How My 2025 Goals Went and the Goals I’m Setting for 2026
This is my second annual goal review! Wow, it feels good to be back writing here! It’s been a minute. You’ll see why.
Here are my 2025 goals before two big life changes:
I will continue focusing on my health in hopes of a full recovery in 2025
I will write a new book
I will continue updating our home with Trace and record the process on our YouTube channel
I will write on my blog and send out my newsletter regularly. As of writing this, there are 1,150 readers
I will pitch bylines to leading publications like The Cut, Elle, etc.
I really thought I’d focus on my career again. But that did not happen. I did not write a new book. I did not publish a new byline. And I did not write here regularly or grow my newsletter (8 new articles this year, so that’s something). And I am laughing at myself that we were attempting YouTube to record our home renovations.
Instead, I almost died in April.
Instead, we sold our house.
Instead, I left social media.
Instead, I decided, despite that health challenge, to get pregnant this July.
Since then, I’ve been cocooned in a protective pregnancy vibe where I do not touch social media, and I have not written publicly. I published a pregnant picture of myself on my new Substack “About” page. But other than that, I feel strongly averse to publicly announcing. I suppose now that I’m writing about it I am announcing? But just to my readers. Just to you! Nothing on social media. Yuck. I will write more about that revelation soon.
If you’ve been following my writing, then you know I’ve had some health challenges since April 2022 (it was interesting timing with a breakup that happened then). My body simply broke down. And even though so much in my life has changed since then, I find my immune system in a vicious cycle that I’m still trying to break free from. I’m still trying to tell my body: it’s safe now.
In April, I found myself in urgent care in incredible pain in my upper back, neck, and chest. I told the doctor that I couldn’t deeply inhale and I was short of breath. I had a clear chest x-ray, so he sent me home—even though I would later find out I was hours away from dying! The drama!
Around 9 pm that night, I tried eating tomato soup to relax. I put on the show Friends. My husband was at a multi-day work conference in the city where he was staying at a hotel. I had been hoping to join him, but was too sick. I called my Mom and told her, “I want to go to the ER in the morning but let’s try to sleep for tonight.” I tried to lie down on my couch and found the pain so intense that I was unable to sleep. I was really struggling to inhale. I thought to myself, “My body isn’t letting me sleep. It isn’t safe for me to fall asleep.” I called my Mom back, crying, and told her that even though it was 11 pm and very inconvenient, I needed to go to the ER now. She met me there. My husband left his work event and met us there. In the ER, they found a large amount of fluid around my heart, a cardiac effusion. I had ignored the symptoms for so long (weeks and weeks) that it got to the point of tamponade, which is when your heart is struggling to beat because the fluid around it won’t allow it to move as well. They looked at a vein in my neck pulsing to confirm the tamponade. I was vomiting and unable to find a comfortable position to rest in. They admitted me into the ICU, and early the next morning, I had an emergency pericardiocentesis.
The experience was profound for me. I asked my Mom to bring me a notebook and pen while I was in the ICU, and I kept writing epiphanies. My husband never left my side. One night, he moved his chair next to my hospital bed, and we had one of those slumber party type conversations late into the night. I kept scribbling in my notebook as we talked. Revelation after revelation.
Recovery was challenging. I wasn’t allowed to go for a walk (which I was too stubborn to agree to!) only to find out that it sent me into a lot of chest pain to go for a walk. At one point, I thought I was having a heart attack and called my husband to come home. I was so scared I was about to die. But then May turned into June and June turned into July. I was able to do pilates and walk again. My cardiologist (I’m in my early 30s with a cardiologist now!!) told me I was cleared to get pregnant. I didn’t waste a single moment. We got pregnant on July 25th, 2025.
I don’t think anyone in my family saw it coming so fast after a medical emergency. And it hasn’t been without hiccups. I was hospitalized with repeat pericarditis in early November, which would have been avoidable except I truly thought the pain I was in was related to the pregnancy and not my heart.
This is considered a high-risk pregnancy, and yet me and Baby are doing so well. I can feel the baby move all the time now and it’s so special. I decided to get pregnant as an act of hope and forward motion. I was moving on, living my life on my own terms. I knew my soul couldn’t handle waiting any longer than I already had. I came here to be a mom. Everyone talks about their purpose. Being a mom is mine. I suppose I already am a mom to my dog, Remy, and cat, Hunter, but my soul ached for my life to move forward, to meet this baby, and to build our family. My husband is an angel who was truly ready whenever I was. I could not have married a more chill and loving man.
So, it’s December 2025. What is next? I find myself not wanting to set goals, perhaps because of how unpredictable this year has been. But when I think of my intentions for the next year, I’m excited to move into our new house this winter. Even more excited to meet our baby in April. And from there, I don’t know. I loosely know I want to write more here, and I have inklings of self-publishing a children’s book. I have a whole series mapped out and think about it all the time. More than anything, I am focusing on my health and recovery, on building a healthy and strong baby, and spending a lot of time with my loved ones, where I am fully present and enjoying myself and everyone around me.
I may not have accomplished some goals this year, but I don’t care. I am so proud of how I took care of myself this year and how I moved our family forward (into a new home and building a new life!). I also celebrate that 2025 has been my most 'present’ and slow year yet. It’s why I left social media. Maybe it was the near-death experience. Maybe it’s knowing I’m about to meet my baby and become a parent. But I just don’t have room on my plate for the noise of the internet. I don’t watch the news. I don’t scroll social media. I read real paper books and watch good shows and movies where I have the attention span to actually focus on them.
My loose 2026 goals are:
Enjoy making our new house a home
Cherish my pregnancy, birth experience, and caring for my baby
Revel in the three months that my husband and I are both home with the baby, relaxing together as a new family of three
Stay open-minded about how I spend my time as a new stay-at-home mom, while also nurturing my ambitions to share my writing more widely and perhaps even self-publish a children’s book. And maybe one day I’ll return to writing novels.
I do believe this health ‘detour’ is all part of the story that I’m weaving and will be able to tell all together one day. I can’t wait to share my healing story. It motivates the hell out of me and is already unraveling. Somehow, life, health, baby, and career are all melding together for me in the best way. It’s all connected.
I hope everyone has a happy holiday season. If you’re reflecting on 2025 or looking ahead to 2026, I’d love to hear what comes up for you. As always, you can reach me at kasia@kasiamanolas.com
