We were lucky to catch up with Meredith Zahorsky recently and have shared our conversation below.

Meredith, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. What did your parents do right and how has that impacted you in your life and career?

My parents taught me to work hard. I saw my parents both work hard to give us a good life where all our needs were met. They encouraged us to be good, kind people and they instilled in us that making the time to build a community at church was important.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers

My name is Meredith Zahorsky. I a wife, a mother, a friend, and Licensed Professional Counselor. It may sound strange to say that I don’t always love what I do but I feel called to it. I don’t always love what I do because the reason people are coming to see me is most often because they are in pain or have been through a season of pain. It is a a weight that I carry at times yet I am honored to do it.

My husband and I struggled with infertility for a season, and experienced multiple miscarriages. In 2015 I was 18 weeks pregnant, had 16 month old twins at home when the doctors delivered devastating news about our baby. The doctors discovered there was fluid build up and did not think the baby would survive. This started what was the hardest 6 weeks of my life. We begged the Lord for healing, for restoration on earth but that did not happen. At 24 weeks we were told that our baby Madelyn Grace did not have a heartbeat. I delivered her sleeping on November 23, 2015.

My road with miscarriage and stillbirth has shaped who I am and how I practice as a clinician. Because I know great loss, walking with others through great loss is not hopeless. There is life after grief, after loss, and after trauma. We may be forever changed by grief, trauma, and loss but not all of that change has to be bad. Real growth, understanding, and strengthening of our faith, our character, and our priorities can happen if we allow it.

If you are reading this and you feel all hope is lost, it is not. It may not happen quickly but hope can come out of the ashes.

Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?

As a teenager I loved playing soccer. In high school I tore my ACL and had to go through multiple surgeries and rehab for my knee. I remember waking up at 4 am to go to the gym to rehab my knee before school because I wanted to be back on the field again as soon as I was able.

In college I played one season for Mid America Christian University before I tore my ACL again. I continued to rehab but decided that my playing days were over. Through both of those experiences I had to learn that sometimes, in fact most of the time resiliency is multi- faceted. I had to be resilient physically, mentally, and emotionally. Physically I had to keep working to recover but couldn’t push it too much or I would re-injure my knee. Mentally, I had to believe that the work I was doing would allow me to recover and if I wanted play again. Emotionally, I had to learn to not run away from my feelings of sadness or loss, but instead process through them.

Looking back every time resiliency is needed so are these skills.

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

Living in scarcity. I grew up having everything I needed and that was a huge blessings that I know not everyone experiences. However, I was taught that you have to plan for every disaster. I remember clearly being taught plan for the three d’s . Death, Divorce, and Disaster. This may sound like a good, independent woman. and for many it may be. For me I internalized this as I cannot count on anyone. At the end of the day, everyone will leave and you and you alone should be able to take care of self. Independence is great, and very needed but I internalized it in very maladaptive ways.

Now, although I still think of myself as a very independent (some may say sassy) woman. I am also interdependent on people. I needed to unlearn that relying on people is always bad, instead I needed to learn that we all need each other and living in true community is good and just how God intended us to live.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.journeycounselingfm,com