My thoughts from a few days after the las vegas shooting.

 

Events like this really, really, really affect me.

I’m lying in bed, reading this article, tears streaming down my face.

Horrific things happen to people all around the world — Every. Stinking. Day.

That absolutely breaks me, and is why I tend to avoid the news.

My family knows how these sort of things affect me. I remember one night, I came home from work, and found my parents and some of my siblings sitting in the living room, talking.

They all looked very solemn as they became silent and looked at me when I walked through the door.

I asked, “What? What’s going on? What happened?” They looked at each other, and were hesitant to tell me, but I wanted to know.

They informed me that a tragedy, similar to this shooting, had occurred. I started sobbing.

When things like this happen, I think to myself, “How can life go on? How can we POSSIBLY go back to just living our daily lives after something like this?”

Like this article says, “the Las Vegas shooting took the lives of a nurse, a teacher, a police employee, and many others…they were people from different walks of life.”

They were PEOPLE. Living, breathing human beings. They have family and friends who love them. I’m sure they all had happy times and sad times in their lives.

They will not be forgotten.

I don’t know if you believe in God, and I don’t want to get all religious here. But, honestly, believing in God and knowing that things WILL be okay in the end is the ONLY freaking thing that gets me through events like this.

All I can do is pray.

My heart is aching for the people who were killed, the people who were injured; as well as their family, friends, and people in their lives.

My thoughts and prayers are with them all. ❤

If I could, I would spend time with each one of them. I wish I could be there to hold and comfort them — I’m sure they were terrified and confused.

I LOVE people. I’ve always had a great love for everyone in the world. I think this is in part because of my depression, body dysmorphia, anxiety, and the way I feel about myself.

So, in a way, I am actually very grateful for the way I feel and for my mental illness; it has made me love people in a way I don’t know I would be capable of if I didn’t feel the way I do every day.

I know that God has plans for each of us — each of the people affected by this tragedy — that are greater than we can even comprehend.

Things like this have to happen in life. We all have to go through trials, tragedies, and heartache to learn and be tested; that is why we are on this Earth.

God weeps when we weep, our heartaches are his heartaches

Although we don’t understand it now, although it hurts beyond measure, although it feels like the end of the world

I hope that, out of this horrific event, we will be led to bond together; to have a greater love for one another, to go out of our way to serve others, to recognize and remember that every single person has SO much worth.

Let us never forgot those we lost and those affected by this, but let us go forward.

Let us try to change the world for the better.

 

xoxo