Entering My New Chapter

2024 is ending, and I can’t believe I’m saying this, but it has been my favorite year in a long while.

While it contained its own stressors, overall I feel so good to be at this stage in my life.

I love my home, I love my little life and “fur family” I have created with Aly, and I love my routine. On weekends, I look forward to the weekdays. I look forward to my weekly therapy appointments, and I look forward to my job. Stability and consistency has been so good for me, and most of my life never looked this way.

For a while I have viewed my life in chapters. I am a visual thinker, and I see the stages of my life as a linear process, and a new chapter with a new theme.

Recently I told my therapist that I believe I am in a new chapter of my life. She asked me what it is called. I told her that it didn’t have a name, but that it’s a really important chapter.

For the past 4-5 years my life has been associated with healing C-PTSD and depression. I’ve done SO much trauma work. I give myself a huge pat on the back for the intensity of the therapy I engaged in to work through some really dark stuff.

This past year, things have calmed down. Less flashbacks, no depressive episodes, no more depersonalization or derealization. Anxiety used to be an every day experience, and it’s not anymore. Not to the same extent, and not very often.

It was unfamiliar, and the unfamiliar can be scary. What does this mean that I used to have flashbacks and now I don’t? This should be a good thing. Feeling far removed from my trauma almost makes it harder for me to feel validated that it is real.

I talked about that in therapy a bit too, but now I am able to acknowledge that my trauma will always be my truth- even if it isn’t running my life.

This year’s theme was a continuation of something I was starting to come to terms with last year: I have masked a lot of struggles for too long.

This led to different assessments from July- October and receiving a diagnosis that actually explained a lot more than trauma had.

There was validation in this, but it’s not all “yay”. I had an idea of what my story was up until this point, and now I’m looking back and rewriting that story in a more accurate way. I’m left with grief that a big part of my experience and struggles were missed as a kid when I could have received support. I’m left with imposter syndrome, as I don’t fit the stereotyped traits that the world believes I should have. I now have a name for things I resented about myself since childhood.

However, I am also learning about this name through positive resources. It has corrected my negative self-perception as the topic is not as taboo as back then. I am finding community. I am also accommodating myself, and educating myself and others. I am embracing and appreciating the qualities I have, rather than trying to fight them.

I last wrote about self-acceptance, and a big part of accepting myself comes from understanding myself.

I don’t want to do things that most people my age like to do, and that’s okay. I’m tired of pushing away the things that made me happy as a kid because I told myself I needed to “grow up”. I want to prioritize my needs, even if they are different from others. I want to listen to my body, and say “no” when things don’t feel right for me. I want to enter the spaces that accept me, and leave the spaces that don’t. I want to embrace my comfort items. I want to bring back my American Girl dolls, keep sleeping with my teddy bear at night, and talk to my imaginary friends when I need to sort out my thoughts. In the past, I would have been embarrassed to say that. I needed them then, and I still benefit from them now.

I don’t need to force myself to fit into places that I wasn’t meant to fit into. I don’t have to feel inadequate because I think and communicate differently than others. Many things are really hard for me, but I also have many strengths.

Last holiday season I was very overwhelmed and sad. This year I am limiting the events I attend, taking quiet space when I need it, and finding time for the little joys of the holiday season that are more comfortable for me.

These changes sound so easy and simple, but I have never done these things with intention.

I feel lighter, I am thinking clearer, and I’m not using up as much energy anymore fighting against my challenges.

These challenges were never less important than my PTSD, and I should never have treated them that way.

For 2025, I don’t have any resolutions or goals. I want to take things day by day, week by week, and see how this “new me” evolves. I have a feeling it’s actually not new at all. This is who I’ve always been, and who I’m supposed to be.

I’m really really proud of myself. It is such a good feeling to have reached this place.