Hello and Welcome to My Blog!

My name is Kimberly Dillavou. I am the founder and author of Gracefully Living Life Loved.  My desire is to encourage and inspire you to become the best version of you.  I hope to help you discover how worthy, precious, and loved you truly are.

My purpose for this blog is to share with you the life lessons that I have discovered on what I call “My Journey”.  The person you see in the above picture is not the same person 10 years ago.  I have come a long way along my path to wholeness.

Who I Am

I am wife to Jess and mom to 3 precious kids. I am the oldest of two girls.  Being the oldest wasn’t the easiest job.  I was the one forging the way for my parents to figure out the “parenting” thing.  My sister and I had the typical sibling rivalry.  I have to say that I love my sister to pieces now.  Though it wasn’t always that way.

Those growing up years were difficult ones.  My parents were parenting the best they could with the “tools” that they had.  They both had fears and strongholds that they were dealing with…all the while trying to raise two daughters and make a living.

A False Sense of Identity

I formed many distortions about myself during those years.  Unfortunately I carried them with me into my adult years.  Many decisions throughout my life were made because of my false identity.

I know the pain of:

• depression
• mental illness
• anxiety
• rejection
• extra marital affair
• abandonment
• divorce
• domestic abuse
• attempting suicide.

I know what it is like to look in the mirror and hate the person that is reflecting back, to feel as if everything in your world is out of control, and to feel like you are broken beyond repair.

Through all those experiences I have found a platform of hope and healing for others.  I am so very grateful for each and every one of those painful situations because of the good that is coming from it today.  I honestly wouldn’t want to change a thing.

My Purpose

Anyone who knows me would tell you that I love to talk.  I absolutely love people…especially preschoolers.  Before I became a mom, I owned my own preschool.  I no longer apologize for my goofiness because I now know that I was created the way I am on purpose FOR a purpose.

Months after our first child was born I was fortunate enough to be able to close my preschool and stay home with my sweet baby boy.  We had the other two children within four years after the first one was born.  I am still a stay-at-home mom after all these years.  I am one super blessed momma!

My Best Friend

Another important part of my life in my personal relationship with Jesus Christ.  Growing up I attended church.  My understanding of being a Christian was to follow the rules that were set forth by the church.  I viewed God as a distant “being” that was just waiting for me to mess up.  Even though I accepted Christ as my Savior…something was missing.

Thankfully, I discovered that God wasn’t a distant “being” but a loving father who wanted a relationship with me.  He wanted to be my best friend.  That is when everything changed for me.  The emptiness that I felt was now being fill up with my relationship with Jesus.

My Passion

My passion to help women realize how precious they are started over 6 years ago.  I myself was on a journey to find healing from my past hurts.  Once healing began I wanted others to experience the freedom that I found from the past.  Thankfully I had an opportunity to become a mentor for women who were struggling with some of the same issues that I had been struggling with.

My Emotional Struggle

I had struggled to believe that I was beautiful, worthy of love and acceptance, and that my life had purpose for many years.  It was situations, experiences, and people that convinced me of these false truths.

Even though they were not true facts about me I held them as truth in my mind.  Many of my decisions in life were based on these “truths” which only lead to more pain and suffering.  I so desperately wanted to be loved and accepted but was never able to find it.

Today I know that I am  beautiful, worthy of love and accepted.  I know that my life has purpose.  It is not out of vain that I know these things but out of the love of my Heavenly Father.  My desire is that you, too, come to that place of loving the skin you are in.

You can reads more about my healing journey – Finding Hope in the Darkness – A Journey of hopelessness and despair to one of joy and peace. 

Can You Relate?

If you can relate to these issues then you are in the right place.  I will share with you the wealth of information that I have discovered through my process of healing and restoration.  Together we will take a journey that will help you become the best version of you.

Question for you….have you been on your own journey to wholeness?  What discoveries have you made?  I would love to hear about it and it just might help someone else too.

Let the healing begin!

Books I read and found healing for my soul…

Here are a few of the books that I read on my journey to wholeness.  If you click on the book it will take you directly to Amazon.  You can preview the book or purchase it.

I have a list of all the books that I have read in the last 10 years that have benefited me in great ways.  You can see that list on my Books That Changed My Life page.

*This page contains affiliate links.  If you purchase something from these links, I get a small commission at no extra cost to you.  That commission is what keeps this blog going.  Thanks in advance!