What they don’t tell you about is that:
It gets better. You start to feel comfortable in your skin.
Your pants get a little tighter, and you buy a bigger size.
One that fits.
You breathe easier.
Peace settles in your bones.
You make peace with having a million crushes. You laugh, even.
Not everyone has to be your friend. You love the ones you do, and you let the others go. Also in love.
Five years pass and you recover. You age gracefully.
You learn when to speak up in group chats and when to step back.
You learn to laugh at your weirdness when before it was cringe.
Grief becomes a constant as people you love move, die, or lose touch.
Through it all, peace like the sound of cicadas blanket the nights.
Insomnia is a friend, and just getting good sleep is an accomplishment.
The mood swings even out and love, pure love, for friends, family, strangers you have yet to meet settle like sitting on the swing.
Love radiates from your heart to your fingertips and instead of snipping relationships you patchwork them together.
Love becomes a quilt and a mosaic, a constellation of tiny interactions, longer and longer hangout sessions, and prayers you speak in your heart that only God hears.
It gets easier. Not life. That gets harder or stays hard.
The acceptance of you. Hugging yourself when you make mistakes.
Smoothing your hair after a bad hair day.
It doesn’t get easy but it gets better.
Life trickles into your bones.
You close your eyes and this, this is what you wanted.
Not the salary. The crush. The praise.
Just feeling at home in your own skin.