Dear Magoo, Goosie, and Mae,
I started this blog just shy of three years ago. And I mainly started it for you. I realized that even though we will hopefully be together for many decades more that you will never really know the mom who raised you.
You will know me, of course. You will know me as we grow through life together. But the me of your childhood, that will kind of fade from your memory.
When you get to this stage in your life, you might ask me questions about back when. I will try to give you answers. But my memory will be foggy and it will be clouded by reverie.
And I want you to know me. Not for some self-serving desire for immortality but because I want you to know that even though it was decades earlier, I travelled the same journey. I hope my words can become a companion for you, can become some place for us to share our journeys.
When you rock your babies, I want you to know what was going through my head as I rocked you.
When you cry in the bathroom from exhaustion, I want you to know what was going on behind this door in our house.
When you first look into your little girl’s eyes, I want you to know that my heart tried to contain that same sense of awe and elation and joy and love that yours is trying to contain right at that moment.
And so I don’t normally write to you. I write about myself for you.
But every now and then, some thought or idea or feeling will come over me, and I feel with a sense of manic urgency that I must write this down for you and to you if only because I can’t open a vein and pour these words directly into your being.
And tonight, I want to tell you that in the face of this big world that will tell you ninety million different messages, in a world full of people who will pull you in every direction they can, in what can feel sometimes like hurricane force winds pushing you this way and that, do you. And only you.
I just turned 37 last weekend. I don’t mind being old. I actually embrace it. But still, 37 sounds really old. I can now talk about things that happened 20 years ago with pretty good clarity. And as I do that, as I think back twenty years and fifteen years and ten years, certain things start to become clear.
And one of those things is that there are people out there who will try to define you.
Hopefully most of these people will be kind hearted and full of good intentions and best wishes for you. But they won’t all be. Some prowl about, seeking vulnerability and weakness. They seek people with a hole that needs to be filled. And they will try to dig into that hole. They will burrow. And their venom can seep deep into you.
Their words can become your words. Their thoughts can become your thoughts. And one day you will wake up and realize that while you have not seen or spoken to them in ten years, it doesn’t matter. Because they are now in you. And the sad thing is that you may not even know it or realize it.
People don’t like being alone. People most definitely don’t want to be alone in their sufferings. And sometimes people will try to ease their own sufferings by putting it onto you.
This is not okay. This is not how friendships, or any relationships, should work.
I’ve always had a weird time making friends in adulthood. I’ve always held back a bit. There was a big part of me that I refused to give over. I would refuse to trust. Refuse to let my guard down. Refuse to let myself settle into a place of comfort.
And I’m starting to learn that a big part of that is because I found myself in a mess that was so entangled I didn’t know how to get out. Or even that I should get out.
But now that I am, now that I am free and have been for many years, I see the damage that has been done. And I have learned that the problem was in the relationship, not in relationships in general.
Boundaries are good. Boundaries tell you and the world who you are. They keep what is yours to yourself while allowing what is social to meet up with others. It lets you become a part of a bigger whole while still remaining whole yourself.
And if you ever, ever find yourself in a relationship where you feel you must sacrifice yourself to be okay in the eyes of another, then the problem is the relationship, not you.
And I wish I could shield you. Just like everything in life, I wish I could shield you from the pain. Knowing that I can’t, I comb my brain trying to figure out some way to build you up now, to strengthen you, and to help you find who you are so that you do not fall victim to such situations. But I don’t know how to do that. I guess that’s your job to figure out as you travel this journey, and I will be with you every step of the way.
But just know…
You are good.
You are enough.
You are not broken. At least not any more than any of us are.
Your deficiencies were created for you. They are yours to work through and maneuver with and overcome.
Your struggles are there to help you grow into an even more beautiful version of you than you already are.
You are good.
You are enough.
Remember that. Please, if you remember anything, please remember that.
You are enough.