When Life Knocks You Off Your Feet

{A polariod of my beautiful Aunt Teresa when she was younger}

I feel like this isn’t the first time I’ve taken a hiatus from my blog but it is the first time life shook me to my core forcing me to fall into a state of depression to where I had no desire to do anything I loved. I went back and forth as to whether I mention this part of my life on here or just keep it private, but I feel that talking about real-life stuff is what helps us all get through the day-to-day struggles and hardships of life. So, here it goes…

Several months ago my life was moving along on auto-pilot. Every day was easy, my job was going great, I was a newlywed fresh off of my honeymoon, I had tons of exciting ideas for my blog; life was good. I guess the saying holds true, all good things must come to an end, at least it did for me on July 2. That was the day life shook me to my core. I still remember the look on my sister’s face when she walked into my kitchen. Moments before, she had called me saying she was on her way over and that she needed to tell me something. When she walked through the door, I immediately asked, “What is wrong?” She directed me to sit down at the dining room table. There she proceeded to tell me the most devastating news, that we had just lost our Aunt in a tragic accident. Anyone who has lost someone knows that immediate feeling is disbelief, and that was what I was feeling. There was no way this was true, I was just talking to her recently! We were making plans to do things together, this can’t be real, but it was.

The days following were a complete blur. Time moved so quickly, yet so slowly at the same time. I wasn’t sleeping much and I hardly had an appetite for anything. The day of her funeral I barely had a voice, but that didn’t stop me from standing up and reading the eulogy I wrote for her. My Aunt Teresa was truly one-of-a-kind and I felt that I owed that to her. The love she gave to everyone around her was raw and unconditional and I can only hope that I can grow to love as deeply and as passionately as she did. The reason that I chose to share this devastating moment in my life with you, is because she was one of my loyal blog readers. She would go to Facebook and share my posts and say the kindest things about me and how proud she was of what I was doing. I felt that by me sharing such a private and vulnerable part of my life, I could in some way pay tribute to the beautiful person that she was.

Over the past couple months, my life has returned back to a state of “new normalcy.” I am slowing finding interest in the things that I once loved, my blog being one of those things. I will admit, there were times I thought to myself, “Just give up Marie. You’ve been away from it for too long. No one cares!” But you know what, that is not the attitude that my aunt would’ve wanted me to adopt. She loved what I was doing and if I do it for no one else other than her, then that’s what it will be. I love to write, I love fashion, I love giving advice, I love making people feel like they are not alone in this crazy thing called life and that is why I am picking my virtual pen back up and writing once again.

The moral of this story blog post is…life is hard and it’s okay to take time to be sad and grieve and feel sorry for yourself. I had to realize that taking some time for myself was needed. Depression is very real and something that so many people, including myself, have struggled with or continue to struggle with. I’ve been lucky to be surrounded by a very loving family and a few great friends who’ve provided the support and love I needed to get through that difficult time in my life. Having someone to talk to is necessary when life gets you down. If you don’t have someone you can talk to, you can talk to me (I’m 100% serious! Reach out to me via email at marie@idreaminchic.com). I don’t care if we’ve never met in person, I will listen to you, just as my aunt always did for me. So, to wrap this post up, I just want to say thank you for taking the time to listen as I opened up to you about something that still hurts my heart so deeply. I am excited to get back to my blog once again, just in time for the holidays! Stay tuned.

Lots of love,