A letter from Sep 28th, 2021

Dear FutureMe, Happy 33rd Birthday!!!! I’m writing this on your 28th birthday. Lanre told me they call it a golden birthday when your age is the same as your birth date. You joked that it could only be golden if in a Kintsugi way. Today you had optholomology elective, (last sem of med school), you left a bit earlier to get to Warsaw. You will pick a friend up from the airport. Are they still your friend? You haven’t slept well in more than 3 days. Actually, you only slept twice, 20 minutes in one and 2.30 hours in another. This is not healthy…. I hope you don’t do that anymore. I hope you are taking good care of me<3 Tumblr was a part of your life for nearly a decade now. Unbelievable, right? Is it still significant to you in any way? I don’t know where you will be in life at this moment, but I know that you’d have tried your best to be in a place were you could be comfortable. And hopefully, thrive. I trust you, if you need encouragement just remember that this month in 2021 you felt and saw beauty the way you hadn’t in over 5 years. You were healing from a treatment resistant depression, right now I’m on Wellbutrin 300mg and Lamictal 200mg. I think this combination is good so far. It made me kinda impulsive? Very expressive, a bit zoned out; need less sleep and some other “side effects” but it really did help make me find joy and find beauty. It’s an essential part of life to me. Being able to enjoy the view out my dorm room window on the 8th floor. I find it magical, do you? These days I’m very aware of this wonderful gift God gave us. The beautiful sky, please dedicate at least a minute to look at the sky, regardless of the clouds , the vastness enough should give you some peace, some feeling that can’t be but good. I know I wrote a lot, but I remember you liked it when reading this kind of letters so I will keep going for a while. Bayan, don’t be hard on yourself ok? OK? Allah knows. The mightiest force in the universe knows you by name. You aren’t alone nor forsaken. Trust. And remember this dua khala gave you (send her something to make her happy by the way, she got your back for YEARS), the dua went; ياجابر كل كسير اجبر كسري, repeat it throughout your day. The last time I did this, a big hurdle was solved within hours . A huge one Bayan. One you thought was the “worst/the end”, So have faith he WILL mend your brokenness. Maybe you are doing very well these days, I would hope so. But even if so you cannot deny that you are forever in need of his help. I love you Your brother does too, you have love around you whether you admit it or not. Whether you felt it at this moment or not. And I’m sure you never forgot your mother’s words, the love of two will always be there with you, the love of god and her’s. Give her a gift, your grandma too. She loved you and your brother more than anyone in the entire world, she deserves something ❤️, maybe you’re already tired of reading all this, but I’m not tired of writing possibly because of Wellbutrin’s pseudohypomania (coined the term:p). But also, I feel that at this point in my life, I have some things to say. I did something recently and it made my day to day life easier, whenever I felt ashamed or anything unpleasant happens, I immediately ask myself one version of this same question; (is this moment going to affect the rest of my life?) /(will this matter for the rest of my life?) it is an extreme case of that 5 years version. But , you get the point x it’s funny because you are living in the five years from now! Does any particularly bad moment you had in autumn and winter of 2021 still affect you? Are you in a tidy room ? Do you have a scented candle around? Do you have a lot of books? Do you read a lot of books? The ones in your field count. Actually, I would applaud you for that. As you remember, depression and pain years weren’t good companions in med school so my learning was minimal to say the least. But we got to a better place, right? Hopefully significantly better. But in any and every possible case, You got this. I love you Yours faithfully, Younger Bayan (You’re still young though ily)