Now What?

I’ve been really sad since Friday 9/18/2026.

Not the kind of sad that completely stops life- well, sort of but I still showed up. I still did what I needed to do. Saturday was a friend’s birthday, and I laughed and was entertained enough that I didn’t really feel it for a while. But when everything got quiet again, the sadness was still there… an excruciating heaviness.

Friday became Saturday. Saturday became Sunday. Then Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday.

And I was still sad.

This morning, I woke up at my usual time and just sat there. I could feel the sadness starting to creep into the room again. That familiar heaviness. That sinking feeling where you know that if you let yourself, you could stay there for hours just doom scrolling and being unhealthy.

So I sat with it.

And then I asked it: Now what?

Because the truth is, I hadn’t really been taking care of myself these days I’ve felt sadness. I was overeating. I was struggling to work out. I didn’t want to run. My body felt heavy. My motivation felt SO different.

And maybe you know that feeling too.

When you’re hurting, what changes about the way you take care of yourself?
What do you reach for when you’re trying not to feel?
What parts of yourself slowly start disappearing when sadness takes up too much room?

I had actually been asking God about my creativity too.

God, what is going on with me? You gave me these gifts, and some days I can’t even tune into them the way I want to.

That has been frustrating because creativity has always been such a huge part of who I am.
It’s how I process, communicate and make sense of things. It helps connect dots, and helps bridge a gap between people and I.

But then I realized something.

I am creating.

Just not what I thought I would be creating.

I’m creating from the space I’m actually in. From grief. From healing. From digging up roots I didn’t even realize were there. From conversations with God that aren’t always pretty or perfectly put together. From parts of my life I probably would have never willingly chosen and to be honest... are embarrassing to admit at 37 years old.

And somehow, maybe that’s the point.

Maybe I had my own idea of what I wanted to do with the creativity God gave me, while He already knew how He could use it.

I’m writing about roots. I’m breathing life into And She Bloomed. I’m creating spaces, ideas and words around healing. I’m taking things I’m actually walking through and turning them into something that maybe another woman will need one day.

And that is wild to me.

I don’t believe God needed any of this pain to happen in order to use me. But I do believe He can take what has happened and grow something from it because HE sees something in me, I don’t YET!

What if the thing you think you’ve lost isn’t actually gone?
What if it just looks different in this season?
What might God be growing in you that you didn’t plan for?

Maybe my creativity didn’t disappear.

Maybe it’s blooming into something I never planned for or ever expected to produce.

And maybe that’s the point, right? Things don’t have to make sense right now. That’s literally the concept of walking in faith.

But sitting there this morning, I still had a choice to make.

Do I continue sitting in this space? Do I keep allowing this sadness to consume parts of me? Or do I acknowledge that it’s here, feel it, and then decide that today it doesn’t get the whole day?

Yes, I’m sad.
Yes, this hurts.

All of it is VALID and warrants attention, but how much?

SOOOO now what?

Well I got up.

I put my gym clothes on and I moved. I ran out of my house as hard and as fast as I could. I felt the sadness, anger, disappointment, loneliness, grief and confusion in every part of my body. I shed a few tears not as many as I had been.

And somewhere in that run, I said: You can’t stay.

Then my mind started remembering beautiful things again.

My children wanting to decorate for fall. The people who have consistently reached out because I’m not afraid to show up in this vulnerable place. My birthday being two weeks away. The things I still want to create. The life-changing ideas God has placed inside of me. The life that is still happening all around me. But overall my future.

And then I realized something.

One of the reasons I am choosing divorce is because the relationship was no longer healthy. Not for me and not for my children. Mostly, because of the amount of hurt that both of us caused sitting in the marriage.

Yet here I was, choosing to leave something unhealthy while still allowing unhealthiness to live inside of me.

Just in a different form. Then it HIT ME!!!

Maybe that is another root God is showing me.

Leaving something doesn’t automatically remove what grew inside of you while you were there.

You can leave and still carry rejection. You can leave and still carry anger. You can leave and still crave validation. You can leave and still replay conversations. You can leave and still neglect yourself because surviving became more familiar than actually caring for yourself.

So what are you still carrying from something you already walked away from?

Maybe the person is gone. Maybe the relationship ended. Maybe the season changed years ago.
But did the rejection stay? Did the fear stay? Did the need for validation stay? Did the belief that you aren’t enough stay?

Sometimes we leave the situation without pulling up the roots.

And that’s the part of healing nobody can do for us.
I’m not saying we shouldn’t grieve.
Please grieve.

Cry. Be angry. Sit on the floor if you need to. Ask God the uncomfortable questions you don’t have pretty Christian answers for. Feel what needs to be felt.

I know I will have more hard days. Healing isn’t me declaring that I’ll never be sad again.

Quite possibly healing might be learning what to do when sadness comes.

I can acknowledge it without building a home for it.

I can say, I see you. I know why you’re here. I know this hurts.

But eventually, have the courage and strength to ask: Now what?

And maybe you need to ask yourself that too.

What do you need today?
What is one thing you can do that reminds you that you are still here?
What have you stopped doing because grief has been taking up all the space?

Maybe you pray. Maybe you run. Maybe you create. Maybe you cry. Maybe you call someone. Maybe you sit quietly with God. Maybe today your “getting up” is something incredibly small.

But grief doesn’t get to take everything with it. NO SIR!!!

It doesn’t get to take my health. My creativity. My motherhood. My relationship with God. Or every beautiful thing that is still growing around me.

And it doesn’t get to take yours either.

This is what digging up the roots looks like.

Not pretending the sadness isn’t there or rushing the grief. It’s definitely not pretending it doesn’t hurt.

It’s recognizing what has taken root inside of us and being brave enough to ask God to show us what needs to stay, what needs to heal, and what needs to be pulled out.

So if you’re sitting in your own heavy space today, maybe don’t ask yourself to have everything figured out.

Just start here:

What am I feeling?
What has this pain been doing to me?
What am I still carrying?

And then…

Now what?

Today, my answer was to get up anyway.

Tomorrow it may look completely different.

But today, I got up. And you will too. Promise!

— Rocio

The Roots | And She Bloomed
The stories underneath the bloom.