I'm Doing The Thing I Never Expected To Do

newlywed ✓

turning 30

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moving back home

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Looking at this time in my life through the lens of gratitude.

I live here now. Well maybe not officially, but certainly soon enough. The photo above as some of you may know is of my parent’s backyard. Not a bad place to be this time of year. What you may not know is that two months after our wedding, me and my husband (still getting used to saying that!) will be moving in with my parents. 

We are doing the thing that I swore I would never do and learning to roll with the pandemic punches.

I moved out of my parent’s house six years ago and I’ll be honest, I didn’t expect to move back. Like ever. But if the last 8 months of a pandemic have taught us anything, it’s to expect the unexpected. Two years ago today I moved in with my boyfriend (now my husband). In two months from today I will be turning the big 3-0. Life is full of surprises and when we learn to let go of the outcome and just go along for the ride, the journey becomes a lot less bitter and somehow even more sweeter. 

If the last 8 months of a pandemic have taught us anything, it’s to expect the unexpected.

I realize I didn’t have to tell all of you via a blog post that I was moving back in with my parents, but I thought it was important to talk about for a few reasons. The most important reason being that even though it’s not what I had planned for this time in my life, it’s happening and I’m trying my best to fully embrace it. I decided that it was not something I was going to be ashamed of and instead chose to look at it as something to be grateful for. It’s so easy to look at our lives and think that we didn’t accomplish XYZ by the time we wanted to. But the challenge and the growth comes from these times when we didn’t get exactly what we wanted and yet we still showed up to learn something from it.

These last few months have changed people’s lives dramatically. We’ve had to ask people for help because we realized that this is too hard to do on our own. We’ve had to ask people for advice because we’ve never been through this before and some of us are handling it better than others. We’ve all been humbled by this pandemic in some way and allowed our most vulnerable side to inevitably come through. 

We’ve come face to face with our worst realities and instead of using excuses to cover them up, we’ve had no choice but to lay it all out on the table and say, “this is what is going on in my life right now, it’s not easy but I’m working through it.” Eight months ago we so easily let self doubt and shame take over our lives but now it feels like everyone is going through something so it’s easier to admit that we are too. 

We shouldn’t wait for a global pandemic to come ripping through our lives to allow ourselves to be vulnerable. For us to finally realize that maybe we do need some time off. For us to make time for and really appreciate our loved ones. I am using this time in my life as an opportunity to be grateful that I get to spend more time with my parents. The past few years have been busy and even though we only live 40 minutes away from each other it’s so easy to pass up the Sunday dinners or the walks in the park because you think they can happen any time. But we know that life goes by so quickly and before we know it it passes us by. This time that we get to spend together is a blessing. It’s a reminder to slow down and be with the people who mean the most. 

Of course we get on each other’s nerves and need our space, but that’s true of any family and relationship. But we will get to have our morning coffee together, sit and eat dinner together, watch a show and simply get to enjoy each other’s company more than ever before. It will be a new way of living with a little less alone time, but I am looking at this time as a blessing above all else.

Whatever challenges you have faced these last 8 months, I encourage you to find silver linings and gratitude in places you least expected it. Now is not the time to be ashamed of where you are in life, whether we are in the middle of a pandemic or not. Find gratitude exactly where you are, for the people you have surrounding you, for the food on the table and the roof over your head.