I’m officially out of office today. Tomorrow is my birthday, 43, though honestly, I don’t feel like celebrating. This year has been… how do I put it nicely? A dumpster fire wearing a birthday hat. A bad dream with a sequel nobody asked for.

Chronic illness has a way of fast-forwarding the body clock, I may be 43 on paper, but my joints are out here celebrating 90 like it’s bingo night.

Still, I had a good breakfast. My spirits aren’t tragic. I even bought myself a cake and candles, there will be people singing, smiling, taking pictures, and I’ll do the same. Because sometimes you celebrate not out of joy, but out of habit, making appearances while the inside of you feels strangely quiet, like joy has gone on vacation without notice. Tomorrow, I plan a sauna day. I’ll call it “melting away the trauma”, self-care, but make it poetic.

This morning, as I took the dog out for her royal morning pee, I looked at my apple tree, the one I always see through my office window while working. Its leaves are falling fast, carpeting the ground like a golden resignation letter. It’s preparing for winter. And of course, my brain, the overthinker-in-chief, starts drawing analogies again.

Chronic pain feels like this moment: the tree stripped bare, every leaf (every ounce of energy) gone. No strength to bloom, no light to chase. Just standing there, exposed, in survival mode, waiting for something to shift. I mourn the spring I once had, when things felt lighter, and the summers that tasted sweet, like my own apples before life decided to throw worms at them.

But maybe, just maybe,  this is how healing works too. Maybe winter isn’t the end, just the intermission. A quiet pause before something green and stubborn decides to grow again.

So yes, this birthday feels bittersweet, more bitter than sweet, but still edible. I’m learning to sit with that. To rest like the tree. To trust that even when life feels stripped bare, there’s still something alive under the bark, quietly preparing for spring.