Dearest Wee Bee–

I’m feeling just the teensiest bit sentimental here so please permit this newly 39 year old lady’s ramblings for a moment or two…

I keep thinking about turning 29. About how at 29 I woke up wondering how much more of a battle against ED (anorexia) I would be able to fight. About how I bundled up in layer upon layer to try to keep out the cold. About how I prayed not to slip and fall on the ice since my bones were brittle and might break. About how I whispered to myself: you’re not going to die…because the cold felt so cold, and my body was so weak, and my heart was beating too slowly.

But this? This is 39. This is ten years later…this is 9 years and almost 11 months post-ED (soon to be ten years post-ED on February 15th). This is picking up yummy delicious nourishing food to eat on the way home and dancing with my miracle of a wee beauty in my living room. This is planning celebration after celebration after celebration to honour the stretch marks on my hips and the grey hair on my head when I didn’t think I would make it.

This is being grateful for the laughter and the tears; the pain and the rising (to quote Glennon Doyle); the box of darkness that I am realizing has been the best gift of all (to quote Mary Oliver) since it is precisely because of all of the dark things that have happened in my life that I am able to shine my light brighter than I ever thought possible.

This is 39. And this is saying thank you thank you thank you. To everyone who has held my hand and danced in my kitchen and iced me a cake and loved me fiercely, through it all.

This is 39. I am so glad it’s here💗

(Repost from Facebook)