Giving Back to Me

Starting to live my best life

Happy 40th year to me; it’s been a long and twisting road, but I've made it: the view of life in my 40s is different than the view I had in my 30s and 20s, my body has changed, and so has my outlook on who I thought I should be.

Whatever happened to my D-cups? my perky D-cups have now moved to a manageable C-cup. At nearly 10 stone, I am four stone heavier than I was in my 20s, but five stone lighter than I was in my 30s, and for the first time in my life I feel and look amazing. I’m much sexier than I have ever been, and where did this new found confidence come from? I’ve developed a cocky attitude and banter that you can only get once you have lived for 40+ years, and I no longer take fools at face; something changed. I can’t pinpoint how it changed, or when it started to change, I just remember taking steps in the last year of my 30s, the steps that had changed my life for the better, and given me a completely different view of the person I wanted to be in my 40s.

In my 20s I looked amazing on the outside, but things were missing on the inside. I rocked the gothic chick look, don’t laugh, but the Buffy look was very much in back then, but in my 30s I no longer rocked the goth look, in-fact I didn’t really have a style, but I felt amazing on the inside and didn’t look it on the outside, what stayed the same throughout my 20s and 30s was the feeling of being insecure. I always felt like I just wasn’t good enough. I worried all the time about the weight I had put on, so I would lose the weight, then worry that I had lost too much weight, I worried about the mummy lines I had over my tummy and hips, the extra skin I found in places that wasn’t there before, and when the hell did that hair turn up from on my nipple. I worried about all sorts, and kept that worry away from everyone, I pushed it to the back of my mind, or at least I thought I did.

It was in my late 30s that I started taking extra steps. These steps changed my life, but it wasn’t until I walked into my 40s that I started understanding what I was subconsciously doing. For my 40th birthday, and for the first time ever, I decided I was having a birthday party: I was about to run into my 40s with a glass of gin in my hand, and friends and family around me, and then come the light switch, suddenly everything started to make sense.

The year before, I had joined a gym, I had changed my eating habits, I was spending time by the pool, and for the first time since my teens I no longer felt guilty about spending money on myself, I would go to the gym for two hours, and then spend two hours by the pool, in the hot tub, and relaxing in the stream room. I was making time for me. I was going for walks along the beach, or taking the bike out for rides in the countryside, and for the first time ever, I knew: I was living my best life, or in my case starting to live my best life.

Now I am in the first year of my 40th year, and I feel amazing! I look amazing. I’m more confident than I have ever been. I’ve learned to say NO! And I'm learning when to say yes! “NO, I am not taking that extra shift a week,” “No I am not working 70 plus hours a week so the tax man can take most of it away,” “No I am not staying at home and having an early night, Yes I am going out, Yes I want those shoes. Yes, you are doing too much, Yes, I am going to slow down and take time out for myself.” What I do now, is what I should have done years ago; I do what makes me happy, and its given me a freedom I wish I have had in my 30s.

Don’t get me wrong, I still suffer with the same illness as I did before, but I have come to understand them in a different way, and I still have the same problems as I did before, but I am viewing them in a different way and working through each one as they come along.

I no longer live in the shadows, waiting to become the person I want to be, I’m stepping up and grabbing life while I am still able to do so. I'm not that woman who is always taken for granted, Annie will get it done, don't worry, ask Annie. I'm just not that person anymore, and I'm much happier than ever.

I have almost everything I need; air in my lungs, food on the table, and a roof over my head. I’ve come to learn that abundance is not about money, it’s a mindset, it’s about what you give, your time, your energy, and what you give yourself.

This is a gift I give myself every day, I give what I can, and I take what I need, and I have never felt more alive.