10/31/2026
I’m 45 years old, and I’m not even close to where I thought I’d be.
There. I said it.
If you had asked me five years ago what my life would look like at 45, I would have painted you a very different picture.
I thought I’d be further ahead. More financially secure. More successful. More settled.
Instead, I spent the last couple of years watching parts of a life I worked incredibly hard to build fall apart.
I closed a business I poured my heart into.
My mental health took me to places I never imagined I’d go.
I went from being a woman who could juggle a million things to a woman who sometimes struggled to do the most basic things.
And I’m not going to pretend that I’ve found some beautiful lesson in all of it.
Because some of it was just really freaking hard.
There has been grief. Embarrassment. Anger. And a whole lot of questioning who I am when I’m not doing all the things I used to do.
But something I’ve been thinking about lately is how much of my worth I’ve attached to being successful, being productive, being needed.
I’ve spent so much of my life reminding other women that their bodies are good, that they are worthy, that they deserve to take up space.
And somewhere along the way, I forgot that those things applied to me too.
I’m 45.
I’m starting over in ways I never expected.
I’m still scared of things. I’m still figuring out what comes next. And some days I still wish my life looked different.
But I also laugh. I love my people. I get excited about little things again. I have ideas and dreams that I thought I’d lost.
And maybe that’s what this chapter is about.
Not becoming some brand-new, improved version of myself.
But learning to love the woman who’s still here after everything.
The woman who doesn’t have it all figured out.
The woman who isn’t always funny, isn’t always positive, and doesn’t always have something inspiring to say.
Because somewhere along the way, I started believing that I had to bring something to the table to deserve a seat at it.
That I had to be funny. Interesting. Successful. Helpful. Something.
And I’m learning that I don’t.
I don’t have to perform for anyone.
I don’t have to turn every hard thing I’ve lived through into an
