The Last Love Note by Emma Grey

Time for real truth talk. I have anxiety. I have depression. I actually think I may have some form of ADHD. I haven’t had the depth of grief discussed in this book but it felt like it was talking right to me. I don’t think I’ve highlighted a book so much since my freshman year in collage. 😉

The last love note is a heartbreaking and beautiful book. While looking through the eye of Kate, who’s husband passes away at a scarily early age, she comes to realize that something has to change. Her life is enveloped by grief and just surviving. I can’t even tell you how many times I’ve just had to survive. Just do the bare minimum of what is needed to get to the next day. 

She comes to realize that the old turn of phrase “can’t see the forest for the trees” is all too true in her life. She has been so consumed by this grief that she hasn’t realized that those she loves most and closest to her have been trying to find their way through this event too. 

Kate like many of us feels like she’s a shell of who she started out to be. I felt heard and validated when she was just lost after having her baby. Her body and mind are all different. She struggled with PPD. So did I. It’s just all different. I realized and marveled that my body could creat a human but I also couldn’t wrap my brain around the changes that took so long but also happened in an instant. And the strange loneliness that you feel while you are NEVER alone with a newborn.

She is an aspireing author. And even with all the confidence in the world you are still scared to put your work and by extension yourself out here.

 “I clung to my day job, scared of really putting my work out there. Terrified of rejection. I even struggled to show Cam [her husband] my work.” 

I don’t know how many times I have fet that. I worked because we needed it. I know I am an artist- I have the experience. I’ve put in the time and practice, I have a degree… it’s pretty much the subtitle to my name. “ Amanda Daley …. Artist.” But boy do I feel the imposter syndrome make it’s way into everything I do. I worked as a photographer and told myself that was enough - I was able to be creative that way. (Although I rarely got to do MY creative thing ) I came home exhausted and to burnt out to actually use my own creativity my way. But we needed that money to live. Then when it was still needed but not as much I kept is because it’s too scary to try to put in the work to do it yourself. 

My hand was forced not too long ago. Laid off and now needing to “do my own thing.” I had been full time working for the past 13yrs and full time working mom for the last 8. I had no idea what to do. I am still in the middle of this new life and honestly I don’t know who I am. I know I need my art to be me. It’s also terrifying to try and monetize my art. Who wants it? Where do I go from here?

Kate was just doing what she had to. She’d turn on the charm and charisma when she needed it for her fundraising job. Then leave her writing on the back burner. It wasn’t until she was forced to separate herself from her grief, the cage of remembering her husband that she was able to look at what she has NOW, what changed to be made and ultimately have the strength to jump into the abyss and take a chance on herself. 

I can’t even express how much that spoke to me. Constantly wondering “is my spark ever going to return?” “Do I just have to take that everything is fine when I am struggling so hard?” It’s not really up to anyone else. You have to make that choice for yourself. Kate had to have a few people point it out - that tough love talk but she made that choice. SHE made those changes. 

“The point is, it’s your life. Your decision. Your timing. You might resist it now, but you’ll know the moment when it comes, and not before. And then you’ll realize the bigger risk is not taking a risk.”

(Side note: I know I know this is a romance and that qoire is mostly talking about taking a risk on love etc but it also spoke to a lot of decisions a person has to make for themselves) 

I guess this is my jumbled up way of saying; this book is a swift kick in the pants to live your life. Be unapologetically you. Do the things that need to be done, take care of your family. But make those choices that keep you human. Keep you alive. Keep the spark that what makes you you. Even if it is tough- really tough. You are more resilient than you think