Ohh wow!! what a year!! I am sure most people have similar expression for this year. What an unexpected string of events on this journey. Certainly did not turn out to be what we planned and how we started it on 1st Jan 2020. Today on 31st December 2020, as I sit here in my hotel room reflecting upon the year passed I can’t help but think what this year did to me as a person.
As I have mentioned in my previous blogs that Life always happened to me and I have been mostly responding to what life offered at different points. Early last year I chose to do some more deeper work on my stuff and trauma from the past. It’s a work-in-progress and I continue to peel the layers of stuff with professional help every week. It has allowed me to know more about me, to become aware of triggers and be able to respond more than react. It has certainly been a great journey that I plan to continue going forward.
After 2 marriages and 2 divorces for each of us, we had planned not to be married and just be in a committed relationship which had to change due to all the visa issues and entering the US and drama with immigration. So we chose to tie the knot. Well, if we are going to do it we will do it in style and make it a memorable experience of our lives, we thought to ourselves. With some of our closest friends around us, we got married on 6th January 2020 in a fairytale style affair. What we didn’t know then was that the lockdown was going to test this marriage and this relationship far more intensely than we wanted it to. I am glad we are still here, in love and more committed to this relationship than before.
Kilimanjaro and the African safari were magical and we can’t wait to go back and finish what we couldn’t this time around. The joy of travels, the connection of cultures, the exploration of the unknown is all something that lights up my spirit and brings me alive. That trip certainly did that.
I was very happy with the lockdown because that gave us time to pause and be still and live in one place and spend more time together and feel settled after the constant travels for last few years. It felt great even if we were not home. We made Malaysia our second home and stayed here, still her after 9.5 months. After 5-6 months of being here the yearning for travel started and the gypsy in me has since wanted to go explore. But then the universe said I have something else in store for you.
4th Sept 2020 afternoon we found out that we are pregnant!! What a shock!! It took a long time to process the news and accept it as well. 13 years ago I decided I didnt want to be a mother. I chose not to have kids with my ex-husband. With my relationship with Clinton the thought did cross a few times but knowing it was never going to happen due to his inablility to father a child was also a relief to a certain extent. Our lifestyle of constant travel and our adventures were more important to us. And then the miracle happened. It left us speechless. We agreed to go ahead with it as we felt that was the next level that the universe had chosen for us.
I had only just started my interview series and planned a lot more to do with my new brand and create an identity, carve a life for myself outside of my relationship and work with my husband, have something I can call mine, something that I can be proud of birthing and nurturing. All of that had to be put on hold with my physical state in pregnancy and then mental state too. I questioned god why he had to take away something that I had just begun enjoying and creating. It felt like a huge loss. With time though, I have had more acceptance and knowing it is only a temporary pause and I will see all those dreams through. It is just a matter of time.
First trimester was tough and I had to question our decision several times. Now, however, in the second trimester, I feel more open, accepting and happier with what has presented us as our fate. It is a boy. That too was tough to accept in the beginning as we both wanted a girl. We’ve passed that phase too and can’t wait to welcome him in this world. Although I have a lot of anxiety around how are we going to raise another human and give it all that is needed and be right and do the right things and raise a conscious being, I am learning to trust the process and let it unfold in its own time.
I lost my friendship with my ex-husband because his wife decided that was the right thing for her to do even if thats not what he wanted. That was very painful. I had to draw lines with her when she decided to dictate my life. On the other hand there were people who I have never met who chose to send me toxic messages questioning my character, my morals and my pregnancy. There were choices to be made, more lines to be drawn, more strength to be found and more peace to be sought within me.
The 1000s of memes I collected and posted on facebook have been a source of a lot of smiles and laughs and joy through these months. I have a whole new appreciation for humour and all those who are creative enough to make that difference in peoples lives.
The video calls with parents, the long chats with girlfriends, the online zoom calls with our community-Frontier Family, all of it has made it easy on us to survive through the difficult times of not being able to travel or run our training programs around the world. Still starved of the face to face human connection and yet making the most of it.
It has been a year of lots of emotional ups and downs, tears and pain, joy and celebration, awareness and growth, sleep-ins and sleepless nights, shattered dreams and unexpected news, surprises and shocks, incessant smiles and laughter and so much more.
The best part for me has been my journey towards self-care, my work on my self-worth issues, my ability to draw more distinct boundaries with people, my openness to ask and seek support, inner work on the mother-daughter relationship, introduction to hypnobirthing, opening up a whole new world of parenting and a whole lot more. And for all that I am grateful. Thankyou 2020!! You made a lot of impossible, possible in my life.