To My Younger Self

On my birthday, I find myself looking back at the little girl I once was. Before I knew what life would ask of me, before I understood the meaning of grace, she was already learning how to survive, to hope, and to keep going.

Today, I want to tell her something she needed to hear all along.

Dear Little Mary,

I. See. You.

I see that skinny little girl with legs that seemed too long for the rest of her, already learning grit long before you ever had a name for it. I see the nights when you sat quietly, your stomach growling in the darkness, telling yourself it didn’t matter if there was food or not. What else could you do? You were learning how to survive before you ever learned how to truly live.

You learned early that children were meant to be seen and not heard. So you became good at disappearing. You made yourself small, a quiet wallflower who was always there but rarely noticed. You watched other children laughing and playing and wondered what secret they knew that made life seem so easy. You never felt pretty enough, smart enough, or good enough.

But Mary, what you don’t know yet is that surviving was only the beginning of your story. Something was already taking root inside you. You didn’t know the words for it then. You didn’t call it resilience. You didn’t call it faith. You were simply putting one foot in front of the other, trying to make it through another day.

You carried burdens that were far too heavy for such small shoulders. You wore shoes that didn’t fit, trying to walk through a world that often felt too big and uncertain. But God saw every step.

You tried so hard to protect Mama. You wanted to hold her together when everything around her felt like it was falling apart. You became her Little Mama, soothing her fears and mothering the very woman who was supposed to be mothering you. You didn’t understand then that some burdens were never meant for you to carry, but you carried them anyway.

And God was there.

Not always in the ways you expected. Not with answers to every question. But quietly and gently, reminding you that you were never truly alone. Even when your faith felt paper-thin, and you felt invisible, that quiet whisper in your heart was not your imagination. It was Him.

You learned about loss far too early.

Blackie, your fluffy little puppy, was taken from you because there wasn’t enough food to care for her. Others may not have understood what she meant to you, but she was comfort. She was love. Losing her was the first crack in your young heart, a pain you didn’t yet know how to explain.

And then came the loss that changed everything.

Your precious baby sister, the little heartbeat of your world, was tragically taken from you in a hit-and-run accident. No one could answer all the “whys” that filled your heart. You only knew that life would never be the same. A piece of you went with her.

You carried that heartbreak quietly, still trying to protect Mama, still believing your own pain could wait. But listen closely, little Mary: you will one day learn that forgiveness does not mean forgetting. It does not mean pretending the wound never happened. It means releasing the weight of what happened and allowing God to carry what was always too heavy for you to hold alone.

Life would bring more goodbyes.

Grandpa, with his quiet stories and gentle presence. Then Grandma, five years later, the kindest woman you ever knew. Each goodbye left another empty space in your heart, and there were moments when the grief felt like more than you could bear.

But even there, God was holding you.

Looking back now, you will understand that every loss made room for a deeper kind of love. Those goodbyes taught you that love does not disappear when someone leaves this earth. The people we love become part of who we are, and God’s faithfulness remains.

Trust that quiet voice inside you, little one. The one you question. The one you sometimes ignore. It is not weakness. It is wisdom. It is discernment. Sometimes it is God gently guiding you when everything around you feels confusing and loud.

You will fall. As a teenager and young woman, you will make choices you wish you could change. You will walk through seasons of confusion, heartbreak, and pain you never saw coming. But those places will not destroy you.

Years later, you will discover that God was never afraid of your broken places. He was already there, waiting for you to understand that none of your tears, struggles, or scars were wasted. Those broken places will become holy ground.

Starting over is not failure. It is faith.

You will survive.

Your story matters.

The scars you carry will one day remind you of how far you’ve come. They will tell the story of a little girl who kept going, even when she did not know where the road would lead.

Your journey is not over. You will love. You will experience loss. And you will find the courage to love again.

One day, you will look back and see it clearly: the hunger, the rejection, the loneliness, and the tears did not defeat you. Those moments became the soil where God grew something stronger and more tender in you.

I wish I could sit beside you right now and tell you this: God sees you, Mary. Not from far away, but right there in the dark. He hears you when the words will not come. He knows your name, and He has never left your side. Not once.

You never had to earn His love. You never had to prove you were worthy. You were His all along.

Be gentle with yourself, little one. You do not have to be so hard on your own heart. Grace was never something you had to chase. It was always something waiting to be received.

And you do not have to keep running all the time.

God is not in a hurry with you.

Happy Birthday, Mary.

Thank you, little Mary, for holding on.

I Celebrate That Little Girl

Today, I celebrate the little girl who did not know what was ahead, the young woman who stumbled, searched, made mistakes, and started again, and the woman I am still becoming, held together by grace.

I keep writing because every time I return to that scared little girl, I remember the grace that carried her through hunger, heartbreak, and loss. I remember that healing is not a single moment. It is a journey still unfolding. Perhaps that is one of the greatest gifts of growing older: learning to look back at our younger selves with compassion instead of only remembering the pain.

That little girl did not know how her story would unfold. She did not know the struggles would one day become lessons, the wounds would become places where healing could begin, or that God could bring beauty from the broken pieces.

But He did.

And He is still writing the story.

If any part of my story reminds you of your own, I’d be honored to have you continue the journey with me in the pages of Running in Heels: A Memoir of Grit and Grace. It is a story of hunger, heartbreak, hope, and healing still unfolding.

From my heart to yours.