This weekend I hit the big 4.0 !! I know hard to believe its finally arrived, middle age..eek.
To be honest though I think I am in a better place turning 40 than I was turning 30. 10 years ago I was fairly newly married had a young child and was pregnant with my second. It wasn't an easy pregnancy being as I was poorly through most of it and so I spent the first part of my 30th year being either sick or at the hospital getting check ups while also dealing with a grieving husband whose Father had died 3 weeks after we found out we were expecting. Then over the next few years came the ups and downs of new babies, house moves and feelings of loneliness and separation.
Today as I start my 40's my children while still young are a lot more independent of me. Our family unit is complete and everyone is just getting on with the business of growing up. Yes of course there are still the daily stresses that everyone goes through. I live with my mother for goodness sake so I know all about them, there just isn't the emotional upheaval there was 10 years ago.
If I look back on that time with a honest appraisal I can clearly see how things between hubbies and I went so down hill. Neither of us were prepared for what losing a parent while gaining a child would do to us emotionally and mentally. While we thought we were probably coping ok, we were in actual fact feathers on the wind being blown this way and that managing to connect briefly only to be pushed apart by another big gust of wind ie work, money worries, demands of family raising, other ties with people and each other if I am honest. The fact we managed to get through any of it is a pure and simple testimony to how much we love each other.
When we first met 15 years ago it felt like old souls reunited through reincarnation with a deep and basic need for each other that surprised both of us, as I don't think either of us had experience such a depth of emotion for anyone else in our lives before. In actual fact as time has gone on and with all we have put each other through that basic primal need for each other is still as strong as ever.
So here I am starting my 40's with "the love of my life" (not words I say lightly by any stretch of the imagination) by my side ready to hold my hand while we walk forward towards the rest of our lives. We have promised to be good to one another, to not take each other for granted, to support each other and to never let the other one face anything alone. We have plans to travel as soon as the youngest is old enough. China is our first port of call then off to the other parts of the Far East. We plan to share the joys of grandchildren together whenever they turn up and we plan to always take time for one another and never again get so wrapped up in our own heads that we stop the most important people from getting in close.
For this year and for the next few we've still got to see our babies through puberty, first loves, exams, university and everything else they'll need to get them to adulthood. Which is its own adventure, and when that's done we can look forward to our time together to feed our thirst for new & for learning. There's no fear now, no insecurity, its as if the circle has come back on its self. I laugh when I catch him looking at some skirt, he's a man they all do it that doesn't mean for 1 single second he would rather have that and lose me, in fact I know that for sure he doesn't want anyone else, he has proved that time and time again. He knows how much I love him too, he's not worried or insecure about who I am or what I think. He doesn't fret if I don't phone, or immediately assume I am going to do the dirty on him. All that pressure and fear we put on each other before is just gone, wiped clean.
Don't get me wrong, I still have my days, my hormones are a bastard but eventually even that will pass, he just has to avoid me for a few days each month till it clears and I have to keep taking those vitamin B's lol
All I can say is hello 40's I've got the door wide open and I am welcoming you in because I'm a little bit older and a little wiser and I ready to face whatever you throw at me...
To be honest though I think I am in a better place turning 40 than I was turning 30. 10 years ago I was fairly newly married had a young child and was pregnant with my second. It wasn't an easy pregnancy being as I was poorly through most of it and so I spent the first part of my 30th year being either sick or at the hospital getting check ups while also dealing with a grieving husband whose Father had died 3 weeks after we found out we were expecting. Then over the next few years came the ups and downs of new babies, house moves and feelings of loneliness and separation.
Today as I start my 40's my children while still young are a lot more independent of me. Our family unit is complete and everyone is just getting on with the business of growing up. Yes of course there are still the daily stresses that everyone goes through. I live with my mother for goodness sake so I know all about them, there just isn't the emotional upheaval there was 10 years ago.
If I look back on that time with a honest appraisal I can clearly see how things between hubbies and I went so down hill. Neither of us were prepared for what losing a parent while gaining a child would do to us emotionally and mentally. While we thought we were probably coping ok, we were in actual fact feathers on the wind being blown this way and that managing to connect briefly only to be pushed apart by another big gust of wind ie work, money worries, demands of family raising, other ties with people and each other if I am honest. The fact we managed to get through any of it is a pure and simple testimony to how much we love each other.
When we first met 15 years ago it felt like old souls reunited through reincarnation with a deep and basic need for each other that surprised both of us, as I don't think either of us had experience such a depth of emotion for anyone else in our lives before. In actual fact as time has gone on and with all we have put each other through that basic primal need for each other is still as strong as ever.
So here I am starting my 40's with "the love of my life" (not words I say lightly by any stretch of the imagination) by my side ready to hold my hand while we walk forward towards the rest of our lives. We have promised to be good to one another, to not take each other for granted, to support each other and to never let the other one face anything alone. We have plans to travel as soon as the youngest is old enough. China is our first port of call then off to the other parts of the Far East. We plan to share the joys of grandchildren together whenever they turn up and we plan to always take time for one another and never again get so wrapped up in our own heads that we stop the most important people from getting in close.
For this year and for the next few we've still got to see our babies through puberty, first loves, exams, university and everything else they'll need to get them to adulthood. Which is its own adventure, and when that's done we can look forward to our time together to feed our thirst for new & for learning. There's no fear now, no insecurity, its as if the circle has come back on its self. I laugh when I catch him looking at some skirt, he's a man they all do it that doesn't mean for 1 single second he would rather have that and lose me, in fact I know that for sure he doesn't want anyone else, he has proved that time and time again. He knows how much I love him too, he's not worried or insecure about who I am or what I think. He doesn't fret if I don't phone, or immediately assume I am going to do the dirty on him. All that pressure and fear we put on each other before is just gone, wiped clean.
Don't get me wrong, I still have my days, my hormones are a bastard but eventually even that will pass, he just has to avoid me for a few days each month till it clears and I have to keep taking those vitamin B's lol
All I can say is hello 40's I've got the door wide open and I am welcoming you in because I'm a little bit older and a little wiser and I ready to face whatever you throw at me...
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