[Illustration by the amazing Sue Kerr]
This was supposed to be an entirely different post about staying positive about your kids during lockdown and homeschooling. But, having two kids at home myself and going in and out of positivity means that I missed the boat on that one! Perhaps I will give it another go soon. Today I want to write something more personal, as it is the day I turn 42 years of age, three and a half weeks into our country’s official four week lockdown.
What does it mean to me to be turning 42 during this time? I reflect upon my life. Perhaps I am half way through it? Or more? Or less?
We are living through a global pandemic and trying to save lives with our behaviour, so in the cold hard face of things any of us could die at any moment (which of course is always the case! However this fact is certainly highlighted during this COVID-19 pandemic where so many have lost their lives globally.) I’m sure I’m not the only one who transitions between feeling very grounded and grateful, to feeling clingy and fearful. There is a certain freedom however, that opens up when you consider that life can be taken from you at any time: what is truly important to you is unapologetically highlighted to you. You are forced to sort the wheat from the chaff. How you choose to spend your time – without the hustle and bustle of ‘normal’ face-to-face commitments – changes. As I write this on a day that is raining, where my baby is sleeping peacefully in her cot, where my husband and eldest daughter are drawing pictures together in the dining room, where I reflect upon all the seasons of my life, I can’t help but feel I’m exactly where I need to be right here right now.
From the ages of 16-27, I partook in the taking of class-A party drugs much in the same way people embark on an exciting career: I got better and better at it and revelled in its rewards. An apt variation of our Prime Minister’s current mantra of ‘go early, go hard’. I was often the last woman standing. I honestly look back on those days – and the beautiful friends that shared it with me – and wonder how we all survived. There were certainly times when I didn’t think I would, and would eventually fall sleep after a multiple-day bender totally prepared for the fact that I may not wake up again. A small portion of it was certainly unhealthy escapism stemming from family and childhood troubles. And, a large portion of it was simply the down-and-dirty hedonism of the 90s-00s. I’ve got so many amazing memories of that time – many presenting themselves afresh to me today – and although I would never be able to do anything remotely like it again, I have no regrets!
Then I found myself in New Zealand. I arrived at age 26 and turned 27 a few weeks later. I did a sky-dive on my 27th birthday, and threw up behind a tree upon the landing, the effects of the previous night’s celebrations catching up with me. The months that followed my arrival in NZ were to mark the beginning of the self-development journey that I will be on for the rest of my life (and maybe beyond). I completely stopped all drinking, drug taking, partying and went to a buddhist meditation school where I learned a loving kindness method that I’ve not forgotten. Ironically, I got a part-time job in a bar to earn money to pay for my NLP training. I was the oldest and soberest person there, including the managing staff. In short, I got still. And things started to open up and fundamental healing shifts began to occur. I did what I had never been able to do before, choose a career, start a business, and get good at it.
I met my husband to be at age 33. This marked another new phase in life. Burned out from running the business, we packed up our city lives and headed for a semi-rural arrangement. Shortly afterwards we married. Shortly after this we started renovating our home. Somehow amongst this we managed to conceive our first daughter, who I gave birth to five days shy of my 37th birthday. Coming into motherhood – and doing so somewhat ‘late’ – signalled another fundamental shift: my first experience of mental illness in the form of post-natal distress (PND). An awful, life-threatening thing to go through. But I’ve come to call PND ‘the healer in disguise’. I came out of it fundamentally and positively changed, in a way I can never put words to.
And so the phase of parenthood continued, with all its challenges and rewards.
And then I turned 40.
I had my 40th birthday at the same time I was rehearsing for a local theatre production which was due to open in a few days. My first foray into the performing arts since leaving the city. I had recently found out that I was pregnant, too. I remember on my birthday feeling like I had everything: I was pregnant, I was performing, I was happy working again. The sad realities of fate intervened: I caught the flu (or something close enough to it) and I had to go on stage totally sick. I lost the baby. No one can know for sure why one miscarries, only that they are so common (a fact you only discover once you’ve had your own). It was an awful time for our family and an extended period of stress.
You know how this story ends, because I have two healthy girls, and I worked hard to get both of them into the world. This time a blissful and natural water birth. Another bout of PND, however; another recovery. Quicker this time. Another experience of the ‘healer in disguise’ and a fundamental shift in who I am. Again, impossible to put words to it. Only to say that I’m so grateful for the healing that offered itself to me, and the people who helped me receive it.
And now here I find myself. So grateful for this previous and wild life and the souls that share it with me in my bubble. Your are the universe to me. Thank you, thank you, thank you. And happy birthday to me.
With all my love, Charlotte.