Lately, I've started treating myself like a fascinating stranger I'm trying to get to know. I've realized I actually hate sitting in bright rooms with overhead lighting. I love waking up at 5 in the morning when the world is pitch black and quiet. I have opinions I suppressed for too long to avoid conflict within the household. Meeting yourself at fifty is like finding an old friend you lost touch with - she's a little weathered, a lot wiser, and infinitely more interesting than she was at twenty-five.
There is a distinct kind of shock that comes with looking up from the life you spent decades building and realizing the foundation has completely shifted. For most of my adult life, my identity was neatly hyphenated. Wife, partner, half of a whole. We had the history, the shared inside jokes, the accumulation of twenty plus years of navigating the world as "us".
Nobody prepares you for the fifty-year plot twist.
If you are standing in this exact same space- breathing through the panic of sudden uncoupling, facing the uncertain silence of a once laughter filled house, and wondering how on earth do you rewrite a story halfway through - I want to tell you something right off the bat: the panic is real, but so is the possibility.
Let's be honest; the logistics of starting over solo at this age are no joke. The digital landscape, the housing market and options, the sheer physical and mental exhaustion of moving, sorting, and untangling a shared life can make you want to pull the duvet over your head and stay there.
We live in a culture that treats older single women as either invisible or tragic. Seriously. But there is a quiet, ferocious power in discovering that you can in fact pay your own bills, fix just about anything with a YouTube video, and build a sanctuary entirely out of your own choices.
If you are in the thick of the transition right now, or the very beginning- if your chest feels tight and the road ahead looks impossibly steep- give yourself permission to fall apart for a minute. You don't have to be brave all the time, You don't have to have it all figured out by Tuesday.
We aren't broken; we are just beginning the second half. And honestly? The view from here is entirely unwritten.
Just take it one small, stubborn step at a time. Sit in silence until it stops felling like an absence and starts feeling like space. Buy the paint color you want. Turn off your phone. Cook the meal you want.
My plot twist has not entirely finished playing out yet. I've lost six pounds in a week, am running on a mere few hours of sleep, smoked a bit and had solo drinks. My heart and gut are fighting over every scenario. I still have not cried.
This is just my 2 cents and not any where near advice on how to live your life! I am just trying to live mine this week.
Courage, love and respect,
G