June 2025

I met my younger self for coffee … well, iced chai with soy, at the campus Starbucks.

“It’s still our favorite drink to order here?” she asked.

“Yes, we get light ice now to make the most of it, because it’s still pricey,” I said with a smile.

We hug and sit in a well-lit corner. Outside, the campus of Northern Arizona University is woodsy and gorgeous—green, alive with students scattering back and forth. We both love it here. She’s tired and rushed. In college, she’s taking 18 to 21 credits a semester, too many extracurriculars to keep track of, trying to make sure she builds a future for herself. She has a point to prove yet never feels like she’s doing enough. Some things never change.

“She never gets sober does she…”

She just asks, point blank, no filter. It’s not really a question. She knows.

“No, she doesn’t, I’m so sorry…”

A couple of years earlier, at 17, we left a note on our mom’s dining room table. “When you’re able to be a mom, give me a call,” it said. She never makes that call.

“Does she ever meet our kids?” she asks. I know she’s worried about navigating that. Like me, she worries constantly about how to make others feel comfortable and seen. She chameleons to others, sliding in and out of lives and relationships, always on a quest to make others’ lives better and to find a place that feels like home. That trait calms down over the years but it never fully leaves. We’re working on it; always working on it.

“You won’t have to worry about that…” her eyes don’t change, she knows. “But your dad meets them for a time, and you’ll treasure the photos always.”

“I’m a mom?! We’re moms??!”

Her face lights up and we both break into tears. I’m not allowed to give specifics, so I use “them.” Life will hit her hard in the quest to be a mom; she needs hope now more than exact answers.

“Yes, and it’s as amazing and healing as you think it will be. And you rock it. They’re amazing. Black hair. Brown eyes. Your entire world and it’s the best experience ever. I promise.”

I know her and all she wants to be is a writer and a mom, so I let that slip too… “You’ll be published nationally. Locally. Two hardcovers. It gives you the flexibility to be there for every moment of their childhood. Being a mom—it’ll be what keeps you going. You’ll be so grateful for it sometimes that your heart will swell with joy.”

I let her soak that in and I feel like I’ve already said too much. But, right now, she needs hope more than anything. She knows plenty of grief.

“Do you want to know more?” I ask.

“I just need a moment,” she says.

I do, too. I don’t know how to tell her to prepare for a life with as many bumps as blessings. How do you tell someone that at 22 their mom will pass? At 24, their dad will follow almost to the day. At 35, they’ll find out that their dad isn’t their biological dad and their world will turn upside down and inside out.

How do you tell them that true love will remain elusive? That they’ll be a single, divorced mom of one child when they want nothing more than the white picket fence and multiple children? That they’ll spend years trying to create a family that looks a certain way but, by their late 30s, they finally realize that a happy family looks however you make it or want it to?

You don’t. Instead, you just speak from the heart.

“So, there’s this quote I really like,” I tell her.

“Life is amazing. And then it’s awful. And then it’s amazing again. And in between the amazing and awful it’s ordinary and mundane and routine. Breathe in the amazing, hold on through the awful, and relax and exhale during the ordinary. That’s just living, heartbreaking, soul-healing, amazing, awful, ordinary life. And it’s breathtakingly beautiful.” ( L.R. Knost)

“That’s kind of how your life is going to work, beautiful girl. You’re going to have some amazing highs, and such low lows.

You’ll hold a baby in your arms and wonder what’s next. Years later, you’ll wonder what you ever did right in this world to be their mama.

There will be moments that you’re rejected by people who are supposed to love you, and it’ll bring you to your knees on a bathroom floor at 2 a.m., alone, wondering if any of this—living itself—is even worth it.

You’ll be held close by people you haven’t even met yet through it all.

And there will be beautifully ordinary days where life is calm and nothing big or little happens. You’re allowed to just breathe, and that’s necessary too.”

We both pause and take a sip of our drinks, now needing to be stirred because the ice melted.

“Do I ever meet him?”

My heart nearly breaks in two. We both know who she’s talking about—this imaginary man, built up in her head, who is going to be the answer to all our problems and rescue us. A knight in shining armor, built up as a coping method when times are tough.

“There will be men in your life that you think are him, but they aren’t. They’re human and flawed and, while it’s hard to say out loud, it’s not fair of us to expect that of them. You’ll find that the decisions you make out of survival mode will not be the same ones you’ll make when you take back your own power.”

She looked at me like I just took her biggest dream and crushed it. Because I did. I remember how we used to tell ourselves that someone would rescue us and then everything would be okay.

“No one is coming to rescue us?” she asked.

“No baby girl, but you grow into the woman who rescues herself…and I promise you that’s more powerful and sustainable than anything else.”

She loses it. She racks with sobs. “That is not fair!” she screams. “I deserved better. I deserve to be rescued and taken care of. I waited for so long, I’ve been through so much.”

“You’re already rescuing yourself, we both know that,” I say, trying to comfort her. “Soon, you’ll walk across that stage with not one but two pieces of paper. You’ll make it in a career field everyone says is dying. You’re going to be a mom. Some of your dreams will come true and some of them will change. But you’re not alone. You’re going to be okay.”

“We’re going to be okay?” she asks as she catches her breath and calms down. I smile.

“Yes. You’ll find your people. You’ll have experiences that you can only imagine. You’ll find things out about yourself that change your life. You’re stronger and more capable than you ever imagined. Even in the moments where it doesn’t feel like it. You’re going to be okay. And, during the calm portions of life, more than okay. You’re going to make it.”

“Promise?” She asked as she started putting her pink/purple messenger bag over her shoulder because our visit is almost up.

“I promise,” I say. “And one last thing… you’re not the horrible person you think you are. You’re just a girl figuring out a life where some of the cards you were handed are quite the opposite of fair. A lot of it isn’t your fault. And what is, you’ll learn to take responsibility for. You don’t have to make yourself small to make others feel big or take the blame for things you didn’t do. Grief and gratitude walk side by side. But you’ll be okay, even when it feels like the end. And, spoiler alert, you see so many cool things and go to so many amazing places. Life is as beautiful as it is hard.”

“But we’re going to be okay?”

“Yes love, we’re going to be more than okay.”

We hugged and I knew my future self will likely write something similar decades down the road.

“You have to go write a paper you put off but you know you’ll rock it?” I asked.

She nodded with a smile. Some things never change.

“So you know, and remember, we always panic, then we rock it,” I said. She nodded and we both threw our cups away. I watched her leave. I’m so proud of her. I’m so proud of us both.