A love letter to 2016

2016

This will go down as the year that broke me, brought me to my knees. Showed me heartbreak like I could never imagine, and took me to the darkest depths of my mind.

The year I learnt that no matter how much you love, how hard you try, how much of yourself you give to somebody, they can still toss you aside, like a dirty tissue. Trample over your feelings, crush your heart and walk away with barely a backwards glance.

I spent the last three months of the year on the floor, gasping for breath, desperate and depressed, with not a clue how I could ever begin to pick up the pieces let alone try to put them back together.

With a little distance, comes a little perspective. Yes, I am broken. Yes, I have lost the thing I thought I wanted the most in the world. I have been hurt beyond imagination and had my ability to trust and love with my whole heart, smashed.

And yet.

I can see that 2016 has brought me some important lessons.

In being broken, I am becoming whole. In my heartbreak, I did what I have never done before – reached out. Dropped the mask of pretence. Gave up answering the ‘How are you’s’ with ‘I’m fine’ and instead admitted my truths. Admitted to the tears and the hurt and the confusion. To the self-doubt and how much I blamed myself and didn’t love myself.

Almost 15 years ago, I was broken and shattered. I gave my heart to a man, put blind faith in him to heal me, to make me whole and gave away my power. I let him be the answer, the one to save me. And he took my trust and threw it in my face.

I’ve finally, finally, learnt that I HAVE TO SAVE MYSELF. 

All my life I’ve been waiting to be saved, putting my feelings of self-worth in others hands. Defining myself by others thoughts about me. I never thought that I was good enough, or worthy of love or happiness. Because that was what I was told. I soaked up his lies because I’d given him my soul. Where I should have had apologies, instead  I got accusations. Blame. Reasons why it was all my fault.

And oh how I believed them.

They brought me to the darkest places I have been in a long time, where I didn’t want to die, but I sure as hell didn’t want to exist any longer.

Yet… my story continues. In my brokenness and openness, I’ve found that I am surrounded by love and light. Friends who have been there to catch me when I fell. To show me that I am not to blame. That sometimes you get screwed through no fault of your own.

Last year was the year that taught me I am enough, I am worthy of love, I deserve to be happy.

it taught me that I am so much stronger than I ever believed possible. Even amidst the worst of all this, I kept going. One foot in front of the other, the tiniest baby steps you could ever imagine, but forward moving all the same. I kept all the balls I juggle daily in the air, kids got fed, and hugged, and loved. Work got done, the house was clean{ish}…life went on in spite of everything.

Grief is not something we ‘fix’, it’s not something to be ashamed of or hide. To have loved so deeply that we are so heartbroken is a gift. It’s in our darkest times that the light can creep back in. After grief, we are reborn as stronger people, with more compassion and a deeper vision.

As I say goodbye to the past year, lay the deepest of its pain and hurt to rest, and try to forge a new path forwards, what I’m taking with me is this “I am not afraid. I was born to do this”

2017 will be the year that I flourish, that I grow into the person I was always destined to become. To strip away the shackles of my self-hatred and crippling fear and SOAR.