Dear [Redacted]:
You are ten years old. Growing up is so, so scary, and nobody seems to understand; they all joke about it! You don't feel right, like something is fundamentally broken inside of you. Nothing is broken inside of us, there's just a whole host of things we haven't figured out yet. That's okay, I promise.
Thank you for doing your best with the little you had, and for keeping us alive. I'm glad to be alive now. Some of your worst fears have come true, and so have some of your biggest dreams. And we keep going; I'm so glad you were there. We're stubborn to a fault, but our therapist says it means we're great at getting things done.
You've become somebody that people rely on, and somebody who can rely on others. We sleep fine now, in the coziest bed we've ever had with a girlfriend(!) curled up with us. We still love Pokemon, and our brother has grown up so much, you'd be so proud of him. You are so proud of him.
Your childhood does not magically shatter once you hit age 13, or 15, or 16, or even 18 or 20. It's still there. You're still there. You'd love the way we dress now, and the things we've made and the people we've met. We never became evil or nasty, and we still love our family.
Being a kid is so hard. I know you're growing up, and so are all your friends. But you won't grow up into a woman, I promise. And growing up doesn't happen overnight. We're always growing up. I promise the perils of childhood get resolved, I promise things are better once you're an adult. I know that's hard to believe. Things are still so hard, but there's so much more we can do.
Thank you for being so strong, and so independent, and so smart. I wish you didn't have to be. I wish you could have properly enjoyed being a kid for a while longer. I'm going to do what I can to make sure the you that's still there, the you that always is carried with me, is happy. It's the least I can do, for all you worried about how we'd turn out. We're turning out just fine, [Redacted]. I love you.
Love, Jay
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