Dear Me,

Dear Me,

First, I need to say that I’m sorry. I’m kind of hard on you. I know you’ll shrug it off and say it’s fine but I know the way I have treated you, hurt you. I hold you to a pretty high standard. Trying to be perfect and get it right every time, for everyone, while being absolutely sure how terrible you are, is a real mind F**k on someone’s brain and I played with your head worse than anyone. Not only did I mess with your head… I allowed other people to do it also. I made you think it was okay. I helped convince you at times, it was your fault somehow or that this was just how it was supposed to be for you…for us. I did not protect you well. You never deserved that because you have always been smarter and stronger than I let know. I am truly sorry for that.

Because I wasn’t good to you, you went unknowingly searching for someone who could protect you and make you feel safe. I know you thought you found that safe place but were let down a few times. You were left confused so many times and your trust was broken over and over. Again, I’m sorry. It was never anyone else’s job to keep to you safe and strong but mine and I was the one who let you down. I failed you repeatedly, made you wait on me to help to stand up off the floor…to move you at all, to give you direction. I was silent when you needed me the most. Again, I’m sorry.

If I wasn’t confusing you, telling you lies or in acoma, I was planning a come back for us. I really was. In my own quiet moments, in the corner of your mind, I hid away trying to keep you alive!  I would pray in those secret moments to reunite us back to the person we once were. Sometimes, I would whisper back to you all the poems we use to write together…Do you remember? I would visit you in your dreams and send you messages to let you know that I wasn’t far. I tried to reach out  many times to let know I was trapped just behind the darkness.

Other times, I was being tortured in the worst of ways. I know it might be hard to believe but I was being lead down some dark hallways and into some strange rooms that overpowered me every single day. I didn’t want to go but I went anyway. This left me powerless at times and angry. I took out all my frustrations and confusion on you. I don’t know how or when this all started to happen. Maybe slowly, over a long period of time, of being hurt or in pain or maybe it happen fast, after one too many traumas that I just could fight anymore…so I broke. I honestly don’t have the answer on what made me give in this time. Maybe just tired of the struggle? What made me leave you to do life alone but I’m so very sorry that I didn’t fight harder…sooner. I should have done something different.

Somehow thankfully, you managed alone to keep breathing and waking up each day and I was so grateful you did. I never knew what to expect. It was tough and go for awhile. I would try to fight and reconnect with you but we had been apart for so long, it felt foreign at first. You didn’t trust me and I didn’t blame you. Trust wasn’t easy when we were together for other people. We always had walls so I knew it was going to be hard trying to fix this trust with us. Trusting yourself sometimes can be the hardest trust to gain back.

Over time and with so much help, we started to come together. I began to see through your eyes again. It was scary for you and know understood but I was proud of you anyway! I am so proud of you still and your strength. You’ve had many people along the road question it, putting up roadblocks, negative remarks and judgments. I know you too well to say it didn’t chip away at you a little but WE kept going and pushed on just the same. It felt good to work through pain together, to do life together. You got stronger and tougher and more “us” everyday. Even when you’d get push back from others, you kept going. I had missed that girl.

So now as we together enter yet another transition in our life, I want you know I am not leaving you to figure this one out on your own. Other people might but I will not. We will be happy. We will be healthy and everything will be good because we will make it that way. God made not a single mistake with you! You are exactly who you are supposed to be!

And through all of these years of different experiences, ups and downs, incredible climbs and massive sacrifices, you have held it together like a damn champ! Maybe you just need to know that! From the very beginning it was not easy but you did it well…becoming a wife and new mother in a very odd and hectic situation…you managed to keep your marriage strong and protect yourself and your child.

When the market crashed and you lost everything and were pregnant with your second baby…life was so hard but you pushed on. You protected your kids, went church and to work every single day. You kept your family going and feed. There were sleepless night and so many tears but you didn’t given it! You kept your faith and handle it like only a mother can do.

Your body broke down! You were in the ICU 2 or 3 times after over a year of ER visits, that still didn’t stop you! You nursed your new baby alone in the dark with a catheter bag hanging at your hip. You were even called selfish during this time for not letting your husband “party more” but you pushed on…Girl! You went through a crazy surgery, nightmare medications and an 8 day stay in hospital but then it was right back to work for you, like nothing even happened. It was hard but you did it!

Not everyone was the most encouraging or helpful but some were and many people prayed but you were the one who LIVED that! YOU did it! I’m so proud of you. You worked that job everyday, 11 hours a day for months with the help of your parents. Thank God for them because that’s all you had some days. I was napping. You came home cleaned the house, went to grocery store, cooked every meal, cleaned up dinner, did laundry, helped with homework and put everyone to bed…all bathtime duties included…that was YOU HONEY! You can say it! YOU! You went bed dead every night. And that was a regular day, not a day with an IEP meeting or extra needs you had to meet and you usually always met them!

Finally, part time work was an options but even then you still worked 7 hours day and continued to do everything…everything…everything. You were tough as nails. You helped your family with whatever they needed. So some days it wasn’t just your house you were caring for, it was your parents house and their errands too. You didn’t complain (too much) you just did it. Not anyone else..YOU. I would have helped out but I was napping.

Seizures, MRIs, achy bones with no explanation! It sucked for sure but you didn’t stop doing everything you had to do! Ovarian cyst would plague our body for multiple decades and lead to our Hysterectomy and a depression we had never known. But you got up every morning, even in the wrose pain, even in tears…you cared for your kids and took care of your house. It was a lonely time but I was proudest of you then. I know you didn’t feel proud at all. You were feeling ugly and sick all the time but I proud of will!  You started this blog, started a small business and lived basically alone as a single mother, raising two kids! I started drifted away from you but you kept pushing forwarded in the sickness, in pain, in sadness and in your loneliness…you kept going. You put yourself out there and made some amazing friends that to this very day have been our best people in life! Their kids become everything to Tristan and Gracie and that connection was amazing! If you would have followed me that would have never happened.

Now I know you only wanted to do what was best but that depression, that anxiety only got worse. The resentments and hurt really set in and who can blame you. Everyone has a tipping point. I want you to know even though I wasn’t there to encourage you, to pull us together in a good direction…I don’t blame you for your angry, your sadness. You have a right to feel all of that. Don’t let anyone tell you different. I will forever be sorry that I wasn’t there to hold you up.

I know there were things you wanted to try for in your life but you didn’t want to change anything or disrupt the flow. This was the way. And I also know how much you do enjoy serving your family but you loved to write since you were a little kid. I remember. You didn’t always write it down though. You use to sing it…just to yourself.

Later, about 2nd or 3rd grade you were asked by your teacher to enter a “Finish The Story” R.L Stine contest because she believed you had a chance. You remember that? I sure do! We didn’t even eat lunch that day! We stayed in class and wrote! We worked on nothing else but this. Our imagination was going crazy with ideas! We were so proud after a week of writing, to hand over 15 front and back, handwritten pages of creativity! I remember the teacher saying to us, she wished we would have typed it and that really busted our bubble! We we hear that again many times in life! Never having a computer growing up, we had to deal with the curse of a typewriter and the hell that is correction tape! Those were the days. I wonder whatever happened with that contest? I wish we still had those 15 pages of handwritten suspense!

I want you know that I see you trying to get your voice back. We are gaining on it more and more everyday, with every new situation that comes. Writing, standing up for yourself and your kids…even your marriage or family, when you feel you need to. I see you. We are working better together than we have in along time but I know you still have doubts. People still get in your heads and have opinions about you…being you. I’m here to let you know, that’s good. Let them! People will always have something to say and think they know about your story and that is just fine. Let them. WE will still need to keep being us either way. Faithful, strong, kind and funny us!

Understand that not everyone will like “us” during this transition time of “us” coming back together, your voice returning, so to speak and that’s good too. Let them. Let them have their opinions, it’s okay but meanwhile can WE just LIVE? If we want to write a badass book on our life or anything for that matter, let’s just do it! If we have a business idea that can bring us joy and benefit our family…then cool, let’s go for it? And you know what? If it doesn’t work out or maybe we change our mind, that’s totally fine too! We are allowed to have that happen too! It’s called being a human being. And…. we are human. Even if I don’t treat you that way. Even if others don’t treat you that way.

WE are only human, girl! You alone, with God have done mighty things to get where you are right now. I wish I would have been a better guide for you but look…WE aren’t going backward…forward motion only.

We may have some scars and be worn around the edges but we are strong! Remember, we will still have hard days, sad days, bad days and even angry days but during all of those days remember this…WE are never alone. You are a human being which means, you are allowed Grace, growth, change and most of all LOVE. Even on the worst of days remember that. But also let’s remember this on all of our boring days, normal days and regular- whatever days…Our happy, exciting days and our days that bring us overwhelming joy and laughter! At every moment you are deserving of this.

I also know this feeling…not being protected and safe…having security is something that give us a sense of peace. It helps us move about this world with confidence because we know we have this at our sides, in our homes, while we sleep…it never leaves us. It’s not of God totally and I think we both get that. It’s a Earth thing partly but God does help us to get there…I understand your need all to well. We need to intentionally pray about this like it’s our full time job. When the time is right it will all come together I am sure. Pray and know you are good and we got this.

So let’s go into this new state…our new home more connected and being who are than ever, being exactly who God created us to be …Sarah all the way. Laugh more and don’t care who hears it!

With Love, ME