The Year of Two Scars

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When everyone kept telling me that 25 was a big year, I don't think this was what anyone had in mind.

Year 25 was the year that kept on giving. It was the year that I learned more about grief, coping, fear, hurt, healing, and grace than I bargained for. A good friend told me the week before my surgery that "We all have a year we look back on and don't know how we made it through." Year 25, I think you were that year for me. To be frank, Year 25, you KICKED. MY. ASS.

If I wrote to you today and told you that I was 100% who I was when I started year 25, I would be straight up lying to myself and all of you. If I tell you I am over it all and good to go anytime soon, feel free to call me out - because I am definitely not even close. I'm making progress, but I've got a way to go. The stage of life that I'm in right now feels like I take 2 steps forward and 5 steps back. 

(photo credit: Holly Ann Abel with Bloom Like Magnolia Photography)

Year 25 left me with two scars, one on my heart and one on my neck. I've finally reached a point, where I wear both proudly because of how hard I've had to fight and still fight daily to make it through getting those scars. But part of me also wishes I didn't have to wear them at all, that I didn't have to fight those fights, that I didn't have to be that strong because it's exhausting. That I didn't have the emotional turmoil stirring in me. It's not fair. It hurts. It honestly sucks for lack of better terms.

This year I had to battle my toxic thoughts head on. I had to confront my doubts and fight through my faith. I had to be strong and struggled with the fact that I had to be so strong, I mean did I really have a choice? I fight the urge daily to isolate, to pretend I'm fine, and to keep trucking along independently. I came face to face with the idea of rest that I had pushed away for so long. 

Everyone always asks if you feel any different after you turn another year older, and usually my automatic answer is "no, I feel the same." But this year, I do feel different. I honestly I think 26 year old me is a completely new person compared to the 25 year old me. And I don't want to go back. 

So today I say goodbye to 25. Hello to 26. May year 26 be a year of healing, growing, having to fight a little (or a lot) less to find joy, realizing that the plan I had for 26 looks much, much, different and that's okay, and most importantly telling myself I'm closer to 25 than I am 30 ;) Let's do this thing. 

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