35

Today is my birthday and I turned 35. For whatever reason, this birthday feels significant. I feel like I am at a turning point in my life, in many respects. Instead of feeling terrified, I feel excited, clear and renewed. My dreams for my life are very clear, I see myself differently than I did in my 20's, even when I turned 30. I think the most poignant part of 35 is that it is the end of the self-loathing era. All those years feeling that I wasn't good enough, smart enough, pretty enough, a good enough mother, wife, friend....oh it goes on...is now over. Sure I'll still have days when I feel down, days when I hate my jeans as though they have betrayed me by holding me a bit too close as I then blame the dryer. We all have moments like that. But moments and a lifestyle are two very different things.

The other day my mother called me to say that she would give me $5.00 for every pound I lost. I was speechless. In the past I would have felt a pit in my stomach, tears welling up in my eyes and witnessing my mind race about how I wasn't pretty enough. Ah, but this time it was different. This time I didn't take that on. This time I responded with "are you on crack?" And I meant it. Now, I love my mum, and I know that her heart is in the right place, she wants me to be healthy, but honestly, this has been going on since I was 9. For a long time I bought into that story, and now it is over for me. I could be upset about what she said, but actually, I am grateful. It feels like it was a "how much do you really love yourself?" kind of test and I passed. 35 feels like a metamorphosis. Funny how my birthday is less than a week from the first day of Spring.

So to celebrate this day, I spent it with my children. We had the best day ever. All I asked from my son for my birthday was "a day of kindness and co-operation" And they both gave it to me. Best present EVER. I took them down to Victoria and I bought a cute little vintage medicine cabinet for my bathroom, we ate at my favorite restaurant and then went to a couple of my favorite shops including this one. We were going to go to the museum, but my son asked if we could go to the park instead. The sun was out and I couldn't think of a more wonderful thing to do. So we went to the park, played in the playground, walked through the meadows, went for an ice cream and off to the beach. As we meandered home, we stopped at Goldstream and looked at the water, it sparkled in the sunlight and the moss hanging from the maples looked like magic. We came home, made a yummy dinner (including the amazing cake my husband baked from scratch for me) and now, kids are sleeping and I am so thankful for this day. This really was a Happy Birthday!