Vivian was surrounded by people who loved and adored her, but no one knew she was suffering from childhood trauma, or that she barely slept—sometimes going days without any sleep at all. Even her closest friends had no idea she was suffering in silence. Tragically, when the darkness pressed in and became too much she took her own precious life, and we lost her forever.

I thought holding everything together was the key to happiness, until I realized God had something better in mind. Control. Planning. Perfecting. If you’re anything like me, you’ve clung tightly to life like a checklist, believing that if you just manage everything well enough, you’ll finally feel whole and fix what is broken. The truth is, even when things look “perfect” on the outside, you can still feel hollow, restless, and unsatisfied on the inside.

Growing up in an alcoholic home, I developed a coping mechanism for dealing with rejection.