Celeste Frenette

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i'm 10 years old it's a lazy sunday afternoon and summer's coming to an end the air is crisp with the promise of the changing season and thoughts swirl through my mind as i begin to imagine the new school year the phone rings and it's my dad i see him every other weekend or so since my parents split up and we have one very special tradition every year he takes me to the stationery store before school starts and i get to choose a few new things so he calls and he says should we go do a little shopping to get you ready for school i fill

up with joy at the thought of it yes papa let's go i get dressed and ready and i wait hours pass the sun begins to set and after dinner my papa arrives i leap down the stairs as i watch my mom walk in front of me and step outside what are you doing here she questions him he says he's gonna take me shopping no you're not it's sunday night the stores are only open for another hour she's not going anywhere with you you should have called me they start yelling at each other moments later he hits her and then they begin physically fighting all i

can think is i caused this i run and i hide under the side table in the living room i close my eyes and i spiral into shame we end up at the hospital when we get home i lay in bed that night and grief overcomes me as i replay the day over and over again in my head i take it all on the responsibility the blame the guilt for years i carry it inside of me and i'm careful never to ask for too much never to upset anyone and always to keep the peace fast forward 30 years i'm in a relationship and my partner yells

at me instantly it triggers that memory i start to shake and every vivid detail comes rushing back to me i feel helpless and small again i remember that ten-year-old me hiding under the table arms wrapped around her legs head tucked into her chest rocking back and forth wishing she could unwind time i take a deep breath and i remember i am not that little girl anymore but the wounds from that day are still there and it's time to heal them i do a meditation later that day and i imagine that ten-year-old me there with all the chaos around her this time though i envisioned myself

there with her i walk over to her get down on my knees and whisper i'm here this is not your fault no matter what you do or don't do no matter what you say or don't say adults are not supposed to hit people are not supposed to treat each other this way she falls into my arms with relief i feel her embrace and her innocence she looks into my eyes and i remind her you are the adult now she climbs out from under that table stands up walks with confidence and grace putting herself right in between my mom and dad she raises her hands out

to her side and she says enough no more the fighting stops and they look at her they realize what they've done she then takes all of that guilt and shame and grief that she's carried throughout her life and she lays them down on the ground right there between them turns and walks away people in our lives will hurt us and let us down triggers will remind us of these events that have shaped us and they'll invite us to heal them i didn't need to forgive my dad or mom as much as i needed to forgive myself for believing that i was to blame for repeatedly

accepting less than what i was worthy of and for tolerating bad behavior for years because i thought i deserved it it's never too late to go back and visit that little us to meet them with the love compassion and protection that they didn't get when they needed it with everything that we know now with all of the wisdom and strength and power we have inside of us it is time to forgive ourselves for the broken beliefs we built our lives upon and say enough and no more tear those beliefs down to the ground and build ourselves new ones you

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my step-dad's name was brian he had reddish brown hair a big beard and the kindest eyes he took me under his wing and loved me like his own from the day i met him onwards he was so much fun and he's a big part of why the joyful memories of my childhood stand out far beyond the painful ones he was brilliant a mathematician and coder far beyond his time he could solve any rubik's cube in seconds and never hesitated to beat me at every game every single time for years with no mercy i loved it i think my competitive nature comes from him board game

nights movie dates long car rides in the countryside he was there for it all there by my mom's side i felt safe with him and i counted on him he was always there to run through math cue cards to help me with tricky school problems hold my hair back when i was sick all of it like a real dad is my stepdad grew up in the foster system and he spent time homeless on the streets of toronto he battled with not understanding why his birth parents gave him up why he wasn't worthy of their love and when an adoptive family chose him he had a

hard time opening his heart fully to receive that love my father left when i was three and brian moved in with my mom and i when i was six i can't really even remember him not being there sometimes love leaves and in the space in between new love enters and it fills every crevice and overflows your life with blessings that you are so worthy of my stepdad did this for me and my mom for 10 years when it all fell apart i was 16 years old laying across the couch with my legs sprawled over the arm of it talking to my boyfriend on the phone

remember those old phones with the cords that got tangled up in everything when you finally tried to move it tripped you up ryan wasn't feeling well that morning which really wasn't like him at all he told my mom and i that he was going to lay down and he never woke up we lost the love of our lives that day and my biggest regret was never having told him that in my mind and heart he was a real dad to me he died in january later that month as i sorted through the things from christmas i stumbled across the christmas card from him that i

somehow hadn't opened yet tears welled up in my eyes as i opened my last gift from him i don't remember any of what he wrote but what i do remember is that i read all the way down to the bottom and i saw that for the first time ever he signed it love dad i had never told him how i felt but he knew as i was reflecting on the years we shared together i was thinking about the idea of being chosen how he was chosen by his adoptive family how him and my mom chose each other and how he chose me as his daughter

life without him has been hard i wish he had been there to walk me down the aisle to hold his grandchildren and to pick me up when i was in my darkest moments i lost myself somehow over the years in a marriage cluttered with betrayal i forgot that i was worthy of love but thinking about him reminds me it reminds me to wake up each morning and choose myself it also reminds me that in the midst of it all there will be people in our lives who have the capacity to love us the way we deserve to be loved and who will choose us too

my dad was the first man who treated me like i was worthy and helped me to understand that i am if i could bring him back for just one minute i would tell him i choose you too

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i'm seven years old wearing a brand new bathing suit with the cutest rainbow stripes angled across my body like a sash i feel happy confident and carefree i walk into the girls locker room towel in hand bare feet on the cold tiles smell of chlorine filling the air and i smile as i see my papa but he's not smiling i see him scan me up and down with the look of disgust jeez honey you really should lose a few pounds before you wear that in public my heart sunk i suddenly felt as though everyone in the room was looking at me judging me shame washed

over me like i wished the water would and for the first time in my life i wanted to hide i fumbled with my towel quickly covered my body up and i wished i could disappear i went to school the following monday and i remember feeling withdrawn anxious and self-conscious in a way that i never had before it came time for lunch and i looked down at my sandwich and i just stared at it i felt too ashamed to eat there i was at the round wooden lunch table everybody unpacking their lunches chatting away holding my breath i was afraid that my classmates would make fun

of me if they saw me eating i heard the words of one person and in my mind i feared they were the thoughts of everyone quietly i tucked my lunch into a paper towel i asked to go to the washroom and i threw it out i threw out my lunch every day for months at seven years old i'm not even sure how the teacher found out that i was doing it but she did she told my mom and from that moment on for the rest of second grade i had to go to the principal's office every lunch and eat with him watching me it was

awful i felt humiliated and trapped i had to eat so i ate and i ate and i ate i ate for all the days and weeks i had been hungry i was hungry so hungry for acceptance hungry to be loved hungry to be enough i ate my feelings and i ate my fear i wasn't even big but i got big i carried those words with me as i grew up and i got bigger and bigger and bigger i hid for so much of my life the shame i had felt on the inside all of those years ago became visible on the outside for everyone to

see i let the words of one person shape and define me until one day i looked in the mirror i didn't even recognize myself on that day i knew it was time to heal i learned how to talk to that little seven-year-old me and i showered her with the love nourishment and kindness that she deserved i stopped hiding and i started showing up for my life and for my dreams even when i didn't feel perfect even when i didn't feel ready and even when i was scared which was honestly most of the time i looked at myself in the mirror and instead of saying you're

too big i started to say you're bigger than this i loved myself back to life back to believing that i was enough back to believing that i was worthy of being seen and that i had it within me to write a new story built on new words that i chose words are powerful we can carry them with us for a lifetime we can't change the ones others have spoken to us but we can absolutely change the ones we're speaking to ourselves maybe you took someone else's words into your heart too painful projections masquerading as truth maybe they led you down a dark path that you

never deserved to be on maybe they kept you small and hidden maybe some part of you believed them but now we get to reclaim our power and rewrite our story because we are bigger than the words that have tried to keep us small we are bigger than everything that has held us back and the best and most beautiful part of our story is just beginning you

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I almost missed it I almost missed so much in November of 2011 I lay in the bathtub sobbing I had been in there for hours in the ones hot bath had gone ice cold I felt numb and lifeless and all I wanted to do was figure out how to leave this world no one not one person in my life would have ever guessed it I was the always there for you person the helper the good listener the strong one but after the loss of miscarriages and doctors telling me I would probably never be able to have a child I felt broken having a miscarriage sort

of grants you entry into this secret Club that no one ever wants to belong to as you sit in the despair feeling betrayed by your body you find the courage to share and the women around you begin to speak up and say that happened to me too I never knew I felt so alone and I was going through those losses month after month it was constantly morning the dream of the life I thought I would live so one by one I began to picture leaving everyone I loved I envisioned what would happen after I was gone I had decided that they would all be fine

one thought kept me here only one I could justify leaving every other person I knew but my grandmother what about my Nana when I visualized life after I was gone it was the heartbreak in my Nana's eyes it woke me up to my soul her love brought me back and she doesn't even know it I thought of her and her resiliency how she likes so many of our ancestors survived the devastation of war and the loss of loved ones only to leave everything they knew and traveled to a country with the language they couldn't understand to begin again I began to understand that my very

exist was evidence of the strength of my grandmother and her grandmother's and that this strength was in me too I was the prayer of a better life maybe we're all the prayers dreams and hopes of our grandmother's as I lay there in the cold mix of water and tears the Sun started to shine through a crack in the blinds and it was so bright that it snapped me out of the trance I was in I closed my eyes and I felt the warmth of the Sun on my face I stood up and opened the blinds and I saw the sunlight sparkling through the vibrant autumn

leaves and took a deep breath I felt myself coming back into my body and I heard the whisper of my grandmother's and her grandmother's telling me to hold on don't miss it they said I stared out the window and of the breathtaking colors red pink orange yellow leaves covering the lawn like a blanket of hope it was like I was seeing them all for the very first time another deep breath and the decision to stay my mind was finally quiet enough to let my heart hear the truth I was worthy of love and I was worthy of living I was hope and I was prayer

and my story wasn't over it was just beginning I didn't know it yet but the biggest miracles of my life were on their way to me I almost missed it I almost missed so much I would have missed the birth of my son and daughter I would have missed the friends I had yet to meet the dreams I had yet to dream and the lives I had yet to change and be changed by wanting to die grants you entry to another sort of secret Club also one no one wants to be a part of it's not until you share that you realize you're not the

only one did you know that in this world one person every 40 seconds takes their own life from the time I began talking until now we've already lost five souls something needed to die in my life but it wasn't me it was the old stories I had about myself the thoughts of my unworthiness the belief that I was broken I was stopped going through the motions believing I was not enough thinking it would never get better being who I thought I should be and feeling less than all of that needed to die but I I did not it is a resilient spirit who chooses to

stay here and live in the pain and the unknowing and the doubt here with the opportunity to write a new story a beautiful story what is it in your life that needs to die so that you can fully live it's not you I promise you that it wasn't me and it's not you we need to have this conversation more often I'm done with the secret clubs it shouldn't be that way we shouldn't have to go through the most painful moments of our life feeling all alone until some future moment of courage if we survive to see it when we speak and realize we were never

alone I'm here to talk about it with you today but I have a friend named Leonard who isn't that he would take his own life was never even on my radar and I wish it had been I wish we had talked about it we need to have these conversation with our loved ones and our friends the possibility of someone taking their own life needs to be on our radar one person every 40 seconds needs to be on our radar give voice to your pain to your struggles shine the light of love on them and know that they are not signs of weakness they are evidence

of your resilience lean in and listen love is whispering

Transcript generated from the recording and lightly cleaned. Some names and wording may differ from the spoken speech.