2019 started like any other year, filled with hope, happiness, and exciting plans to put into action. The only difference to the start of my 2019 ways that I rang it in by jumping on a hotel bed in Nepal with one of my best friends. I said exactly what most of us declare for the New Year, “This is going to be my year.” Flash forward to December of 2019, and as I reflect on this year, I could easily say that 2019 beat me down and dragged me down the curb a few times over, but the honest truth is, 2019 was a year that I needed to experience and the reminder that life is precious, make the most of it.

When I reflect on this year and think of the best words to use to describe it, the only two that come to mind are growth and transformation, and to be honest, growth and transformation are rarely a pretty process. They are both pretty ugly, and none of us want to experience them, but life makes sure that we do when we need it the most.

Almost two weeks after saying that 2019 was mine for the taking, I got bit by a street dog in Colombia, which at first was just a few puncture wounds, no big deal. Or so I thought. Quickly it escalated to cellulitis of the hand. Next thing that I know, I’m in the E.R. in Cartagena being told that what they said was the rabies injection that I thought they had given to me the day of the bite, was actually a tetanus shot. There I sat, in an E.R. in Colombia, being told that I need to get a double dose of the rabies vaccine ASAP. Also that if the antibiotics that they prescribed to me didn’t get rid of the infection in my arm, then there was literally nothing that anyone could do. I felt defeated, but the show must go on, so I continued on my merry way while taking antibiotics both orally and injected and prayed that I didn’t have rabies. Thankfully, I did not contract rabies. Otherwise, I wouldn’t be writing this right now because I would be dead.

Colombia thankfully was only a small scare, but looking back on it now, it was just a precursor to what would be the rest of my year. Two weeks after my Colombian street dog adventure, I was back in the U.S. visiting my family and friends and taking a course to become a certified medical interpreter. Since I was in town, I made plans with my stepdad to go out to eat with him and his mom (my grandmother) and catch up. The day we were supposed to meet up, a polar vortex hit our city, and there was no way in the world that he or I were going to leave our houses because we both despise cold weather. We canceled our original plans and decided I would visit him at his home two days later.

When I went to his house, we talked for a few hours about everything that had happened since the last time we saw each other. I told him about my motorcycle accident on my 30th birthday in Colombia, having raging food poisoning on the streets of India, and my most recent adventure, my brush in with a Colombian street dog. In typical dad fashion, he shook his head in disbelief and dismay. He told me to start being more careful and to quit going on these crazy trips because something always happens to me. (There is nothing but the truth in what he said.)

After hearing my crazy stories, he asked me when would I move back home because he missed me, and he wanted me back home. He said he thought the best thing for me was to go home for a while and be with my family and spend time with everyone. I told him that I was going to try to get my interpreter certification so I could come back home and work as an interpreter for a bit and then head back to Panamá, and if everything went according to plan, I would move back around March. I told him that when I moved back, we would start going on walks together and hanging out to make up for the missed time. When we got around to saying our goodbyes, I promised him that I would be back sooner than he knew. He told me to give him a hug, and as I did, he squeezed me extremely tight like he always did, and then told me that he loved me. He started crying, and I said, “I love you too, dad. Why are you crying?” He said, “I just love you so much. I love you so much.” He gave me a kiss on the forehead and another tight hug, and I was on my way. Little did I know, I would never be able to take another walk with him or visit with him again. My dad died a day and a half later of a heart attack in his sleep. I was the last person to see him alive and to talk to him.

My dad’s death triggered a downward spiral in my life. I had forgotten what it felt like to lose someone that you love and how your heart feels like it is shattering into a million pieces when you hear that someone who you love is no longer here. I am not a stranger to loss or grief. When I was in high school, I lost two grandparents and my father the morning after my high school graduation. Loss and grief and I had already met face to face when I was younger, but now what I was 30 and hadn’t felt that pain in my many years, I had forgotten how absolutely horrible it is.

My dad (stepdad) was in my life since I was four years old, and he was what I believed to be the best dad. The day that he married my mom, he got down on one knee with two rings in his hand and asked my sister and me if we would be his family. From that day forward, we were his daughters. I never questioned if my stepdad loved us because he demonstrated it to us daily. His actions spoke louder than words, and where I felt a lack of love from my biological father, my stepdad would try to make up for it by always telling me how proud he was of me and how much he loved me. I always knew that I could count on him for anything I needed, and he would always be there for me. He helped get me through some of the toughest moments in my life when my grandfather and my father passed away. He pushed me to move forward, and he was always one of my biggest fans. When he passed away this year, my world felt like it fell apart. I lost someone who loved me no matter what, who always had my back even when I messed up and who would remind me of how great I could be even when I couldn’t see it. My soul felt crushed after I found out that he had passed away.

He passed away February 2nd, and the months following his passing were filled with numbness, sadness, and pain. I couldn’t understand why my stepdad passed away right before I was planning to move back home. We had made plans to hang out together and see each other, and now it was all gone. I didn’t know why it happened, and I knew I was never going to get the answer. Someone who I loved dearly was taken away from me without any warning. I was mad at the world.

After I moved back home in March, I went through months of not understanding, being depressed, and just feeling as if I was never going to get back to feeling like “myself” again. It wasn’t until July, the month of both of our birthdays, that I started to feel true happiness again. I was traveling around my state and other cities nearby, spending time in nature and taking photographs of butterflies and flowers. As I started to feel better and think about what it is I want out of life, I realized that I wanted to finally do something that I had been talking about for years. I wanted to start a blog and discuss travel and tell all of my crazy stories to the world. I kept going back and forth on if I should or if I shouldn’t, and if I started it, what should I name it? From a little help from my friend’s mother and a sign from my stepdad (a butterfly), I came up with the name Janel Has Wings, and then I got online and researched how to start a blog. The rest is history.

I am not the same person that I was starting in 2019, and I know that I will never be. I moved back home, which was something that I never truly wanted to do, I lost my stepdad, two grandparents, and a friend, and I was working a job that I didn’t enjoy which is something that I said I would never do again. All of this combined reminded me that life is fleeting, and we should make the most of it while we can. Life will never be perfect, and there will be problems and loss, but there will also be those really incredible moments that make it worth it. If anything I’ve learned in 2019, it is to allow myself to feel “negative” emotions but never give up. It took feeling like I had lost it all to find myself again. I’m thankful for 2019 and the life lessons that accompanied it, no matter how hard they were. I know that walking into 2020, I am a totally different person than I was at the beginning of 2019, and I know that 2020 will push me to continue to grow and transform myself into the person I am meant to be.

P.S. Thanks, Dad, for the wings! 💖

“May the tears you have cried in 2019 water the seeds that you are planting for 2020.” -Steve Maraboli