He stopped me dead in my tracks. I sat motionless and lacking the ability to breathe as I heard the words, “Abby, we’ve found cells that could potentially be pre-cancerous and if you don’t change your lifestyle immediately, I’d give you ten years.”

I’d never felt so undeniably hopeless in my entire being. At the vulnerable age of fifteen, I’d been in unbearable pain for years and it began to affect every aspect of my life: my education, mental health, physical health and above all, my ability to sit back and simply enjoy living. After a struggle of dealing with daily doses of constant pain, I knew something was coming, but there is no earthly way to possibly prepare yourself to be knocked off your feet with news like that. I rebelled against the reality I then had to face with a poignant drive to do exactly the opposite of what the doctor told me: continue living the way I had my entire life. My slate was wiped clean and I was clueless: clueless on how to start over, clueless in trying to fathom why and clueless in where I stood with the God that made me- He was nowhere to be found.

I went looking for a map. I tried to trace the blurred lines that were life as I’d previously known it, and tried to reconstruct their clarity as I scrambled to return to some sort of normalcy. In the meantime, I lost myself in sunny days spent inside an eerily dark room, curled up in a ball and repeatedly asking “Why?” until sorrows sent me to sleep. I lost myself in red-stamped attendance letters, reminding me that failing was only so far away. I lost myself in missed calls and texts from dear friends that it felt that I hadn’t seen or talked to in several lifetimes, pleading for me to go out for a night or just stop by and say hello. Time was passing slower than it did as a child, when I was aching to grow up and deal with “adult things.” At that point, I was submerged in an emotion of astonishing aimlessness and pain, not showing any reluctance as it branded itself into my insides, just as the news of a limited life had several months prior; in contrast to my childhood mentality, I would’ve given absolutely anything to turn back time.

I long for the day I can scientifically explain the sensation I felt the morning things changed. For the past several months, I felt like I was sitting in a glass box, helplessly watching my hopes and dreams die on the outside. Only that morning, it was different; something remarkable was in the making and it took over my existence. The path that had been previously and cautiously laid out in front of me had disappeared and for the first time, I had a completely clean slate.

I blinked and was having opportunity and accomplishment consistently thrown my way. I soon became the District IX President for the Louisiana Association of Student Councils, the President of my school’s Student Council, a contributing writer on an online platform for thriving young adult writers, and pursued entrepreneurship in established my own photography business. After being knocked down time and time again, I realized the greater things happen outside of our comfort zones. Just when I thought the opposite, I didn’t need life to come together or become better, I needed it to come undone and become fundamentally different, teaching me that adversity is not a curse, but a disguised blessing to last a lifetime.