Happily ever after is right now.

What a year 2018 was. It was my first “full” year as a divorced woman. Wow, never thought that would ever be anything I would be. I would like to think that I have handled it well. I guess when I am writing for it to be read I want to put forward my best side. The ever optimistic “What doesn’t kill me makes me stronger” and “look at all the lessons I’ve learned” and the “I’m so much stronger for having survived this” and all the other beautifully penned cliches. I oftentimes tell my clients that I don’t want to hear their regurgitated therapeutic cliches and other bullshit. I tell them I want the reality of where they are right now. If it’s angry they have to be in my program, I want it. I just want them present and expressing themselves. But then I sit here like some polished piece of shit doing the same things they try to get away with. Maybe that’s why it irritates me when I see it in them, because I see what I try to convince myself of every day. That I have this flowery optimistic point of view. That I joyfully choose to look at every challenge as a “opportunity for growth”… The reality isn’t that pretty. Not by a long shot.

This year has been hell. That is not me being negative, that is my bloody and bruised soul looking at you with eyes of fire saying I’ve seen the darkness… I lived there. And I am fighting with everything within me to embrace the light. I have great days. This year was filled with more beauty and adventure and LIFE than I can explain. I felt every heartbeat, every smile, every beautiful moment. And I felt every disappointment, every gut punch, every failure, every tear. I felt it all with every fiber of my being. I’ve felt unstoppable and I’ve felt hopeless. And through it all, I held on. I held on to the hope that it gets better, some days just by a thread.

Oftentimes people only want to share the struggles once they have achieved the success. We hide the struggles as we live them, we will tell our story when we have a happy ending. We don’t share our before until we have an after that seems “good enough” for us to justify the struggle we have survived. But fuck that. When I’m in the darkness bracing for the next deathly blow I don’t want a success story, I just want to know I’m not alone. I don’t want the happily ever after to tell me how much better it gets. My eyes, having adjusted to darkness, are searching for others like me. Those who don’t have it all together, so we can all struggle together – helping each other where we can. But so many of us are afraid to admit that we don’t have it together. Or if we do, those who have it all together just want to give us the lectures of what we need to do to get where they are. I don’t want that. I don’t need that. I don’t need to be fixed. I’m not some success story to add to your repertoire to impress those above you so you can “level up.” I don’t want your advice or “3 easy steps to fill in the blank.” I don’t even want someone to fight for me. I just want someone to take my hand and say “You got this” and stand by me as I embrace the struggle. So, here I am promising to be that person for you. I will stand with you in the messy, dirty, dark struggle and look you in the eyes and say “beautiful soul, you got this. fight when you can, rest when you must. you are not alone. don’t look away… I see you. I see your soul, every part of it. and I will not look away. I see you and I am with you, always”

Today I dropped my daughter off at school after one of the most emotionally draining winter breaks I’ve had with her. Not for any fault of hers, she is perfection, but because life is heavy. I have unhealed wounds from my relationship with her father and sending her away to spend the week with him still stings. I am struggling in every area of life. I am entering my last 9 weeks of grad school in a few days, searching desperately for a job – I’ve been getting by on hope, charity, and public aid – and while I’m grateful, so grateful – it still isn’t enough and the bills are piling up. This past year I’ve lost my stable job of almost 8 years, lost people so incredibly important to me, and lost a year long court battle. Each one of those deserve a time of grieving that I am not able to provide. I go to bed exhausted, but I can’t sleep. This is my darkness, my struggle, my reality. The weight of it all disappears when I keep myself busy. I find myself falling back into that place I lived for years. The numbing buzz of keeping busy. A million lists. So many projects. Check it off and move on. If I’m moving I can’t feel how heavy it is. But that isn’t living. Those are the moments I need you to show up for me. It’s like a trance, I’m asleep – not alive. I miss out on the weight of it all for those moments. But I miss out on the joy of it all. And I am so incredibly lucky to have a few great people who know me well and love me enough to remind to me stop… breathe… live. And I feel the weight of the struggle, but I also start to see the joy of it too. Those moments when the little voice says out of no where “I love you mom, you’re the best” … I stop and I live. Those moments when you make me laugh when I don’t want to… Those moments when you walk up behind me and hug me tight and tell me you love me… Those moments when you text me just the right thing at just the right time because we have BFF ESP…. Those moments are the ones I don’t want to miss. Because that… that is what living is. The weight of the struggle will always be there. I hope someday it won’t be this heavy, but I know it will never go away. If I try to avoid it I miss those things. Those little things that make life so sweet. It’s not the “happily ever after” … It’s the right now. Happily ever after is just a lot of right nows put together day after day after day. Happily ever after is right now… and i’m going to live it with purpose.