Hi dearest internet friend,

Well today I turned 31.

August 9th 1992 was the start to my 31 years on this earth.

Unlike most, my thirties have always been chapters of my life that I have really looked forward to watch unfold. For some reason in my brain, I have always had a preconceived notion that people take you seriously in your thirties. Why I have always thought that I don’t know.

People talk about their thirties like it’s a looming time to be alive. I don’t know if it’s my need to go against the grain or what but I have always had the mindset that I couldn’t wait for thirty. Some of that stemming from feeling lost in my twenties and longing for more from my thirties. My twenties have now come and gone and I wave Forrest Gump style to see my 30s.

I am now thirty-one with two kids, a few more forehead wrinkles, smile lines, and sunspots. All things I don’t view as bad. My life is starting to make sense and my outlook on life is the most positive it’s ever been. I have stretch marks from giving life, and some cellulite to match, and a lot of crappy clothes in the closet that I am ready to ditch. There is a lot under my belt, some good, some bad, habits I’m ready to kick, and a mama bear mentality to make it happen.

All that to say, I wouldn’t change a damn thing. With age comes wisdom. With time come trials and tribulations with every trial there is a silver lining and reason to look for the light.

Okay, well the only thing I would change is I would give a lot less shits about the things I gave a shit about. I wasted so much time and energy on things that truly didn’t matter.

From people’s perspective of me, things the internet said and didn’t say, to silly things like worrying too much about the scale. I could go on and on but I’ll spare you that trouble also we aren’t gonna live in the past.

It’s weird because when I turned thirty it seems as if things just started to click. Less shits were given. Maybe that’s because I had two small kids 17 months of one another. I had my own chaos to focus on.

Anyways, so far I am still a hot mess but the trajectory of my life is finally starting to make sense. Although I’m surviving, I feel intentional and more like myself than ever.

I’m still considerably new to the 30’s club so I often think back on my 20s. Don’t get me wrong, I had a blast in my twenties but I was living blindly, probably drinking too much, and causing my own anxieties to flare up. I worried too much about what others thought, and I was aimlessly hoping and praying that my thirties would somehow be better than my twenties.

I am thankful for that decade though. In my twenties I made money and chased money out of fear for the future. I lived fast and competitively, always wanted more and to go to the next big thing. I worried about my weight on the scale too much, and wore my heart on my sleeve more times than I care to admit. I stressed about the future but I had moments where I was still very stuck living the past feeling like I had something I had to prove. Now as a thirty one year old woman I look back on those years that creeped, yet flew by… There’s so much I don’t love about my twenties yet so much I wouldn’t change. It has all helped and is beneficial to molding me into the woman I am today.

Today I stepped on the scale fifteen pounds heavier than what was my “normal” a year and a half ago… and I didn’t feel the need to kill myself doing cardio or a HIIT workout after stepping off.

Today I bought an outfit for the weekend that was true to my size. I didn’t size down thinking in the back of my mind how it would be motivation to lose weight. Today I was able to look at pictures of myself and not pick myself a part. For some people it might sound silly but to me these are big wins for my brain and not something that has happened overnight.

As humans its enviable we are going to have those tough days and even years. Years where it’s harder to find the light. It’s harder to love and meet ourselves where we are.

Those seasons are hard. The ones that creep by but the year flashes before your eyes. We are left thinking, “Where the hell did the time go?” The thought of that makes me happy and sad at the same time.

After years, I am finally in a place of acceptance and appreciation. I’m finally to a place of wanting to heal and acknowledge parts of me that I’ve put to the waste side.

Towards the end of my twenties I was on a mission to “rewire” my thought process. Today I can clap for myself and others and full heartily mean it. Although, I have always met people where they were at but never allowed myself that kind of love. The last few pages of my twenties and my babies has taught me the importance of being kind to myself.

The older I am getting the more I am learning how it’s okay and healthy to let contradicting things like that coexist in the same space.

Things like being happy and sad at the same time.. or loving someone so much but having frustrations with them all within the same breath. In these moments I have learned that is okay to hold space for both simultaneously. It has everything to do with how we express those feelings. It has taught me a lot about myself and the things I need to work on as a person, mother, and a spouse. It’s taught me to control the controllable, that being my temper, tongue, and need to numb has to be tamed. All traits I really don’t want my kids to one day store in their arsenal of shitty habits.

Thirty was good to me. It taught me a lot. Motherhood also has taught me a lot about myself in a quick two years. My first year in my thirties I had a mirror held up to my face daily and presenting itself with areas of my life that I need to work on. Honestly I thought my thirties would be the typical “Thirty Flirty and Thriving” but if I’m being honest my first year was a lot of surviving not necessarily thriving… but thats okay. I am happy and I’m thankful for it and in due time I know I will be thriving.

Like a flamigo I’ll eventually get my color back. I’m not worried because I am already starting to see it peeking through.

Back to what I was saying though about my daily mirrors…

What I mean by that is my son, August… He has been my mirror. He has forced to live in the here and now. I am no longer chasing the next decade but I am chasing the moment. Literally and figuratively, my dude is hell on wheels. Alongside my August, is my Avie Bug being my easy going little miss observant mirror.

Since having August, he has taught me how words truly matter. Words can give so much life but they also can also paralyze you from knowing your worth.

Since having Ava, she has taught me how negative self talk is a thing of the past. How self love is in and viewing myself, the things my body has done for me in a positive light it is vital to living confidently as woman. All being attributes I want her to carry one day. Auggie too but really Avie being that she is a female. I think about how one day she will see me step on a scale or see me look at myself in the mirror, she will hear how I speak of other women, and my response to looking in the mirror. It matters because one day she will be in my 31 year old shoes.

Year thirty was a lot of surviving and not necessarily thriving. It was good to me because it gave me my kids but there were tears, growing pains, a lot of what the heck am I doings, laughs, eye opening moments, fights, forgiving, shitty diapers, making up, making out, hanging at home, and learning how to meet needs with two small kids in the mix.

Chapter thirty opened my eyes to the closet of crap I needed to address. Thirty I decided that the only person I was concerned about taking me seriously was myself. Truthfully this wasn’t an over night thing…

t wasn’t until the end of chapter thirty that I realized I need to start to control the controllable. It was time to take myself seriously. I started therapy to focus on just that. Now in chapter thirty-one I am controlling what I can control.

My first session of therapy just a few short weeks before my thirty first birthday my therapist said to me something that will forever stick with me.

Bare with me for this isn’t word for word but she said something along these lines…

She made me close my eyes. She said, “Imagine a closet. It’s packed to the brim with crap. The door literally won’t shut. It’s pouring out into areas of your life that you don’t want the world to see. You’ve hid it for years but it’s time to clean it up. I want to take everything out of the closet and help you clean up the mess. There will be moments that you just want to shove all the shit back in the closet and say you’ll clean it up another day or potentially another year. Please hang with me because we can get it clean. Truly, there will be articles of clothing that you don’t want to keep in your closet. Some colors that just simply do not look good on you. There will be a burn pile of things you absolutely do not want to pass down to your kids one day… and there will be a pile of things that we definitely want to fold up nicely, preserve it, and hope that your kids have one day.”

This visual has stuck with me. Year thirty one is a year of unpacking the closet.

Each year goes faster and faster. It’s true when people say, “Don’t blink when you have kids.”

With that being said, I don’t want to blink and look up and my kids be ten and eleven and thinking to myself that I should have done the work when they were little. It’s not just them I want to be better for but for my husband as well. I want to look up ten years from now and continue to love my husband and love him well.

So here’s to thirty one… The year of ripping the bandaid off. The year of peeling the onion layer by layer. The year of removing calluses and nurturing my inner child. Here’s to unfolding the tree of my life and giving room for new growth. Moving from mental fuckery and captivity to liberation.

Here’s to burning the articles that no longer fit me and preserving the wonderful traits that have been instilled in me from my mother and generations before. Here’s to allow space for the uncomfortable things like therapy and knowing it brings growth and understanding. Here’s to truly knowing the definition and importance of self love and applying it in all areas of my life. Here’s to chasing around my little mirrors, bettering my reflects, and sitting back watching them change for the better overtime.