The Last Year of My 20s
THE BITTERSWEET BEAUTY OF BECOMING.
You know, when you’re a little girl, you imagine your life going a different way.
You dream of soft love stories, perfect timelines, and that movie ending moment where everything just works out.
But life?
It had other plans.
I would love to say my 20s were peaches and cream.
I would love to say they felt like a dream.
But they didn’t. Not always.
There were chapters of beauty yes.
Of wild nights with friends.
Of falling in love.
Of feeling free for the first time.
Of having my 3rd child.
But there were also chapters that broke me wide open.
Where I felt like I was barely holding it all together.
Where the pain wouldn’t stop coming.
Where everything I thought I knew kept shifting.
Sometimes I ask myself
Is this how it was supposed to go?
And then I remember
Maybe there is no “supposed to.”
Maybe this is exactly what becoming looks like.
From 21 to 24
I was flying, laughing, glowing, loving life with my girlfriends. It felt like I had finally entered a season of ease. My kids were happy. Healthy. I got married and for a moment, it felt happy it felt like mine.
But 25 to now?
That’s where it got real.
That’s where God started stretching me.
That’s where the tests came.
From personal pain,
to business failures,
to heartbreak,
to betrayal,
to moments where I wasn’t sure I’d make it through.
It felt like I was losing more than I was gaining.
But what I didn’t see then, that I see now
is I was being stripped of everything that wasn’t truly me.
And so here I sit.
28 years old.
On my bed.
Typing this with tears in my eyes, gratitude in my chest,
and a heart that’s held both ache and awe and kept beating anyways.
If you’re reading this, and your 20s haven’t looked like the vision board
if you feel like peace only comes in glimpses,
like the pain just keeps circling back again
you’re not alone.
You are so loved.
You are not behind.
You are not broken.
You are in process.
And there is no shame in your journey.
As I enter this new season of 28 and 29
I say this with my whole chest:
I’m choosing me.
Fully. Loudly. Boldly.
I’m not shrinking.
I’m not quieting down.
I’m not hiding the parts of me that dream big or speak too loud or feel too deeply.
I’ve had my light dimmed for far too long.
People telling me my dreams are too big.
That I should tone it down.
That I should be more “realistic.”
No more.
These last two years of my 20s will be about expansion.
About joy.
About God.
About creating freely.
About traveling and showing my children the world.
About healing and becoming and not apologizing for either.
I just booked another trip for us to go somewhere new, somewhere we’ve never been.
Because we deserve to feel joy.
To experience life.
To make memories.
Even in the midst of healing.
I want to spend more time with my family.
I want to create the visions that have lived in my heart for years.
And I will.
Because I’m no longer waiting for permission.
Cheers to the woman I am becoming.
Cheers to the version of me that kept going when everything around her was falling apart.
Cheers to the woman who still chose love.
Who still chose softness.
Who still chose faith.
And as for my early 20s?
Thank you.
Thank you for the fire.
Thank you for the trials.
Thank you for the lessons.
Even the painful ones.
Because I now know…
Everything has purpose.
Even what hurts.
I may not understand it all yet.
But I trust the One who does.
So I put my faith in God.
In Jesus.
And I let go.
And I keep becoming.
So to the woman reading this
if your 20s haven’t gone as planned,
if you’re in the in-between,
if you’re trying to keep your head up in a season of “why me?”
Let this be a reminder:
You are not behind.
You are not too much.
You are not alone.
You are becoming.
And the woman you are becoming?
She’s powerful.
She’s resilient.
She’s you.
Cheers to 28.
Cheers to the last two years.
Cheers to the light that never went out.
This season of my life has stretched me.
Losing my husband to the unknown,
waking up each day unsure if we’ll ever get answers.
it has changed me.
But even that pain holds purpose.
It’s taught me that love is not always safe.
That people hurt too.
That even the strongest ones can fall.
And it’s taught me how to rise.
How to love myself without conditions.
How to be a safe place for my babies.
How to be a lighthouse for others
who are lost in their own storms.
So as I enter the last years of my 20s,
I carry this:
I don’t need my life to look like everyone else’s.
I just need it to feel mine.
- MonaLisa
