Battling On

Sometimes 30 feels like the new 70.  It's like when the clock strikes twelve on your 30th birthday your metabolism slows down and it's all downhill from there. Don't get me wrong. I actually love my 30s. (I wasn't very good at my 20s.) But I often find myself commiserating with other mid-30s about all our aches and pains. And sometimes it's not just the usual stuff.

I just had lunch with an old colleague who was in an awful car accident. We hadn't seen each other in years. Her accident was a year ago but she's still recovering. I know how she feels. The last three years have been rough for me too.

Both my husband and I had really bad health scares. Okay, writing that sentence feels like a bit of an understatement. Both of us nearly died - in two separate instances.

It is an odd kind of therapy - the trading of battle stories over sushi. When you deal with something so life altering it's cathartic to talk to someone else who can understand. You both know that even though you came out okay on the other side, it's not ever going to be quite the same.

And yet, it's amazing how quickly you can also forget what it felt like to go through it all. There was a moment two years ago when everything felt heavy. I could not see the future. I was just putting one foot in front of the other and hoping to reach the end of the dark tunnel I found myself in. But I also felt a strength.

Going through something like that puts everything into perspective. And as awful as it is, it also has a way of making you realize how strong you are. There are things you think you aren't capable of handling - and then you find out that you actually are.

Now back in the grind of every day life, things can feel overwhelming in a different way. And it seems silly that sometimes the frivolous stuff almost seems harder. And in your 30s you want to be doing all the things you've been working towards and dreaming about in your 20s. You feel time passing quicker. You feel the clock like you never have before.  Being derailed by something can make that urgency you feel to accomplish things even more urgent. That's when I need to summon both the strength of knowing that I've survived life's curve balls before and the optimism of my 20s when I believed anything was possible.