When I got to the point Before Matt, about 5 years ago, things started getting weird. I was a very different person 6 years ago, and further back from there, I was a teenager. Yikes. I am not always proud of who I was back then. I made a lot of bad decisions, and ran away from a lot of my problems. When things were hard, too grown up, or just unpleasant, I would hole up and hide.
I could have blamed a lot of it on my depression and anxiety. I only really was starting to regularly take medication for it in 2010. When I was a young teenager, and until I was at least twenty, I kept on seeing my depression as a phase, something that I could grow out of or something that would go away after taking meds for 6 months. I wanted to wake up one day and say "Look, the depression I've had since I was eight is cured! Hurray!" I blamed a lot of things on my depression, and it wasn't until later that I slapped myself in the face and told myself to stop running away from something that I was going to have to learn to live with for my whole life. I was finally in a good place emotionally so I could do that, and I was finally starting to gain some self esteem. I stopped using my depression as a crutch, and started enjoying my life. My brain chemistry just needs a little help to be balanced, and there is nothing wrong with that.
I may not be proud of a lot of the things I did or who I was back then, but I don't really regret any of it. I am who I am today because of the choices I made, and I wouldn't change a thing about my life. I learn from making mistakes, and all the mistakes I made helped me to become the person that was able to fall in love with Matt, and to be the kind of person that he could love in return. Its crazy what can happen in a year, and even crazier what's happened in the last 5 years. Seriously, I met Matt almost five years ago. I graduated from high school almost 8 years ago. I keep thinking that Matt and I are still newlyweds, and then I remember that we have a baby, and a house, and three cats, and none of that happened overnight.
I'm glad for all the people who have stuck with me through the years. I know I'm not the same person who I was when we met, but I've been growing into a better version of that person. I'm like a Pokemon. I started off as a Charmander, and now I'm a Charizard, ready to do battle with the elite 4. Okay, maybe I'm not that cool yet, but I'm at the very least a pretty spiffy Charmelon. Or a Vaporeon. Or a Dragonair. Okay, I don't know what kind of Pokemon I want to be. One of the original 150, at least.
But seriously, thank you to all the people in my life who are growing and experiencing life with me.
