Dear Emma: You can get through this…

Sometimes in life, it is easy to get swept up in a world, where you listen to snap judgements that people make about you, without really getting to know you. Gossip, rumours, “banter” and nasty things people say, can start to get under your skin after a while and you start to believe them. In my case, I knew they weren’t true, but the guy I was seeing (the father of my unborn baby), chose to believe the opinions of people who didn’t know me, over getting to know me for real. He’d imagined up a different me, a not very nice me… that didn’t fit my character at all. I now know that this was down to someone poisoning him against me. Someone who wanted him for herself, and won. Someone who is genuinely not very nice, but he is blind to that.

And as I went from low to rock-bottom, because of all the things happening in my life, the real people came out. Real friends who have known me a long time. Whether we speak often, or they have watched my life unfold from afar, via my blog, these are the people that took the time to know the real me. And they are the people who count. And I’ve been overwhelmed recently, by how many of those people have messaged me words of love and encouragement.

So I decided to put those words into a letter to myself. And for the time being, whilst I am struggling to find reasons to get out of bed in the mornings, I am going to use that letter, filled with all the words of people who are honest and kind and full of heart, to motivate me. That letter is going to be my ladder out of the black hole I have fallen down.

You can read that letter here, and I thank everyone who contributed, from the bottom of my heart.

Dear Emma,

You can do this. You can beat this. You can get through this. You can rise above it and you will fly.

People will pretend to care about you when they don’t. They will use you, abuse you and trample all over you to try and steal that little bit of sunshine and make it their own. They can’t take that light, that fire, because it is who you are.

You are a fighter, you are a warrior. You have beaten cancer twice. You’ve beaten HELLP Syndrome. You’ve beaten depression and OCD. You’ve survived heartache, grief and a broken marriage. You’ve been homeless, you’ve been lost and you’ve been alone. You’ve been in the gutter and climbed back out. You’ve been knocked down more times than anybody will ever know, but you always get back up stronger.

Don’t lose faith in humanity. Don’t give up on the world. There are still plenty of good people doing good things. Keep your chin up, keep smiling and keep being you.

It feels like the future is lost, but in truth the future has just lost one person. One person who didn’t know your worth. One person who tried to break you because they couldn’t see what was in front of them. But they didn’t know how strong you are either. You are beautiful inside and out. You have achieved so many good things. Nothing is permanent and you will get through this. You can do this. You can do this on your own. And on your own… all your successes will belong only to you.

…And nobody can steal your sunshine!