This Year I Decided Not to Celebrate My Birthday

Photo by Sofiya Levchenko on Unsplash

I was fortunate for 35 years with numerous surprises, celebrations, gifts, and affection. It was as if my life was mattering only during that uncommon day. I will forever be grateful for all the love I received, whether it was genuine or a show. For the latter, they don’t know better, and I forgive them.

This year, I made a decision. I will not celebrate my birthday. Three days before, I informed my family, friends, and acquaintances through a Facebook post. At the same time, I shared the story of my life and my struggles with mental health, starting from my teenage years — having been a miserable perfectionist my whole life — for the first time on that platform.

The last episode of the story

Exactly two years ago, after having been harshly abused by a malignant narcissist, I was about to end my life. I was saved at the last moment by the grace of my pure love divinity through an out-of-body experience.

It was as if the servant leader in me dissociated to make me see all the lies of my unhealthy ego and realize this gigantic universe was not revolving around my small self.

Most importantly, and during this magic dissociation, I was able to visualize I was on this planet for a mission. That was the moment of my migration from being religious to spiritual.

The butterfly took time to emerge.

The caterpillar had to heal the easiest scars and gain some strength to start the most rewarding investment of the whole existence: destroying all my limiting beliefs about myself — fixing my insecure attachment style — and the world where the subtle manipulation happens.

I rewired the invasive subconscious program I never wrote in the first place in alignment with the original center the creator granted us: the principles. And my gratitude to the universe for that trauma is beyond being describable. It was what I needed.

The pain was seemingly unbearable. I doubted it, hated it, was feeling I was becoming crazy, and wanted to give up so many times. But there was a secret. I persisted because of my drive for transforming.

Every time I was feeling like giving up, I only needed to remember why I was doing it in the first place. Suddenly, my bravery was rising again!

The unexpected and priceless gift

I was working in my favorite coworking space while I received a call from a Swedish beloved soul friend. We worked together a few years ago but in different locations.

He was my first contact for questions or desired features or issues about our internal reporting tool we use for all our deliveries. My team had many projects in common with the Swedish team. Thus, it was usual for me to visit Sweden.

We built such a beautiful friendship, which we strengthened after leaving the company. A year ago, I needed to spend some time in Stockholm and asked him whether it would bother his wife and himself to stay at their place.

They hosted me for a month. I can never show all the gratitude I have for the magic stay! They saw my silliest and happiest version because their energy is so welcoming! They’re real, generous, and hilarious. We were spending hours having dinner talking about everything, and most importantly, giggling!

We loved watching movies, eating caramel corn and ice-cream. We were spending our weekends mostly on mother nature after having breakfast at home. My heart was bleeding when I was about to leave. I spent a month adapting to my place. I still miss them and the rituals we had every day.

More to the point, this is the friend with whom you only have real talks. I was in my favorite coworking space while he called me for my birthday. We talked most probably for 20 minutes.

A girl was sitting close to me. After a while, she was ready to leave. She came to my direction with torn eyes and a trembling voice. I was worried about her and asked whether everything was okay.

I rarely take the initiative to talk to strangers. But I just felt compelled to do so today. You impacted my spirit in a way I cannot even describe. The icing on the cake: you didn’t even intend to impact me in any way!

She moved me to my core! My heart was about to explode before adding, “Oh my god, how sweet is this!”. I gave her one of my warmest hugs. After we finished hugging, she said:

“I’m sorry if I heard your conversation unintentionally! I’m going through some harsh times. Hearing you talk to your friend about similar challenges with such resilience, tender smile, unbelievable gratitude because it happened when you were ready to handle it, and the faith everything is going to be okay was beyond inspiring!”

That was by far the most adorable gift of my 36 years on earth; a gift you can’t buy; a gift engraved in your heart for a lifetime!

With love, Myriam