It’s that time of year when I make my complete trip around the sun. I get another year older and wiser. Reflection is always more substantial this month, and this year it’s infinitely more profound than last June. June is the month that gave me life. The month also brings us hurricane season; maybe that’s a parallel as to why I am so feisty. My half of June is the month of Cancer, and I blame that on my love for water. However, June always forces me to look in the mirror and figure out who I am, again.
I hate the phrase, “People don’t change.” I know that people can and do change because I am living proof. I am not the person I was at 23 or the person I was six months ago. I have watched almost everyone I care about change and grow. The only time someone doesn’t change is when they hide behind the phrase, “People don’t change.” They use it as their excuse for their obstinate and shitty behavior. Every June makes me nostalgic and forces me to look in the mirror and dig deep to see my growth. It’s when things come full circle for me. When I was younger, I would get excited for June and the thought of celebrating another new beginning, but now as June approaches, it brings me a melancholy joy because I am growing older. GROWING that’s the keyword, though. I choose, maybe feel a little forced, to contemplate on the past year and look at how I have changed and where I want to change moving forward. The want or desire to change, though, is the first step in growing as a person. You have to want it before you can act on it. This June is no different, but at the same time, it’s substantially different. The second half of my 32nd year was a complete shit show.
In the last six months, my life has come crashing down. It has derailed. I have been stuck in flight or fight mode. I have been forced to fight. My entire nervous system has been in complete disarray. Honestly, it’s still not in the healthiest of states, but it is slowly improving when you are forced to advocate for yourself because you are made to feel crazy since your ailment isn’t easily fixable and your symptoms aren’t visible. When you repeatedly get told you’re a complicated case. When you feel like everything about you is a problem. When you are fighting to make sure you wake up from surgery because your biggest fear is not making it through. When you all of a sudden feel your heart stop beating and begin to flutter, then everything goes dark. When you come to, it feels like time has stopped, and you were out for hours only to find out it’s been a matter of seconds. When you realize your biggest fear has come true, your heart stopped again. When you lay in a hospital and sit on your couch for days on end with nothing but time to overthink. You change. You change on a cellular level. A level to which I don’t feel words can accurately describe. When trauma has been forced upon you in such a manner, you lose yourself. For many people, trauma chips away at them, little by little, until one day, they don’t recognize themselves. In this case, it wasn’t a little-by-little process. I lost myself abruptly in the hell that was my life. I lost myself so quickly that I was blind to it for months. I changed in ways I have yet to understand.
Here we are again in June, and I feel the uncontrollable urge to pore over the past year. It’s a harsh reality when you are forced to come to terms with the fact that you almost didn’t complete this trip around the sun. If it were up to my heart, I wouldn’t see my 33rd year. That knowledge affirms my belief that you can start over at any time, as often as needed. I have because I wanted to, and I have because things out of my control forced me.
June is here, and it brings a time of year that encourages fun, awareness, self-reflection, and the most important day of my existence. As the days tick away and my birthday approaches, I am forcing myself to start the process of finding myself again. I’m pouring myself into creativity, whether it be writing, cooking, or a new hobby. I am forcing myself to have hard conversations about what I want. I am going to be more in the present and realign my priorities. I will work on my self-talk and put my mental health first. This June, I will come out of my cocoon and embrace 33 as a new person.
Ele and the Little 