My Story:
From Survival to Surrender

I didn’t grow up in chaos.

I grew up in open fields.

In long summer evenings where the light stayed soft and golden long after it should have. In barns that smelled like hay, leather, and horse manure. In a house where my parents loved each other out loud.

 

My dad taught me what steadiness looked like.
My mom taught me what generosity looked like.
And neither of them ever tried to make me smaller than I was.

 

I was a dreamer.

 

The kind of little girl who could disappear into her imagination for hours. The kind who talked to animals like they understood her…and maybe they did. I didn’t crave a white picket fence or a tidy plan. I wanted land. Movement. Something wild and honest. Something…free.

 

Even then, I heard a different rhythm.

My parents used to say I beat to my own drum. Heard a different song than everyone else.

I think looking back, I listened inward before I listened outward.

 

I was raised Ukrainian Catholic. And it was a religion…a strict one. But my parents always taught me to seek Jesus outside of the institution of the church. I am grateful to the Catholic Church for teaching me Jesus. But religion…it always felt…wrong to me. Forced. Manmade. And as I grew up, that instinct was proven.

 

But the world has a way of getting louder as you get older.

It starts gently.

 

This is what you’re supposed to do.
This is what success looks like.
This is what a good life is.

College. Stability. Marriage. Safety.

 

And slowly, without realizing it, I stopped listening to the quiet rhythm inside me and started following the louder one outside.

I told myself it was maturity.
I told myself it was wisdom.
I told myself it was what adults do.

 

Underneath that, if I’m honest, I was afraid.

Afraid of being the only one who didn’t follow the script.
Afraid of being wrong.
Afraid of failing publicly.

 

So, I stepped into a life that looked right on paper. And somewhere along the way, I drifted from the girl who trusted her own knowing.

 

You sit in classrooms learning about business and management, and part of you loves it. Another part of you feels the subtle weight of debt and structure and expectation pressing in.

You watch your peers talk about internships, careers, engagement rings, timelines.

 

You tell yourself you’ll figure it out.

You tell yourself you can do both…live wide and still follow the pattern.

 

And somewhere in those years, something shifts.

You start measuring your life against other people’s milestones.

 

You start wondering if maybe your longing for land and movement isn’t enough. Maybe you need the rest of it too.

 

And then love shows up.

Or something that looks like it. See, I was a romantic…I still am. I believe in deep, all giving, covenant love. And back then…I was so in love with the idea of love.

So this man...he says the right things. Mirrors your depth. Talks about forever in a way that feels cinematic. You don’t feel forced into it, you feel chosen.

And because you’ve always believed in big, consuming love…you lean in.

 

Not because you’re naïve.

Because I want it to be real.

 

There are moments, small ones, where your body tightens.

Moments where something feels slightly off.

But you override it.

Everyone gets nervous.
No relationship is perfect.

 

By the time I was walking down the aisle, staring at my cowgirl boots peeking out from underneath my dress, arm wrapped in my dad's, it didn't feel like a decision anymore.

It felt like momentum.

Like I was in it. Too late to back out.

I couldn't openly admit I felt that way in that moment until recent years.

 

The marriage wasn’t just a mistake. It was a slow unraveling.

Not in explosions, but in erosion. In confusion. In shrinking. In control. In manipulation.

 

I remember sitting on the back steps of my house, late at night, crying, asking God quietly:

How did I get here?

Not accusing. Just bewildered.

 

I knew Him. I had always believed in Him. But belief had been wrapped in rules and rituals and expectations that felt more like performance than relationship.

 

Still, even in that dark season, God did not leave.

On December 31, 2017, He interrupted everything.

He didn’t shout. He didn’t negotiate.
He spoke clearly: You need to leave today.

 

And for the first time in years, I listened to the voice that had always been steady beneath the noise.

 

I obeyed.

 

The house was quiet the next morning in a way I hadn’t felt in years. Not the tense, watchful quiet of walking on eggshells, but a stillness that felt both terrifying and sacred.

I didn’t wake up triumphant. I woke up raw. Exposed.

Unsure of what came next. But beneath the fear, beneath the uncertainty about money and stability and what people would think, there was something steady rising in me…relief.

 

For the first time in a long time, my body wasn’t negotiating its own safety.

 

The months that followed were not dramatic.

There was no cinematic breakthrough, no overnight transformation.

There were bills to pay, hard conversations to have, and long stretches of rebuilding that no one saw.

I worked. I moved. I returned to the land in small ways.

I returned to movement and breath and the quiet strength that comes from using your body honestly.

 

I began relearning how to live without constantly scanning for threat.

And slowly, almost imperceptibly, my relationship with Jesus changed.

 

I had always believed in Him. Even in the strictness of my upbringing, I believed.

But belief had been wrapped in obligation and ritual and performance.

Now I wasn’t interested in performance. I was hungry for presence.

I didn’t need more rules.

I needed relationship.

 

So, I began seeking Him. Not out of fear, but out of dependence.

Out of gratitude. Out of the deep knowing that He had been the one to interrupt my life when I didn’t have the courage to do it myself.

 

He did not rush me. He did not shame me for drifting. He did not demand that I prove anything.

 

He simply stayed.

 

He brought me back, not just physically but internally.

Back to work that felt grounded and real. Back to early mornings and dirt under my nails.

Back to the rhythm of animals and open roads and the kind of labor that strengthens instead of shrinks you.

When I started hauling horses and traveling across the country, it wasn’t just a business decision, it was a return.

 

A return to movement.

A return to the wide skies that remind you how small you are and how faithful God is.

 

He didn’t just change my circumstances. He began reordering my interior life.

 

He began untangling the fear of being wrong. The fear of failing publicly.

The need to measure myself against other people’s timelines.

He began teaching me that obedience is safer than approval, and that peace does not need to be earned.

 

Today, my life looks unorthodox to many.

It does not follow the script I once tried to squeeze myself into.

I haul horses across the country. I am building the online work He has called me to, slowly and deliberately.

I structure my days around seeking Him, not chasing milestones.

 

I move when He says move.

I rest when He says rest.

 

My nervous system is still catching up with what my spirit already knows.

 

There are days my body braces out of habit, days when peace feels unfamiliar because chaos was once normal.

There are moments when blessing still feels fragile.

But now I recognize those patterns.

And instead of forcing myself through them, I bring them to Him.

 

I am no longer surviving.

I am surrendering.

 

God did not simply remove me from a toxic, mentally abusive marriage.

He restored my inner knowing.

He restored my ability to listen.

He restored the little girl who once trusted the quiet rhythm inside her before the world got loud.

 

He is still restoring.

 

And if you are here because something in your own life feels misaligned, because the script you followed has left you smaller than you were meant to be…I want you to know this:

 

God does not abandon His daughters in their drift.

 

He calls them back.

 

There is more than survival. There is more than performance. There is more than fitting the pattern.

 

And He is not finished.