You Are More

Welcome to Her Story. We are excited to release our September story. This month’s lady is a real treasure. I don’t tear up a lot, but this one got me and Emily teary eyed as this woman spoke about God’s redemption in her life, especially as she doesn’t know how long her life may be. Emily and I went to high school with this sweet soul, and we didn’t even know half the things that she shared with us. You are in for quite a treat, so sit back, relax and enjoy Her Story.

Her name is Casey Troulias

Amidst busy schedules, we were so excited to be able to meet with Casey. It was nice to catch up with an old classmate, and fun to see where life takes people. Casey has been on quite a life adventure and a lot of you out there know her as a makeup artist, which she is amazing at, by the way. Casey’s story goes way deeper than that. We met Casey at the Little Donkey and enjoyed some food before we began to dive deep into our conversation with her. Emily and I love these times we get to spend with all the women we interview, and we love that they allow us a glimpse into their lives. Every story has been so different and with this one, Casey knew exactly what she wanted to share. When asked to tell us a little bit about herself, that opened the door to her story, and here is what she had to say, “I was born with cystic fibrosis, which is a genetic lung disorder. It actually affects a lot of organs in the body, it mostly affects the lungs. Basically what it is, is a defect in your cells. There’s a hole in cell of you gene and that’s what CF is. CF creates a thick mucus that fill your whole body. I have a really thick mucus that clogs my airways, blocks my pancreas. That in turn makes me have diabetes because my pancreas can’t produce insulin, I have lung exacerbation's that put me in the hospital. I have a port in my chest so I can do home IVs at anytime for when I’m sick. That’s been my life since I was born, at about 6 months of age on October 3rd 1993. I’m about to come up on my 25 year anniversary, which I’m really excited about as it is a big milestone for people with CF. This has been something that has always been a part of my life and I’ve had a fair share of obstacles along the way. With all that being said, that created a different childhood for me. I had to mature a lot quicker than everybody else, I understood the value of life and how important it was to live every day to the fullest. I spend about three hours a day doing treatments to maintain my current lung function and my health, and that’s getting better and better over the years. It was getting worse for a time in my life, but I recently started a new medication, that’s basically a stepping stone to a cure.

We are in the final stages of finalizing a cure for CF, and I’m on one of those drugs. I’m having less lung problems, less insulin requirements, less enzymes with all my meals, and I have more energy. On top of dealing with all of that, my dad had a narcotic addiction, which was something that I always dealt with. I never really got to go to church when I was younger as much as I wanted to go to church because my family was dealing with so much. My dad had such an issue with it, that we would go to church and he’d be standing in the back falling asleep while standing up. It made it really hard to live a normal life when we felt like we had everything on top of us. All my life I wanted to be baptized, but I wanted to wait until I found a home in a church to get baptized in. I really wanted to understand what that fully meant. I grew up with my dad being that way and my parents divorced when I was in 8th grade, which was one of the biggest blessings ever. It’s a crazy thing to say because I never wanted to see my parents split, but I knew it was a toxic situation for my family. Once they got divorced, things got a little bit easier. My mom ended up getting married and found a man that really cared for her a lot. That was an adjustment for sure, trying to welcome someone new into our family. Especially someone who didn’t understand my health situation. He assumed that CF was like asthma, and he had asthma himself. Throughout school we had a really hard time seeing eye to eye on my sickness, like if I was sick and couldn’t go to school, he didn’t understand why the sickness was preventing me from school. It was a big barrier between us for a really long time, but eventually it took him to see me being hospitalized over minor things that he could do and I couldn’t. He was finally able to see how CF affected me. We have a great relationship now, and he is a father figure that I’ve never had before. With all my struggles, I ended up finding a great guy, despite everything, who went through a lot of stuff that I did (we are all hoping that she can marry this guy soon because he is definitely a keeper).”

When Casey started to discuss her relationship with her current boyfriend, she started to share about where it all begin, which starts in a dark place in her life. She explained that she was working for a boudoir photographer doing makeup, and she had no issues with boudoir photographer at all. Her issue became when she became so desensitized to what boudoir photography meant and she started to get pictures taken of herself. She felt that this was more something to do for your significant others, and keeping those private between the two people. She got to a point where she felt that she needed to take those pictures to get attention, acceptance and love from somebody. It created the wrong kind of attention from men and it truly ruined her self esteem. Her family never liked her doing those photos, but she just thought they might be old fashioned. It took her meeting her now boyfriend to realize that it wasn’t the best thing for her (y’all he really is the sweetest). It didn’t happen right away after they started dating, but he cared so much for her that he didn’t want to see her do any more self destruction and to really see her value. It took Casey a lot of time and prayer to figure out that wasn’t the kind of work she wanted to be doing anymore and that she had to remove herself from it. It was extremely hard for her, but she knew the business was toxic for her to be around. She explained that the in the beginning of the business she had really good intentions as a lot of the women that came into the studio had struggles and she got to share her testimony with those women, but it eventually became too much and she had to walk away from that job, which she knows what an act of God. She felt like a weight had been lifted off and her and after quitting she was able to pursue after God more and more. As a result of all of this, Casey ended up getting baptized which she didn’t know if she would ever get to do. This actually happened only a couple of weeks ago.

She shared how the Lord moved in her to commit herself to baptism, and we had to share this part of her story. She explained, “We didn’t know if we would make it to church that night, and it was just a weird service in general. During the service, it had been about three weeks on my new medication, and I felt myself breathing in a way I’ve never felt before. The reason I noticed that, was I was staring forward and I saw my chest expanding further than I’ve ever seen. I just kept breathing deeper and deeper and Austin (Casey’s boyfriend) leaned over and asked if I was okay. I told that I was okay, but I’ve just never felt this before. From there, I was realizing how extremely blessed I was. I’m living with a disease that is technically supposed to be killing me and it’s reversing. I’m living in a time where I’m actually being healed. This is something that we’ve all prayed for, my disease to be lifted away, and I always kept my faith in it, but it never seemed like something that would happen. That fact that all that started happening in service made me realized that I am being healed and that I needed to give God all the glory for this. After that moment, the pastor started talking about how you should get baptized and I’ve always wanted to do that but there was always a little part of me in the back of my head that was telling me that I couldn’t get baptized because of all of my past and that I would continue to do same stuff. I was telling myself that I wasn’t worthy. In this moment, my thoughts went to those thoughts but the pastor kept talking about it and saying there’s nothing to wait for. In that moment, I realized that God wanted me to do this. It was clear that I needed to get baptized. I started to get really nervous and clammy in service. I tapped Austin and told him that I had to get baptized. I realized that I had been listening to these lies about myself and I was actually worthy to get baptized because of Christ.”

Casey explained that being baptized was the best decision that she’s made and that she’s really in a great place in life. She is feeling great health wise, and she is in an amazing relationship (we are all hoping she gets in engaged soon). Casey is a wonderful human being inside and out, and she is oh so talented. We asked Casey what all she is doing now work wise. Of course, she is doing her amazing makeup stuff, which you should all reach out to her to book her to do your makeup for an event (you can contact her at CaseyTrouliasMUA@yahoo.com and follow her stuff on Instagram @caseytroulias). She is also selling Younique makeup (which is a great company), so if you need any of that, you should reach out to Casey. We aren’t kidding, she is a phenomenal makeup artist and you should really check her out.

As we always do, we ended with asking Casey one of our favorite questions, which was particularly fun to do with someone who helps make women feel beautiful. We asked Casey to define beauty for us and if she found herself beautiful. She answered, “How I find beauty in someone is their selflessness, like how much they’re willing to do for someone with no return. That is something I look for in every person that I come in contact with, and that is usually what helps me weed out people in my life that I can’t really relate to. I do find myself beautiful. I think I have a beautiful soul and I’m proud of who I am. I couldn’t have said that about five months ago, but I’m very proud of who I am and everything I’ve done. It was really hard to accept that and I think women in general have a hard time accepting that and that is why I like doing my job. I can help women see past their past and see who they truly are.”

We knew each of you would love this story and we can’t thank Casey enough for telling us parts of her story. She really is such a sweet gracious soul, and we are so happy that we got to spend time with her. Each women in such a blessing to be with and we are glad to continue to add to our list.

Per usual, a big shout out to my partner in everything, Emily. She takes bomb photos and just adds so much to what Her Story is all about. This couldn’t be done without you.

If you don’t follow us on social media, please do. Instagram: @herstorybham and Facebook: Her Story. Please continue to share these stories with your friends. As Emily always says: “It’s not about how many people read these stories, but about the ONE person that needed to read it.” If you think of friends who need to hear these encouraging words from Casey, pass this along. We are grateful for each reader, and we couldn’t do this without each of you.