follows me; eyes blank, face serene, hands extended. below his bare feet rests a hand-scrawled sign: out of order.“Art that impacted me the most in May: My Name Is Asher Lev, Chaim Potok (book); Stateless, Elizabeth Wein (book); Instructions For Traveling West, Joy Sullivan (poems); A Wish in the Dark, Christina Soontornvat (book); Revelle, Lyssa Mia Smith (book); A Perfect Little Death, Eleri Ward (album–particularly Take Me to the World and Send in the Clowns)June

Quite literally as soon as I got out of the hospital, my church was shaken by unexpected news. June found me trying to recover both physically and emotionally. It was a heavy and stressful month where I struggled to see the good. Work was slow and I spent time working on my book, getting back into pen palling, and eating baked potatoes in the sun on my porch.

Notable quote: “At least I’m no longer feeling imposter syndrome about not having suffered enough to write my book?”Art that impacted me the most in June: Remarkably Bright Creatures, Shelby Van Pelt (book); The Outsiders (musical); My Days, The Notebook (song)July

July started out with some fun, happy times with friends! Things at church were stabilizing. I was really enjoying the theological study required by writing my book (paired with lots of lavender matchas). But my mental health was really dipping as I missed participating in musical theatre and music in general, and felt lonely. Work was still very slow, too, which stressed me out. At the end of the month, Joshua and I went to Grandpa’s house in Mississippi for a week. Although it was so wonderful and special to see everyone, my low level of physical functioning discouraged me.

Notable quote: “I have so many people and I have no one, at the same time.”Art that impacted me the most in July: The Outsiders (musical); Family Business, Lawrence (album); The Risk of Us, Gracie Abrams (album); A Ring of Endless Light, Madeleine L’Engle (book); New Money, The Great Gatsby (song); Appalachia, Rebecca Rhea (song)August

I came home from Mississippi doing really badly myself to also find a very sick cat. I knew Windy had been off for a while, but I didn’t realize how bad things were. She was diagnosed with advanced stage kidney disease in early August and the vet was unsure how much longer she had to live. All of my physical and emotional energy immediately went into caring for her. Once she had stabilized, I pushed through my worsening fatigue to squeeze several fun activities with friends and family into the last couple weeks of the month, as well as onboarding several new clients.

Notable quote: “I am so exhausted from quite literally just trying to keep the two of us [Windy and I] alive. And I’m so scared of grief.”Art that impacted me the most in August: The Berry Pickers, Amanda Peters (book); Waiting on a Miracle, Encanto (song)September

September was a very difficult month. My health was significantly worse, and any physical and emotional energy I had was being poured into caring for Windy. Her health had a lot of ups and downs. I felt anxious, full of dread, and crushingly weary. Eventually, however, at the end of the month, there was nothing more we could do and I brought Windy home from the vet on comfort care. Other things that happened in September: I spent a lot of time with my church family, I went to an Avery Anna concert with friends, I became obsessed with junk journaling.

Notable quote: “Crying so hard in the shower last night about Windy and saying ‘please, God’ over and over but didn’t even know what I was asking for. Finally whispered brokenly ‘… just be good to me’ and felt Him say, ‘I am.'”Art that impacted me the most in September: Little Girl Blue, Janis Joplin (song); Avery Anna (musical artist); Mama’s Broken Heart, Miranda Lambert (song); The Fortune Seller, Rachel Kapelke-Dale (book)October

Windy passed away in my arms on October 6th. I was devastated, but in some ways it was also a relief because the emotional limbo of the past two months had been so hard on me mentally. I threw myself into work because I’m an enneagram 3 and that’s what we do rather than feeling emotions. Mid-October, I took the loveliest vacation to an AirBnB near Blue Ridge, Georgia–three days by myself and two days with Brooke of journaling, reading, just being. It was pure peace. That week ended with a crazy, wonderful weekend of putting on a music event at CHOA and then jumping into adopting TWO new cats!!

Notable quote: “Windy was the best thing that had ever been mine. I’ve grown up from a girl into a woman with Windy. Really, I’ve never lived alone, because I’ve always had her… I love her so much. I will miss her snuggles for the rest of my life.”Art that impacted me the most in October: The Mountain Is You, Chance Pena (song); Heroes of Olympus, Rick Riordan (book series); I’m Not Afraid of Anything, Songs for a New World (song); Bright Dead Things, Ada Limon (poems); Stevie Nicks (musical artist)November

November was characterized by medical stuff and cats. The medical stuff felt very heavy and honestly, I struggled not to despair. I was going through the process of getting my own health insurance for the first time and it felt incredibly discouraging, especially with the timing of the election. Then I landed in the hospital for a few days starting on Thanksgiving because of my feeding tube. I felt like I was grieving a lot of things. But after my new cats (Ramble and Rocco) spent their first week home behind my washer (lol), we fell in love with each other! I had the best time getting to know them through snuggling with Ramble; playing with Rocco; and, yes, even watching them fight and smack each other around 24/7 (it’s a brother thing, I guess).

Notable quote: “Have you ever had to beg strangers on the internet for the food you need to stay alive? Nutrition is a human right. And I am absolutely exhausted of fighting for it.”Art that impacted me the most in November: Greenwild, Pari Thomson (book); Sixpence None The Richer, Sixpence None The Richer (album)December

December was the first month since May that I’d had a “normal” workload. I was thankful, but also struggling to stay on top of everything as I juggled holiday stuff and recovered from my November hospital admission. It was all very tiring. Christmas week was tiring, too, but I got to spend time with all of my three separate grandparents and that was nice.

Notable quote: “I have so few usable hours. I hate sleeping my life away.”Art that impacted me the most in December: Come Thou Long Expected Jesus, The Arcadian Wild (song); Lasagna Means I Love You, Kate O’Shaughnessy Overall thoughts on 2024

Some big unexpected things that ended up characterizing this year were my book and my cats. I started writing Still Good, which is half memoir and half theology, during my sabbatical in April. By the end of the month, I had a 20,000-word outline of the full book. By the end of the summer, I basically had a full draft. Researching and writing my book absolutely characterized last year, in a deeply wonderful and wholly unexpected way.

But sadly, in the late summer and early autumn, so did Windy’s sickness and death–she was diagnosed with chronic kidney disease in early August (after turning 10 in May) and died almost exactly two months later. I would never, ever have imagined that Windy would die last year. It was extremely difficult and devastating, and it’s still sometimes odd to me that now, she will only ever be a memory. But I absolutely love my new boys, Rocco and Ramble, four-year-old brothers whom I adopted around Halloween. They are playful and hilarious and snuggly and lovable.

And on a fun note, something else I enjoyed in 2024–for fun/rest/gifts for others and to stretch myself creatively–was trying out different kinds of art!

God knew I needed my sabbatical when I had it, because honestly, from approximately the middle of May through Thanksgiving, life was just really, really, super hard. I’ve mentioned several of those hard things already. But another thing that characterized this year was my fatigue/hypersomnia worsening, and how that, in turn, affected my work and my financial situation. As best as I can figure, my overall health got worse once in June, and again in maybe August or so. My fatigue worsened, and specifically my hypersomnia and sleep schedule: I try to set an alarm and get up at 1:30 on weekdays, but if I don’t set an alarm, I can easily sleep until 3-5 PM (after going to sleep around 1 AM and sleeping hard all night/day). I feel like my cognitive abilities have worsened. I have a lot less usable hours in the day–less hours that I can use to work, or to leave the house, or to be productive with much of anything (yes, I’m up until 2 AM, but my body and brain aren’t good for much of anything during those nighttime hours). It’s extremely discouraging, frustrating, and hard to work with. Combine that with the freelance industry and all of the many challenges and changes we’ve seen, and from June-December my monthly income has been easily half what it’s usually been. I also had some major unexpected expenses–try $7,000 back taxes, immediately followed up with $6,000 vet bills on for size–and all of that led me to live off of my savings for much of last year. (God also worked on me a lot this year about my pride surrounding money and finances.)

My best day of the year

I think often about what I’ve long considered (since well before the year ended!) to be the best day I had in 2024. It was a Saturday in May, when I’d gotten up in the morning and driven to a familiar little town about 30 minutes away to meet several close friends from church. We walked around an arts and crafts festival that was set up in the botanical gardens; we bought some gorgeous items, discovered whimsical fairy gardens, and petted lots of dogs. Then, when everyone else left in the early afternoon, I drove across the street to the small city park and spread out a blanket in the grass under some trees. I read Joy Sullivan’s new poetry book from cover to cover and wrote in my journal–all while listening to Eleri Ward’s A Perfect Little Death album of acoustic Sondheim covers, which I’d discovered for the first time that day (and it truly is perfect). Finally, hours later, I drove home and took a nap. It was the most perfect, lovely, beautiful day.

The highlights of 2024…

In 2024, I read 149 books, watched 16 movies, and listened to so much good music. I saw one Broadway musical (Aladdin at the Fox), and I went to two concerts–Em Beihold and Avery Anna (although man, I don’t know if my body can handle concerts anymore). I wrote 50,000 words of a nonfiction book and released three original songs on Spotify. I adopted two cats whom I love. I went to two weddings with my family for longtime friends who felt like siblings at different points growing up. I also went on four trips! I went to Cleveland Clinic in Ohio (a new state for me) with Mom; Fort Sill in Oklahoma (also a new state for me) with Kristen (and some other friends) to see Annabelle; Mississippi with Joshua to see family; and Blue Ridge, Georgia with Brooke/by myself.

…and the lowlights

I also went to three funerals this year. I went through medical situations that I described in my journal as “a nightmare that won’t end and just keeps getting worse.” I cared for my beloved cat for two months as she got sicker until she passed away in my arms, feeling like she took a part of me/a season of my life with her that I’ll never get back. I cried alone in bed at one AM many times. I walked through some very hard circumstances with my church family. I was told we were at the end of the road and I needed major surgery to take out my large intestine. I struggled more with my career than I have in years. And I went through several other hard situations and hard seasons–looking back, 2024 was honestly just a hard year.

What’s coming up in 2025?

Perhaps surprisingly, I don’t really feel the need or the desire to set any big goals for 2025. Mainly, I just need to be more disciplined with the things I’m already working on–getting over that final hump to finish the first draft of my book, actually doing my physical therapy exercises every day. I’m interested in continuing to explore doing different kinds of art or making other creative hands-on projects. And I already have some big fun plans on the calendar I’m excited about (and crossing my fingers my body will let me fully participate in)–like being in a friend’s wedding in April, planning/participating in my church’s local missions week in May, and attending the Oley Conference for work in June in Charleston plus maybe pairing it with a vacation.

As my body has gotten sicker, I find that setting a lot of big goals really far in advance doesn’t work great for me anymore. So I plan to just keep moving forward, taking things as they come and being faithful month by month, week by week, day by day in every aspect of my life.

Overall, despite all of the hard, 2024 also held so much good and I am thankful for all of it. A month and a half into the new year, 2025 has been pretty good so far (knock on wood). I’m looking forward to seeing what else the year brings. And that’s my wrap-up of 2024! (Just for fun–here’s the very first picture and the very last picture I took in 2024!)

How was your 2024? What were some highlights or lowlights? How is 2025 going so far for you?