#abt grieving the years you should've had in safety and feeling like your childhood stole decades from your future | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

serialreblogger · 3 years ago

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hot take but "old" is a good thing, actually. contrary to popular belief we aren't guaranteed a specific number of years before we die. You don't have a countdown written in your blood, your birthdays don't mark "one less year left," what you have is the past you've already lived.

The future is not yours yet, and maybe not ever. We cannot lose something we've never had; but no one can take away the past. The more years you've lived, the more years you have that are yours. Yeah, 30 isn't old, etc etc, but also - so what if it is? Why do we have to extend the deadline for youth in order to tell each other we have worth? Are the years we've lived not worth something, in themselves?

#seeing a lot of posts abt aging today #abt grieving the years you should've had in safety and feeling like your childhood stole decades from your future #and we have the right to grieve that. but we don't *need* to feel like we're obliged to play catchup #you deserve to be happy for yourself. your journey towards that is your own. and just bc a lot of years were spent trying to survive #while ur age peers were living out the things you now get to do in adulthood - that's worth grieving; but it doesn't mean #the years you spent surviving don't ''count.'' you lived them differently (and lived them in pain) but you lived them.#and the child that survived deserves to be treasured as well #anyway idk what i'm getting at exactly #but - like; from the chronically ill perspective of ''i'm not worth less for being sick &/or living closer to death'' -#idk i just get frustrated sometimes with how we talk about age. bc so much of our dread boils down to the fear of becoming a person like me #disabled; prone to illness and pain; closer to death. these things don't make us worth less. and it's kinda screwed up #how intensely we're taught to fear it. ageism & ableism go hand in hand is i guess what i'm saying #and it's worth the effort it takes to examine and challenge the roots of both #also? age *is* something we deserve to celebrate. i meant every word i said. our lives have value #and the future exists only in potentia. our lives *exist.* the years we've lived are *ours.* we deserve to celebrate them #to celebrate ourselves #linden's originals #age #aging #reframing #linden in the tags

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