{"id":94,"date":"2015-03-25T18:56:57","date_gmt":"2015-03-25T18:56:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/?page_id=94"},"modified":"2017-03-28T21:44:42","modified_gmt":"2017-03-29T02:44:42","slug":"about","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/?page_id=94","title":{"rendered":"About"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>I fell in love with writing in second grade when I entered and won a writing contest.\u00a0 I found such joy in stringing words together to create a story of my very own.<\/p>\n

As a teenager, writing became part of my therapy as I walked through my recovery from childhood abuse.\u00a0 Writing allowed me to sort through the thoughts and feelings swirling around in my head and heart.\u00a0 I could write what I couldn’t say out loud.\u00a0 In my journals, I found the ability to speak truth into those painful places.\u00a0 The truth that God loved me, even in my broken, wounded state.\u00a0 The truth that He could redeem my life from the mess it was and bring healing to those places I thought would be the end of me.\u00a0 The truth that He would use me and my story to bring Him glory and honor.\u00a0 It was in my writing that I found my voice and my purpose.<\/p>\n

I began using that voice in 1996 as I was big and pregnant with my first child sharing my story at a women’s retreat.\u00a0 Since then, I have spoken at numerous MOPS events, women’s retreats and conferences, and youth events.\u00a0My hope is to encourage others to genuinely experience the depth of God’s love in a way that brings redemption, healing, and freedom to live the abundant life Jesus came to give.<\/p>\n

In addition to writing and speaking, I’m also a wife and mother.\u00a0 I have been married to my high school sweetheart for almost 28 yea\"\"<\/a>rs.\u00a0 We have shared many adventures in that time, including raising\u00a0five great\u00a0kids.<\/p>\n

We\u00a0were blessed to have our first, a daughter, right before we celebrated our seventh wedding anniversary.\u00a0 In our delight of having her, we told God of our desire to have more.\u00a0\u00a0In\u00a0His unique way\u00a0of doing things, He gave us a set of quadruplets, consisting of two girls and two boys, twenty-one months after the birth of our first child.\u00a0 Yes, that’s five kids under the age of two! \u00a0Thankfully, God provided a gracious and loving\u00a0church body which helped with everything from caring for babies, to making meals, to yard work, to house cleaning, and anything else that came up.\u00a0 We would not have survived that first year without them!<\/p>\n

As if life weren’t already crazy enough, at age three one of our sons was diagnosed with autism.\u00a0 Even though we knew it was coming, the diagnosis was still a tough pill to swallow.\u00a0 We had a lot of questions about his future and ours.\u00a0\u00a0Once again, God\u00a0provided.\u00a0 He\u00a0guided us to great doctors, therapists, teachers, and friends who taught, supported, and encouraged us as we navigated this new road.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Now, sixteen years later, all five of our kids\u00a0have graduated\u00a0high school and are currently in\u00a0various colleges in Texas.\u00a0\u00a0So now my high school sweetheart and I are\u00a0in transition,\u00a0learning to live as almost empty nesters.\u00a0\u00a0I’m enjoying the time with my husband and the new adventures we are having, but my favorite times are still when everyone is able to make it home for\u00a0a family dinner.<\/p>\n

Now I’m on a\u00a0quest\u00a0of becoming Karen.\u00a0 I’m learning who I\u00a0am and God’s purpose for me in this new season.\u00a0 I’m learning to abide deeply in His love and embrace the woman\u00a0He created me to be. \u00a0I hope that as you read, you find encouragement to wade deeply in God’s love and find His purpose for your life, knowing that you are not alone on this journey.<\/p>\n

\u223ckaren<\/p>\n

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I fell in love with writing in second grade when I entered and won a writing contest.\u00a0 I found such joy in stringing words together to create a story of my very own. As a teenager, writing became part of … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":1,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-94","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/94","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=94"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/94\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":643,"href":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/94\/revisions\/643"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=94"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}