They took my child. And for a while, it felt like they took everything.

My breath. My balance. My name. The way people looked at me. The way I looked at myself.

I remember sitting in the dark, asking God how it got to this. I didn’t break any laws. I wasn’t some monster. I was a mother. I was doing the best I could with what I had and still, they came.

The system doesn’t come gentle. It comes loud. Cold. Fast. And when it leaves, it doesn’t take just your child. It takes your peace. Your rhythm. Your sense of safety in the world.

But even in all of that, somehow, hope stayed.

Not the pretty kind of hope. Not the kind that makes it to bumper stickers or church signs. This was survival hope. The kind that shows up when you’re sitting in a parking lot crying so hard you can’t drive. The kind that whispers, “Keep going,” when everything else says, “You’ve already lost.”

Hope, for me, looked like a friend who didn’t ask questions, just showed up. It looked like a stranger on the internet sharing a story that reminded me I wasn’t crazy. It looked like that one moment where I finally breathed without crying.

They can put your life under a microscope. They can put your name on a list. They can put a target on your back. But what they can’t do is kill what God put in you to fight for your children.

I’m not writing this because everything is perfect now. I’m writing it because even in the middle of the mess, I know now that I’m not alone. And neither are you.

You may be walking through fire right now. But hear me when I say: everything fire touches isn’t destroyed. Some things are made stronger. Sharper. Clearer.

You are not what they wrote down in their reports. You are not your worst moment. You are not too late. You are still that child’s mother. And that means something.

So take today one minute at a time. Cry when you need to. Pray like it’s your only weapon because sometimes it is. But don’t you dare give up.

Your child still needs you. You’re still here. And that means hope is too.