18 August 2022
Dear 26 year old me,
You've made it another 10 years and things have changed so much in this time. Life has thrown you many curveballs - some you were expecting and others that knocked you to your knees from the shock but you've taken things in your stride, no matter how bad the situation and just gotten on with it. You've got more guts and balls than you ever thought you had and you should be proud of your determination.
It took you a long time to stop fighting things (life, the universe, yourself, your demons) and instead embrace the lessons that had come to you. The thing you still struggle with, even 10 years later is embracing the circumstances you're placed in, when the lesson is unclear. The thing is, by embracing the circumstances, the lesson will eventually come clear but you have to learn to be patient. Even now you're not great at doing this, but I promise you that you're getting better. Perhaps this will be something you will spend your whole life trying to learn.
You finally won the baby lotto and have two beautiful children. After they arrived, right at the point where you were wistfully remembering those Sunday morning sleep ins and how you used to be to go to the toilet on your own, you even wondered why you made all that fuss to have a baby in the first place! Despite this, you wouldn't have your life any other way.
Richard is a great dad to the kids and they adore him. You love how he is with them and how much they love doing things with him. He's still a great husband, although still knows how to get on every single one of your nerves (guess that's where the kids learnt it!). He brings a softness and thoughtfulness to the family that is needed. I don't think you could have chosen a better man to raise your kids with.
You know all those things you said you wouldn't do when you were a mum? Guess what? You have, for the most part, done them (with some exceptions). All those things you said your kids wouldn't do? You got it, they've mostly done it. But guess what? They're still good kids, and you're still a great mum, despite your fears that you wouldn't be. All those years beating yourself up thinking that the universe was stopping you from being a mum because you were going to be bad at it was for nothing. Of course you're not perfect - you get things wrong, you snap sometimes when you probably shouldn't, you tune out when Richard and the kids are talking and sometimes you just want to be left alone for an hour, but you like to think that you're teaching your kids valuable lessons about life and they're certainly not damaged from this. Ask them when they're 26 themselves and we'll find out for sure!
Your twins would have been turning 14 this year and you still wonder what they'd have been like. You still pause on 5 June every year to think about them and how much further you feel from the day you lost them. Every year when you're celebrating your niece's birthday, you're also silently sending birthday wishes up to the two babies that never were. The pain never leaves, and perhaps the biggest lesson you've learnt since finally having kids of your own is that having them doesn't actually erase the pain of your loss. Sometimes it only magnifies the pain. So please let go of the notion that it will - you're only setting yourself up for a fall. When that fall comes, try to be gentle with yourself.
Oh by the way, you know all that pressure you put on yourself for being so far behind from your cousins in the baby making stakes, and how terrified you were that your brother would have a baby first? Guess what? Your kids are still loved by your parents and your nanna. It doesn't matter that they weren't 'first' because they are *yours* and that's all your parents and nanna care about. Nobody has ever told your kids that they cannot be loved as much as the other great-grandkids or grandkids because they were not 'first' because it's simply not true. Look at you as a prime example - you were not 'first' but you were loved equally, if not more than your cousins and brother. I cannot believe you've spent so much of your energy thinking about this and feeling so much pain about it. Please stop twisting yourself into knots on the inside and hurting yourself thinking about this.
Sometimes life is not fair. Sometimes it is. You know this. Please love yourself as much as others love you.
I promise you that if you just let all this anger, fear and loathing go, life will take you to amazing places. But you have to trust the universe. Most importantly, trust and love yourself. What you're looking for is just around the corner. Just take good care of you. It all works out. Trust me.
Love,
Your 36 year old self.
