For the rest of my life, Medjugorje is going to be a special place in my heart because that was the turning point in my life.

When I was 13, I saw a picture that someone had taken in Medjugorje. It was a picture of Our Lady with Her arms stretched out holding rosary beads and the rosary beads were glowing, they were iridescent. The story I heard was that someone in Medjugorje had taken a picture of a wooden cross with rosary beads on the arms of the cross, and when they got the film developed, they saw a picture of Our Lady holding the rosary. 

I saw this miraculous photo when I was 13, and it just stayed with me. I thought it was awesome. That was when I first heard of Medjugorje and miraculous events surrounding it. 

In 2008, I had just split up with the person I was dating. I was 29. I was in a lot of pain, and I knew I needed healing so I said a novena for healing to St. Raphael. It didn’t seem like anything changed after that. I was very depressed. The depression was so strong that I didn’t want to get out of bed in the morning or at all. 

I noticed I didn’t really want to live, that kind of depression, but I had this desire in my heart to go to Medjugorje. It was so weird, the juxtaposition of being very depressed but having the desire to go to this place. I didn’t know why I had the desire. It was just there. I was glad for it because it gave me a glimmer of hope amidst the darkness. It gave me something to look forward to. 

Within months, I found out that my parish was sending a group of people to Medjugorje at that time so I signed up. 

I remember we had meetings prior to the trip. I didn’t talk to anybody. I wasn’t very social. I was very private and isolated. I remember not making friends with people, just going to the meetings to prepare, just learning about the place and learning the information but not talking to anybody. 

But I was going. I was definitely planning on going, and it did give me something to look forward to. 

We went in June of 2009. The first thing I did when I got there was I went to confession. I remember being extremely angry and confessing the sin of anger. At the time, I didn’t know why I was so angry. I just knew I was very angry, and I was directing that anger at God. I was confessing that, and the priest told me for my penance to go before the Eucharist in adoration and say, “Jesus loves me,” 50 times. 

I did that, but I was angry because I still felt angry. I felt like nothing happened. 

I was more in a state of denial than I was skeptical. I remember being outside, and people would say, “The sun is dancing,” and I wouldn’t look because I was stubborn. I didn’t want to give God credit for miracles because I was so angry. 

I participated in some of the events, but some of them I didn’t. I went to Mass. I went to confession. I remember going to Cenacolo and really liking that, listening to the stories of the young men there. 

I remember being on Apparition Hill during one of the apparitions, and it was at 9 o’clock at night. We were all praying the Rosary, and then all of a sudden we all stopped, and it went dead quiet. How would we all know to stop at the same time? That was so weird, but that’s what happened. We were all praying, and then we all stopped. Why did we stop? Because something was happening. 

On our second to last night there, a small group of young adults, including our priest who was our director for the trip, were going to spend the night on Cross Mountain. We climbed up Cross Mountain together. I think we probably prayed the Rosary or did the Stations on the way up. Then it was like a little camp out party on top of Cross Mountain. The other young adults and the priest were all laughing and talking. I did not want to participate because I was angry. I was participating to the extent that I was able. 

They were staying up all night talking, telling stories, having fun, and I was thinking, “Why would I stay up when I could sleep?” I loved to sleep. I didn’t have a coat or a blanket. I just wrapped myself up in hotel towels that we had brought. I put my hood on, and I went to sleep. 

When I was asleep, I had an experience in my dream of being like a two year old child, like a baby, and a woman, a mother, was holding me. I was in swaddling clothes. It was the most peaceful sleep of my entire life. 

I will never forget that moment because sleep was always something that I struggled with. Since early childhood, I always had trouble sleeping. I would wake up crying. I grew up having nightmares of ugly things. Sleep was not a peaceful experience for me, at least not like I felt in that moment. In that moment, sleep felt very pure. I felt comforted, and I felt protected. I had not experienced that feeling before in my life. 

My friends woke me up in the morning, and I was angry at them for waking me up because I was having literally the best sleep of my life. They woke me up, and we spent the next day there. Then we went home. 

I didn’t want to go home from Medjugorje because I felt like I needed more time. I felt like I was in a safe place while I was there, but I had so much interior chaos that I needed time to sort it out. I was still angry when I went home, but I had this precious experience of sleep, being held by the mother. 

For me, the blessings of Medjugorje not only were that sleep, but they unfolded after I got home in the form of people coming into my life to have relationships of friendship that would be very healing for me. 

I think it was a month later I met a religious sister who reached out and befriended me. That relationship helped me to see the color in life again. Then a couple months after that, I met a young man who now is my best friend. He’s like a brother to me. I had a sister relationship, and I had a brother relationship. The following summer of 2010, I met a bishop who adopted me as a spiritual son. Then I had a father relationship and the mother relationship with Our Lady. It was like Our Lady came first and then a sister and then a brother and then a father. 

All of those relationships helped me on this long journey of inner healing, to step closer to God in my life and experience joy and happiness again. 

That moment of being on top of that mountain sleeping in Our Lady’s arms was the turning point in my life. That was the turning point. For example, up to that point, I was a very angry, scared person. After experiencing a lot of healing over many years, I’m not an angry, scared person today. 

What I would say to others like myself is, it’s okay if you don’t have everything together. It’s okay if you’re broken. It’s okay if you’re hurting. It’s okay if you’re angry. Our Lady just wants to embrace you and treat you as Her own child. She takes us where we’re at.