A Letter To The Wild Party Girl I Used To Be

To the girl blackout drunk in the bushes outside the frat house. The girl who proudly drinks shot after shot of apple skol vodka with no chaser necessary. The girl who laughs all day through the week to cover up her pain until she can drown it all in alcohol on Friday night. The girl who only feels beautiful when intoxicated men are fawning all over her. The girl who doesn’t know what having a true friend means beyond having someone to keep pouring booze down her throat.

Yeah, you.

What’s gotten into you? What’s going on? What happened to the real you? The one filled with hopes, dreams, and enough smiles to fill the whole world? Can you hear me? Are you in there or am I just talking to myself?

Hindsight twenty-twenty always sounded nice until I was looking back at myself silently screaming with tears in my eyes. Who knew hindsight could be as much hell as I used to be? I wish I could get through to me before I take another hit of that joint or shot of that booze. But who am I kidding? This is a losing game. You can’t help someone if they don’t want the help.

Oh the things I would do to give you that realization before you’re two years deep and swallowed up unable to utter a peep. But I can’t save you. You can only save you. I just wish I could have gotten through sometime before all this got the best of you. I wish I could have gotten to you first before everything took a turn for the worst. But the thing about the past is; while it does not dictate the future it also is not susceptible to be changed. I can wish all I want, but what’s done can’t be rearranged.

So why am I writing to you today? Good question. I don’t have many answers for you. I don’t have it all figured out. But what I do know, I know with my whole heart to be true. I write to you because now you are me. And while this life is a beautiful sight to see, the path we took to het here- the path that so many girls like you take to get here- and so many others don’t even make it to the here that is now. The path that you were on, that they’re on, doesn’t have to be the route to lead them to the moment they are finally set free.

There is a way out of the cage where you live. There is a way out of the stress and pain you’re feeling. And the answers aren’t found in the bottom of a plastic cup. You can do this, I know you can, because I’m sitting here writing to you from the other side.

That drunken stumbling girl you’re being, is not who you are, it’s not who you’re meant to be. There is so much more to life than partying. You are destined for so much greater than the tile of the “party girl.”

You are loved and cherished and beautiful and worthy. You are needed. This world needs the gifts that only you can bring. But you can’t bring those wonderful gifts if you’re living in a realm so far away from the life that is truly living.

I know it feels like this is the only answer. It feels like this is the way to make friends and fit in. But I promise you, there are friends who accept you for who you are sober and flawed just as you are waiting for you on the other side.

Now I’m not saying that every party girl is engaging in these behaviors as a means to mask the pain underneath the way you did for so long, but I do know there are lots of girls who are. What seems like a harmless phase can quickly become a destructive path of habitual behavior. And that is why I write to you, because I know first hand the destruction that can come from the party scene, and I also know first hand that the other side of it, is so much more fulfilling than those drunken memories ever will be.

I know it’s easy to lose sight of what you want in this life. But hold on. A single shred of hope is still a very powerful thing. Grasp that hope and never let it go. Don’t let the pain turn you into someone you never wanted to be.

You are loved. Not only when you’re drunk and stumbling with a fake smile plastered on your face, but through your pain and tears and bad days too.

I used to spend every weekend drinking myself to unconsciousness and every weekday high as a kite. I’ve been on that side. And it seemed like the best option at the time, even though I was completely miserable. And now, now I am on the other side. I don’t party. I have genuine friends, and long lasting memories. I feel whole again- slowly but surely. I am building back my self worth, and my self-love, and damn does it feel good.

To the party girl I used to be, what you can’t see, is what I see now. To the party girl I used to be, it’s time to set you free. To the party girl I used to be, I will always believe in you, for now you are me. And lovely girl, being me for the first time in quite possibly my entire life, is much more fulfilling than the bottom of that bottle will ever be.