Dear 29 year old Erin,

You've entered motherhood. I mean your wedding celebration ceremony revolved around having the girls up front with you, Kurt and Bobby G. talking about the joining of a family. You've known those girls for two years and you love them like you never knew you could. 

 

Here you are, with an instant family. A brand new last name and two new titles. Wife. Mother. The the biggest responsibility you have ever known. You have been entrusted with the life of two girls and you cannot even fathom the roller coaster of emotions that is about to start. Your heart already feels full. How could it possibly love any more? But just you wait, there's a lot more stretching of the heart to be done.

And that heart will stretch in a million directions. Knowing you, you will let it stretch a lot with worry. There will be sleepless nights, and not the kind that involve waking every couple of hours to feed a newborn, but nights where you make yourself sick worrying if you are making good decisions. The joys of motherhood also come with the curse of self-doubt. You've always been sure of yourself, but this new title makes you second guess every decision. Are you doing enough? Are you doing too much? Are you saying the right prayers over them? Are they listening to what you're really saying? Are you leading by example? 

Remember that there is no absolute right way. Somedays (in fact, many many days) you will forget this. You will cry yourself to sleep thinking you should have done it another way. You will make yourself sick with worry that your words never sunk in. 

Some of your words, your advice, and your prayers won't always be reflected in the actions of your kids. And that's okay. Sometimes the best way to learn something is by making a mistake. Your responsibility is to first, love. And then love some more. When you're upset, love them more. When you're frustrated, love them. When you're angry, love them. When you're happy, love them. And in the times you don't know how you can love, just love them.  

And despite that notion that love always wins...it don't always feel that way. You will get blamed. Your actions will be second guessed by many people. But you have to do what you think is best and keep praying. Repeat after me, "pray, make good decisions, pray, do what's best for your family, pray, keep going; pray, make good decisions, pray, do what's best for your family, pray, keep going  You will find yourself fighting pointless battles with other mothers about what you should do. STOP! make your decision and then keep going. Nobody is better equipped to make decisions for your and your family more than you and your husband. Work together, pray that God reveals His plan, and then move forward.

You will mess up. And then mess up again. And frankly, that's okay. You will survive. Your girls will survive. Your family will survive. As long as they see your love, things will be okay in the end. And if it's not okay, it's not the end. Learn from your mistakes and then keep going. You will hear yourself give this advice to your daughters, so take it for yourself. 

I wish I could tell you that those times of self-doubt are few and far between. Don't let that curse of motherhood steal the joy. Just pray and love, and everything else will follow.

With compassion,

(4+ years of mom experience Erin)

Dear 24 year old Erin,

I see you lying there, in the stillness and dark. You think that because it’s dark that I can’t see the tears streaming down your face. You try to stop them…you hate to cry. But there they go, rushing down your cheeks faster than you can wipe them dry. 

You’re crying because you’re in love. Wait...you're crying because you think you're in love. But I know why you’re crying, and honestly, you know it too…you just won’t believe it. You’re crying because you know what you have to do, but it’s so hard to make that decision.

You contemplate every single excuse, try to make the situation better so that things work out. You try to imagine that things will get better. But in your heart you know that it won’t. You keep hearing your mothers advice but try to block it away. But you know it will come back. Because it came back last month, last week, last night. Your mind and your heart are pulling you two different directions. 

You make a mental checklist of the pros and the cons. And though the cons outweigh the pros (not just in numbers but in their meaning and importance), you still fight it. 

Three years. That’s what you gave. You had guarded your heart until three years earlier. And then when you finally decided to love, you loved as hard as you could. I wish you could see now how much of a good thing that was. But instead all you see is regret. You’re angry that you gave away three years and a part of your heart to somebody who didn’t deserve it. You’re angry that you think you wasted three years of your life. 

And the funny thing is, even though you don’t honestly believe he loves you, he is still trying to convince you to stay. That’s a trap! Stop. Stop overthinking it. Do what your mind knows what it should do. Do what your heart deep down knows what it should do. Don’t let somebody else define you. Don’t let a relationship define you. Don’t think that you should stick it out because you already gave three good years. You know better than that. You know that you are better off alone than in bad company (there goes your mothers advice again…).

At school the next day, somebody told you exactly what I would have told you, “But think about all you learned. You learned what you deserve, you learned what you need, and you learned that you are worth more than how he treats you.” You laughed in between sobs and actually said the words, “I would rather have those three years back than have learned any of those lessons.” But Erin, those lessons are a blessing. 

I wish I could tell you that in 3 years those lessons would come in quite handy. I wish I could tell you that in between that relationship and your next one that your entire view would change. That when you meet your husband you will see what a real relationship looks like, what it feels like. 

And there you are again, the next night, tears streaming down your face again. I can see them. You’re crying because you’re not sure you did the right thing. You broke up with him (trust me, it was the right thing). You’re so unsure of yourself, mainly because you're so upset at wasting those three years and finally being vulnerable enough to give away a piece of your heart. I wish I could tell you that in three years you will see the value of this experience. I wish I could tell you in one year you will laugh at the tears you wasted. Keep wiping those tears away. There is joy ahead. You can’t see it now, but it will be there.

With compassion,

30ish year old Erin

And so it begins...

Hindsight. What a wonderful gift. But by the time we have it, its too late. The time has passed. As I look back now I smile at the good things: the times I took the road less traveled, the times I went left when the rest of the group went right, the times I was victorious when people said I wouldn't be, and the times I made the hard decisions even when it wasn't popular. But sometimes I feel heavy hearted. In those time I think about the times I wish I would have been honest with myself, at the times I should have walked away but stayed instead, at the times I kept fighting for somebody that wasn't fighting for me, and at the times I lost a piece of myself to somebody who didn't even deserve it.

Live and learn. All of those circumstances shaped me into the person I am today. But oh how I wasted so many tears, so many heartaches and so many sleepless nights worrying, thinking, stressing, and crying about the wrong things. And I see so many people doing the same thing. I see so many young women going through those very same experiences and my heart aches for them. So badly I wish I could tell them, and make them believe that they are enough. They are enough, just the way they are. They are enough, just the way God made them. They are enough. It took me years to learn it though. Even though I heard it, even though my mom (who pretty much knows everything) told me over and over, I still fought it. I struggled to find my identity. I lost myself over and over trying to be what somebody else wanted me to be, what somebody else thought I should be. And what a waste that was. Because all along, the best thing I could be, was me. The only thing I needed to be, was me.

Fortunately I had strong women surrounding me. And even when I didn't listen, they kept telling me. Even now, I keep my tribe small. It is full of women with an unspoken pact of building each other up, of supporting each other, of being honest with each other, encouraging each other, and reminding each other that we are enough.

And as I think about my life, and the stories that I share with my tribe, I see so many of the same trends. Luckily for me and those girls, we had mothers/fathers, sisters/brothers and friends who were able to help us finally see that we were enough.

But I still wonder, what if I had the gift of hindsight then. What if 29 year old Erin could have spoken to that 13 year old girl that was struggling, to that 21 year old girl that thought she knew what love was, to that 23 year old girl who was terrified of failure...what would she have said?

And so it begins, letters to my younger self. Through the gift of hindsight, what I wish I knew then.