photo: Guillaume de Germain via Unsplash
After many years of feeling drained as a partner and a mom, I decided to take my life back and stop going through the motions.
At some point, I lost a bit of myself along the way of raising my children.
I let go of my passions and only focused on what made my children happy. And the funny thing is, I didn’t even know it.
Years later, upon deep reflection, I realized and recognized the loss I was feeling.
I let go of me.
I stopped living for me and only woke up each day wondering how to make the lives of the people around me more fulfilled.
I let go of me.
I started to become a shell of a person simply going through the motions rather than living life each day. Even before the pandemic, I felt I was living day after day the same life over and over again.
I let go of me.
I didn’t wake up refreshed, ready to take on the day, rather I was tirelessly traipsing through the day with little to no emotion.
I let go of me.
I was trapped inside my own shell, knowing the walls to escape could be broken down, but no one could reach in and help me.
I had to emerge on my own.
And that, my friends, is exactly what I did.
I reached deep into my soul and pulled out the old wounds and dealt with them face to face.
I slowly started to find me.
I gently traveled to the parts that I had been missing, brushed myself off while being wrapped in a warm embrace, and invited myself back in again.
I slowly started to find me again.
I essentially stopped living life going through the motions.
I started living and I let go of the guilt.
I let go of the looming thoughts that burdened me. I stopped feeling selfish for the times I was making myself happy.
I slowly started to find me again.
I started living for my family as a whole.
Not just living for my husband. Not just going about my day for my children. But for me also. For the first time, I was living for all of us collectively.
I slowly started to find me again.
Life has not changed drastically, but how I look at my life has been altered.
Each day I am presented with decisions to make and I am living within the decisions, feeling each and every part of the day.
I am not going through the motions of filling a void in the hollow of the shell that once existed.
And oh, what a blessing it has been.
I found me!
