Growing Pains

No one ever tells you that in order to become and grow into the person you are destined to be - often requires more growing pains. Only they hurt different this time. Growing pains when you get older don't cause your muscles to cramp or girlie bits to ache,
 now they hurt deep on the inside.
~J.V. Manning

I remember the pain being like white lightning as it travelled up my legs, each muscle seizing tight, and feeling like they would never release again. Growing pains I was told. My newly turned 13 year old self decided that if this is what it took to grow taller, I was totally okay with being short. Growing hurt like hell and it was taking far too long! Oh, but then other parts starter to grow, too. The horror! The embarrassment! Getting taller I could almost handle, getting boobs - not so much. I remember trying to hide all the changes I was going through, pulling in on myself. Suffering in silence, because to admit it out loud was to admit I was changing.

I just wasn't ready. It went too fast, it went too slow. There wasn't a rhyme or reason to when the pain would come or when another size bra would need to be horrifically shopped for. I just wanted it to be over already. I wanted to be OLD, like twenty or so, because that would mean that I had made it through the transition from childhood to adulthood and would never have to worry about growing pains again.

How very, very wrong I was.

No one ever tells you that in order to become and grow into the person you are destined to be - often requires more growing pains. Only they hurt different this time. Growing pains when you get older don't cause your muscles to cramp or girlie bits to ache, now they hurt deep on the inside.

I've decided growing pains when you are older, though a sign you are finding your way in life, often hurt a hell of a lot worse than when I was a teenager. Growing pains now mean feeling loss, grief, anger and lonely or incredibly scared, as you let go of who you were - to fully become who YOU want to be. Taking risks and leaps of faith. Closing chapters on periods of our lives because they are without a doubt over and it is time to move on. Time to grow. Our hearts grow heavy, our shoulders burdened and our eyes downcast. Maybe we are embarrassed to be changing. Maybe just exhausted. Growing spiritually and soulfully, at first, hurts worse than any leg cramp we got when we grew another inch as a child.

When we were children, our growing pains were acceptable because we could see tangible results. We started being able to reach the top shelf. We suddenly looked down on our parents. Our clothes seemed to have shrunk overnight. We didn't have to DO anything to morph into adulthood, our bodies did it automatically.

No one ever tells you though in order for you to actually grow into who you are meant to be - your soul must grow, too. No one warns you that growing pains happen in your twenties, thirties, forties, fifties and beyond. 

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No one ever tells you that growing pains never stop.

We didn't have a choice when we were younger, betrayed by our bodies and natural progression. As adults, we do. We choose to change, to adapt. To use the lessons we have learned and chart a course to where we want to be, who we want to be. Some decide it is too hard though, facing the growing pains and figuring out what they need to do. So, they simply stop growing. They hit a spot that is comfortable and call it good. But eventually - everything changes. Life happens and if you aren't prepared to change with it, the growing pains could drive you to your knees.

I've been looking back over the course of my life to date and can see the times that I was growing and the times I allowed myself to become stagnate. Mired. I needed to see where I was both in the physical sense and the mental at those times. I had a personal epiphany. I usually let things progress way too far before taking action. Before accepting the growing pains needed, to become who I wanted. However, I also noticed, regardless of how much I fought them, eventually they always came to bear. How I handled them determined who I grew into in each instance.

Growing pains know no age limit. You feel them at sixty, you feel them at eighty. We may stop getting taller (though other parts seem to spread out) but we never stop changing or growing. Adapting. Sometimes, these changes hurt to our very core. We have to let go of things or people we desperately want to hold onto. We have to lose everything so we can make room for the new. Situations end and we must change ourselves and our thinking in order to make it through to the other side. We must confront our fear. We must understand that we do not in fact have all the answers.

The key is to remember the lesson we learned as children - The pain of growing does not last forever. It will fade which new milestone and accomplishment. But, we must never stop becoming, evolving. The end result is worth it and after a while the memories of the pain will fade and we will be left standing there, more whole than ever before. Confident and strong. Capable. Knowing without a doubt that we chose to make this happen and while it hurt like a hell for a while, not growing, not changing – would have hurt worse.

Growing pains and life lessons.

Becoming exactly who you want. Becoming comfortable in your own skin. The growing pains will hurt you in ways you probably never imagined as you take the step to get there but the reward for doing so -is astonishing. Your reward will be your happiness; your heart, soul and a life you chose to grow into. A life YOU made happen.


We had no control over our height but we sure as hell have control over who we become and the life we shall live.

                                                                                           ~

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Perfect for the Holidays...
WallArt by
 J.V. Manning
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