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Have you ever been so busy surviving life that you never stopped to heal from it?

You know what I mean. Life throws something devastating your way, and somehow you find the strength to get through it. You pick yourself up, put one foot in front of the other, and keep going. And before you know it, another storm comes along.

For Kimberly Foley, life has been a series of storms.

She endured years of infertility and five rounds of IVF before finally becoming the mother of two beautiful boys. Then came open-heart surgery while her children were still very young, followed by a devastating divorce that left her raising those boys on her own.

And through it all, Kimberly did what she had always done.

She kept swimming.

She became the protector, the provider, the one who held everything together. There wasn't time to fall apart. There wasn't time to process the pain. Her children needed her, and that was enough to keep her going.

But years later, when her boys were grown and she was finally beginning to discover who she was beyond motherhood, another wave came crashing in.

Breast cancer.

A double mastectomy. Twelve rounds of chemotherapy. The loss of her hair. And eventually, the news that she would need a hysterectomy.

But something unexpected happened during her cancer journey.

All those emotions she had packed away for decades began rising to the surface. And during You Night's Candle Pass experience, surrounded by women who understood what it meant to carry invisible scars, Kimberly discovered something she had never given herself permission to do.

She could stop being strong for everyone else. She could finally let someone be strong for her.

Her story, Sink or Swim: Becoming the Shore, is about a woman who spent her entire life building boats to survive the storms, only to discover that surviving and healing are two very different things.

And perhaps the greatest revelation of all?

She wasn't simply the woman who kept everyone afloat.

She was the shore.

This is Kimberly Foley.

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Still I Rise features stories from You Night's STORY CRAFTING COMMUNITY. To read additional stories, visit our Facebook page:

https://www.facebook.com/YouNightStories. Would you like to participate in a 6-week Story Crafting small group experience so that you can share your story? Write to us at teamyounight@gmail.com

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Have you ever heard the voice of God?

There have been moments in my life when I believe God has spoken to me so clearly that I couldn't ignore Him—during grief, heartbreak, fear, and moments when I questioned whether the work I was doing even mattered.

In this deeply personal episode of Still I Rise, I share three experiences that changed the way I understand faith and God's presence in my life: a vivid dream during the unraveling of my marriage that led me unexpectedly to Psalm 91; an encounter during one of the most difficult seasons of my work with You Night; and a remarkable message that came after the death of my mother, just when I needed encouragement most.

At 63, these experiences have taken on a new meaning. I'm thinking differently about time, the battles I choose to fight, the people I give my energy to, and how I want to spend the years I have left.

For much of my life, I asked, "Am I worth it?"

Today, I'm learning to ask a different question:

"Is this worth my time?"

Covered is a story about hearing God's voice, trusting His protection, letting go of battles that aren't ours to fight, and recognizing that none of us knows how many summers we have left.

Psalm 91 says, "He will cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge."

Maybe being covered doesn't mean we won't experience heartbreak, loss or hardship.

Maybe it means we don't have to walk through any of it alone.

The wings weren't there to keep me from living. They were there to make me brave enough to fly.

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Still I Rise features stories from You Night's STORY CRAFTING COMMUNITY. To read additional stories, visit our Facebook page:

https://www.facebook.com/YouNightStories. Would you like to participate in a 6-week Story Crafting small group experience so that you can share your story? Write to us at teamyounight@gmail.com

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There’s a difference between being bent and being broken.

Life can put so much weight on us that we barely recognize ourselves under it. It can change our bodies, shake our confidence, disrupt the future we thought we were going to have, and make us question just how much more we can carry.

But sometimes, it’s under that weight that we discover what we’re actually made of.

When Tara Alviano heard the words, “You have breast cancer,” her world changed in an instant. Suddenly, her days were filled with radiation, chemotherapy, surgeries, medical appointments, exhaustion, and fear. There were mornings when simply getting out of bed felt like climbing a mountain. And there were moments when she looked in the mirror and struggled to recognize the woman looking back at her.

Before cancer, Tara thought strength meant handling everything and not showing fear.

Cancer taught her something very different.

Strength could mean being afraid and showing up anyway. It could mean asking for help. Letting someone else carry you when you couldn’t carry yourself. Celebrating a good lab report, a short walk, a peaceful morning, or simply another day with the people you love.

And through it all, Tara kept coming back to one of the greatest reasons she had to keep going—her children. She wanted them to see that courage isn’t about never being afraid. It’s about what we choose to do when we are.

Cancer left Tara with scars, both visible and invisible. But today, she doesn't see those scars simply as evidence of what cancer took from her. She sees them as evidence of what she survived.

Her story reminds us that some of the strongest people we know aren't the ones who were never brought to their knees. They're the ones who discovered they could rise again.

Cancer may have bent her.

But it did not break her.

This is Tara Alviano.

Support the show

Still I Rise features stories from You Night's STORY CRAFTING COMMUNITY. To read additional stories, visit our Facebook page:

https://www.facebook.com/YouNightStories. Would you like to participate in a 6-week Story Crafting small group experience so that you can share your story? Write to us at teamyounight@gmail.com