I recently watched the movie, Je m’appelle Agneta which really struck a chord with me. It was about a middle-aged Sweden lady, Agneta, who takes an opportunity to fulfill her dream of living in France. She finds herself unemployed and applies for an au pair  position in France and gets this position. She is unhappily married and an empty nester, so off she goes for this life-changing adventure of finding true happiness. The following is how I found this movie so relatable. 

For so long, I lived for everyone else. I put everyone else’s needs above mine with the feeling that to do something for me would be selfish. Oh how wrong I was and I lost my voice along the way. 

Lately I’ve been asking myself hard questions:

Who am I now?

What do I live for?

Do I even recognize the woman I’ve become?

The truth is, healing hasn’t looked like “finding myself” all at once. It’s looked more like molting.

The movie uses the analogy of birds. Like the birds that begin dull and gray, only to shed what no longer serves them and slowly reveal brighter, stronger feathers after their babies leave the nest.

That image stayed with me because I think reinvention can feel messy before it feels beautiful, just like it was with my health and fitness journey and my road to recovery.

For years I worried about what everyone else thought. I apologized for taking up space. I made myself smaller. Quieter. Easier to carry.

But grief has a way of stripping life down to truth.

I no longer want to spend the rest of my life shrinking.

I want joy loud enough to drown out sorrow.

I want laughter again.

I am choosing to show up as myself unapologetically, instead of disappearing inside everyone else’s expectations.

I’ve learned that the most freeing realization of all is this:

the people who seem most alive are often the ones who stopped asking permission to be themselves.

Since losing Steven, everything has become difficult. Nutrition has been hard because even the thought of cooking seems impossible. Despite my weight gain, I’m learning to thank my body instead of criticize it. It is physically thanks to my training for my endurance strength. My body is carrying me while I carry the heaviest cross of my life and for that I’m grateful.  

Through writing my memoir, I’ve learned to trust the voice inside me that has been quietly waiting to be heard again.

God has chosen me for great things. I’ll never understand why and how Steven’s story came to an abrupt end, but I’m still here and God isn’t finished writing mine. 

I am sober. I am healthy. I am investing in deepening my relationship with God. By His grace, I am no longer surviving my story, I am finally finding my voice within it.

Life With Lisa