Nick (98:49)
That's the part you might have to work on. I mean, listen, and acknowledging that while you are generally open, knowing that if you had it your way, you would like to have another child, you know, if you could, if right now, you could, if you could write your story, it sounds like a third child would be a part of that story. But you know, you, you do, you are a mom, you know, and, and not having children and having one child is hugely difficult, different than. And I say that as someone who. Natalie and I have tried to grow our family unsuccessfully recently, and that's been very painful. But we are so thankful that we have our daughter and so thankful compared to the many families and people out there who have experienced what we've experienced recently. But don't have the blessing of knowing that they are capable and able to give birth to a health, healthy child. And we feel very grateful about that. And so it's not exactly what we want to be dealing with right now, but we, we can see that. And, and, and similar to you, you have the benefit of that. And while it's not perfect and it's not the way you would necessarily write your story, there are a lot of good things there that you, you're just gonna have to challenge yourself to focus on. It is normal to turn 40 and freak out. You know, I knew I was, I kind of felt weird about it, it, but kind of like I was like you, you are in a unique position as a woman who's about to turn 40 to kind of act like a man who's about to turn 40. Which a lot of women who are, you know, and who are single, who haven't had the, who want to have children, who haven't had the benefit of having children aren't in a position to act like that. They just, they don't, you know, they don't get to, you know, 40 year old men, men who still want to have children, who've never had children can around and find out and date a 23 year old who like may be like, it might be the dumbest thing they have ever did done because like, you know, there's a lot of, you know, and it can blow up in their face and they can then be 42 and, and nothing's really changed for them. You know, they're still capable of having children if they ever meet the right person. They're a couple years older and you know, hopefully they have the same amount of hair as they did two years ago, you know, and you have that you don't have to worry about your hair like 40 year old men have to worry. So again it's a lot of it is how you choose to look at this situation. And we all have self limiting beliefs, we all have fears and things that pop in our head. But I think you just have to remind yourself of the progress you've made made and you got to give yourself grace and you have to jokingly have some fun and just be like I get to be, I get to act like 40 year old men get to act when they turn 40 and still maybe want to have and are open to having more kids. And I can, you know, around and find out. And again there's, I think there's a difference between, you know, yeah, you made some bad decisions Dating when you're younger. But your bad decisions were based off of thinking you needed a man and you needed the validation and then you all wanted to have kids and then you got stuck in this very toxic relationship. And I'm not saying you should go like some 28 year old guy. I'm just saying that if all you wanted to do was go on vacation with your friends and just have fun and throw caution to the wind and you happen to meet, you know, and you decided, you know what, I haven't been late in a while and I'm going to do that with a 28 year old man. Short of just making sure you have protected sex, you can do that guilt free and risk free and just have some fucking fun on in ways that like other people in your position don't feel like they have the luxury of doing. And if you waste six to 12 months with a guy you probably realize you had no business doing that with. You don't have to beat yourself up or be like, I shouldn't have done that. Like you didn't really waste much time. You have the benefit right now of kind of doing things for the plot enjoyed. But yeah, I'm not saying you should necessarily do that, but like embrace the, embrace the fact that you have the ability to do that. And I think when going back to like your greatest fears of, of knowing what is healthy and not knowing and feeling triggered when you meet a guy you like, to me that is a sign that you're honestly just not ready to date. You know, to me that is your body telling you that you, you, you still have some self love to give, you know, you still have, you know. And you say, well how will I know know the better you are at knowing what you deserve and giving you those things, giving yourself those things you deserve. And most of that is grace. And just like how you see yourself and how you talk about yourself to yourself, you know, and how you talk about yourself to your friends, the better you are, the, the kinder you are to yourself and the more respect you give yourself and the more, more the, the, the, the way you prioritize yourself in a way that isn't necessarily narcissistic or self centered. And you can still, you know, you can be a single woman, right? And you can prioritize yourself. And again, you're still a mom of two. So you have, you know, you, there are a couple people who really need you to be there for them, right? And, and, and if you have any free time you can, you can give back to Your community, you can, you can volunteer and, and you can do things to hold yourself accountable so that you're not just like become some self centered, egotistical person who's like, trying to make up for lost time because she gave so much to this narcissistic man who didn't deserve that. You know what I'm saying? You can do things to check yourself while still getting better at loving yourself. And the better you get at that, when you meet a guy who doesn't match the way you've been treating yourself the past six, 12, two months, three years, four years, five years, that will be a signal to you that, like, they're not your guy. But right now you're still not totally comfortable with giving yourself that grace, with treating yourself with love and respect and kindness and things like that, that you don't know how to hold men accountable who also don't do that.
