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This month I turned 31 and birthdays always make me want to pause and reflect on life. Last year in the midst of moving across the country I was too busy to think, so I’m doing my reflecting this year. Here’s a true confession: I was NOT expecting turning 30 last year to be a big deal. But honestly, it kinda was.
My identity is shifting. I’m no longer the super young mom that gets asked if she’s the babysitter. People don’t gasp in surprise when they see me with three kids and I explain that they’re all mine. I kinda just look like a mom-ish sort of person in her 30s (exactly what I am). And while that’s fine. MORE than fine. It takes some getting used to.
Moving from the “just graduated from college” phase into the “real adult (with kids spicing things up)” stage is an adjustment. I found my first grey hair this year. I’m just aging like a normal human. Even though I basically skipped my 20s (when you get married at 20 and pregnant at 22, you grow up fast), and have been doing some serious adulting for over a decade, entering my 30s did make me feel a little bit….weird.
So I’m letting myself feel a little weird about it. And I’m also letting myself feel a little awesome about it. There’s so many things I can DO now that I would never have imagined I would be capable of doing 10 years ago. I have become someone I would never imagined I could be 10 years ago.
Here’s some things I’m proud of doing during the past decade (in no particular order):
- Getting through three pregnancies with severe morning sickness.
- Learning how to take care of a child with asthma (Benjamin) and getting it under control.
- Writing for a living (would never have imagined it!)
- Reading my favorite childhood books with my own children.
- Buying a house, selling a house, and buying another house.
- Going on a 6.5 week road trip around the country with 3 young kids.
- Driving a lot–even on scary highways, even by myself. (I had mild driving anxiety that turned into pretty major driving anxiety after I was in a bad accident a couple years back–panic attacks and all that fun stuff).
- Packing up our whole life and moving across the country with a toddler to go to grad school in FL.
- Packing up our whole life with three kids and moving across the country to live on a farm.
- Packing up our whole life again and moving to our own little urban farm.
- Learning to milk goats.
- Becoming Catholic.
- Learning to stay on top of my autoimmune disease with alternative medicine.
- Celebrating our 10th anniversary (AKA surviving 10 years of marriage)
- Becoming an OK cook (what’s the point in becoming a fantastic cook when your husband will always be better at it? But for real, my Shepherd’s Pie is legit.)
- Learning to maintain a home for five people, laundry, drs appointments, dentist appointments, dishes, floors, tidying, decluttering, deep cleaning, bill paying…..so many things.
- Homeschooling three kids and figuring out what educational style jives with our family.
- Working on upping my patience and controlling my temper (working on because I’ve come a long way, but I still have a ways to go).
- Sharing my love for good books (blogging about literature, teaching literature to the high schoolers at our homeschool co-op, etc).
- Having a podcast (but for real, I couldn’t have done it OR kept it going without Christy leading the charge and being awesome).
- Working a variety of pretty cool jobs: teacher for a non-profit, instructor and rehearsal assistant for a ballet studio, publications specialist at a university, barista/shop girl at a French pastry shop, and a self-employed writer/blogger/speaker.
- Figuring out I wanted to leave academia.
- Learning how to use Natural Family Planning.
- Speaking in front of large groups (and small groups.)
- Learning to camp with small children, stay in hotels with small children, and basically all the insanity that is traveling with small children.
- Becoming really good at entertaining toddlers at restaurants until their food arrives.
- Surviving a year in a 650 sqft apartment with small children and no flushing toilet.
At 31, I’m surprised at where I am. It’s been a REALLY full decade. At 21 I would never have imagined that in a decade I’d already have three kids or that I’d have been Catholic for 6 years. I would never have imagined I’d be a writer and a speaker (not in a million years!). I would NEVER have guessed that we’d move back to Waco or how much I’d fall in love with this town.
I would have expected to be finishing my PhD in medieval studies somewhere and beginning to think about starting a family. But God’s plan for me was a much better fit (and a lot more exciting) than anything I could have imagined for myself.
The past decade has been jampacked with adventure. And while I wouldn’t mind a super boring couple of years to recover from it, it’s been amazing. I like who I am now so much better than me at 21.
Motherhood has softened me. I am more compassionate and more secure. I love my husband more. I treasure moments with my kids more.
My health issues have made me slow down. I try to get 7-8 hours of sleep every night. I can’t drink coffee and run on fumes anymore. I have to consider carefully what I eat and whether it’s going to help me or set me back. I don’t move frantically from thing to thing anymore because I just can’t.
Life has strengthened me. I feel empowered by becoming a mother. Nothing in my life has been so difficult as pregnancy for me. I’ve loved my births and newborns and toddlers and big kids. I love knowing they’re in the world bringing joy and wonder. I’ve survived kids with stomach bugs and respiratory infections and asthma attacks and hospitalizations. We’ve dealt with a lot of vomit on road trips. We’ve had such little sleep so many nights in a row. At times, we’ve been stretched so thin and love is the only thing holding us together.
I feel so much wiser than I was a decade ago with so much to learn and so many more adventures to have. That grey hair I found this year? I’ve totally earned it. Here’s to more grey hairs, adventures, and wisdom in the decade to come.
I’m going to need you to write a full post on all the ways you entertain toddlers at restaurants.
Congrats on 31!
Happy (belated) birthday, Hailey! I turned 30 this year and found my first grey hair! Honestly, I pulled it out; it looked out of place in my (not-dyed) red hair. I also had my third child, started homeschooling, and am still weirded out at all the grown-up happening. I started a little later than you (married at 23, first kid at 25), but we seem to share a lot of the rest of this decade. I still feel so young though, until I hang out with some university students… and then I realize I am a lot older, wise, and more experienced than I was then and I’m happy to be 30 and have kids and be all sort-of-grown-up. Thanks for this reflection of yours!
Happy birthday! I love this post.
Haley I just love this post! A beautiful reflection on what you’ve learned. (And ah! I too have bad driving anxiety after a bad crash 8 years ago!) cheers to the weird thirties!
Love this post! i feel similar about being 30 and I think it’s a gift in a way! at 22 i never would have thought i’d be so much more secure or such a more capable person at 30
great post, kudos!
Great, great post. I’ll need to do some writing on the same theme, since my 33rd birthday is coming up on Nov. 1st.
And I’ve definitely got more than 1 gray hair, so I’m ahead of ya there.
That is one impressive list!! And yes I totally relate, I had 5 kids in my 20s and grew a lot but… here to assure you that the 30s will bring out strengths that you never knew. After getting over the shock of actually being a grown up they are a great decade. Blessings
I felt like I really related to this post. I am only 28, but I have multiple gray hairs! With getting married at 23 and being slammed with life, I feel like I have spent much of my 20s growing up too. I agree that pregnancy is one of the most difficult things (I imagine severe sickness is awful). For me it’s depression, anxiety, etc (and losing my first baby to miscarriage really changed my perspective on things.)
Anyway just wanted to say that even though I am not quite 30 yet, I really related to your post. Thanks for sharing (any tips on how to make a living as a writer?)
I love this post! I’m turning 30 next year and I feel weird being a real adult and not in the just out of college phase anymore. You’ve really had an eventful decade! When I look back on my 20s thus far I feel like a wasted a good chunk of that time. When I was 20 looking ahead I thought I’d be farther along in life than I am now. Like you said though, I prefer the person I am now to my 20 year old self, and I’m grateful for the blessings God has brought into my life in the last few years, but I wish I’d made a few smarter decisions in the first half of the decade.
I am totally with you on the Shepherd’s Pie…. My husband is definitely the better cook, but I make a mean Shepherd’s Pie! Thank you for this post; I am turning 30 next month and am having all the emotions right now. I have a wonderful husband and a sweet toddler and mostly I feel so lucky, but I’m also feeling pretty weird about leaving my 20s behind.
This is a great list, it made me thinking of writing my own. I’m only 26 now but the 6 years since I turned 20 were so incredibly surprising that I can’t wait to see what else will life bring me. I would never imagine that I will end up where I am now, and even though it was difficult at times I’m so grateful for it! Except I’ve already found way too many grey hairs for being 26, I could definitely live without that:)
and now we all need the Shepherd’s Pie recipe!
If you think 30 is great, just wait till you hit your mid-40s. I am finding these the best years yet. Self-confidence has gone sky-high, laundry has halved (4 of our 6 our over 18 now), my awesome husband and I are free to take weekend trips alone, and my girlfriends and I joke about how this is the “no-bull**** forties.” Our tolerance for BS has gone right down the tubes, and we are not afraid to call it out when we see it. I love this decade.
Love this post!! Thanks for sharing, as another “young mom” in her early thirties.
Happy Birthday. Is there something you need for yourself?
I have had one grey eyelash since I was sixteen, which I thought very distinguished. At twice your age, I’m close to 50% grey now and have earned every one. Never being blessed by a child, I still feel unformed. We’re coming up on three years as Catholic converts. Thanks for your Liturgical Living posts. You are so wise; I admire you enormously. Be proud of your accomplishments. Also, thanks for the Remembrance Day post.
You are so sweet, Nina! Thanks for the birthday wishes. <3
You are too kind. And as for the pregnancy and infant loss post, I've been honored to get to walk alongside some amazing women who have shared their journeys with me. My heart goes out to you.
Happy birthday Haley! If you don’t mind me asking, how did you get over your highway driving anxiety? I have the same issue.