I Lost Myself (and Had to Find Her Again)

Spring Equinox. That magical moment of balance, equal day, equal night, when the world gently nudges us towards renewal. New beginnings. Fresh starts. The promise that something better might just be around the corner.

But how, exactly, are you supposed to embrace renewal when your insides feel like a hormonal spaghetti junction?

It got me thinking about a time just after I turned 40, seventeen years ago now, when I found myself standing in the middle of my own life, quietly wondering, Who am I, exactly?

My three children were growing up, needing me less in the way they once had. School runs were still happening, of course, but the intensity of being everything to everyone was beginning to shift. And instead of feeling liberated, I felt… untethered.

Being ‘mum’ had been my role, my rhythm, my identity. Without it taking centre stage, I didn’t quite know who I was anymore.

I wanted more. I just didn’t know what ‘more’ looked like.

And confidence? That was in short supply. I could organise a household, juggle schedules, and get three children out the door on time, but beyond that, I felt completely adrift. The lights were on, but nobody, or at least not me, seemed to be home.

Of course, hindsight is a wonderful (and slightly smug) thing. Looking back now, I can see it clearly: I was perimenopausal. The anxiety, the low mood, the creeping loss of self, all the classic symptoms, quietly reshaping how I felt about the world and my place in it.

But at the time, I just thought I was… failing at being me.

And then, quite unceremoniously, renewal arrived. Not in a grand, cinematic moment, but in the form of a leaflet pushed through the letterbox.

Short courses at the local university.

Now, I’d never been to university. The idea alone felt wildly out of my comfort zone, like turning up to a party where you’re convinced you’re underdressed (or in my case, overdressed) and slightly out of place. But something in me, a tiny flicker, said, Maybe this is it.

I spoke to my husband. Told him how I was feeling. That I needed something, something just for me. And before I could overthink it, I signed up for a Mixed Media course.

Reader, I loved it.

It wasn’t a particularly good course; in fact, the way it was structured was objectively rubbish. They threw away some of my work even though I had arranged an appointment to pick it up. The process and red tape involved in getting a pass to use the library took longer than the course itself (who came up with that chestnut?), but that almost didn’t matter. Because for the first time in a long time, I was doing something that had nothing to do with being needed by someone else.

And then came a moment I still think about.

I was making tea in the common room when a lecturer, chatting to a colleague, gestured towards me and said, “She’s sparky, this one.”

It was such a small comment. Casual, even. But in that moment, it landed like a tiny firework.

Me? Sparky?

It was as if someone had flicked a switch and reminded me that I existed, not just as a mum, not just as a caretaker of everyone else’s needs, but as a person with something to offer. Something… alive.

And… something shifted.

Trying something new. Stepping outside the familiar. Taking a small, slightly terrifying leap, it didn’t fix everything overnight, but it gave me something far more important: a sense of self-worth. A beginning.

A quiet kind of renewal.

Because maybe that’s what the Spring Equinox is really about. Not dramatic transformations or perfectly curated new lives, but small shifts. Tiny sparks. The courage to try something, even when you’re not sure who you are anymore.

If you’ve been feeling a little lost lately, maybe this is your sign to try something new, however small. What could your ‘sparky’ moment look like?

Additional reading about low self-esteem and menopause from Dr Louise Newson.

The image above is of a ceramic torso, one of the artworks I created on the course. The bubbled glazing effect was not expected, but I love the way it has separated (a very happy accident).