quiet strength
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The Bloodbath of Healing
People don’t understand that healing isn’t a glow-up. It’s a bloodbath. It’s standing in the wreckage of everything you tolerated and realizing the monster wasn’t just him – it was the version of you that stayed. The one who kept… Continue reading
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The Ones Who Stayed When No One Else Did
A haunting reflection on the kind of darkness that doesn’t visit – it becomes you. This piece explores the truth that sometimes our demons aren’t intruders at all, but the guardians that kept us alive when no one else did. Continue reading
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Holding It All Together Nearly Broke Me
I didn’t notice the burnout at first. I just thought I was tired. Of course I was tired. But then the tired didn’t go away. It didn’t matter how much I slept – or didn’t. I’d wake up with heaviness… Continue reading
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I Built the Life. Then My Body Broke Down.
For years, I didn’t stop. Work all day, come home and mother, then study deep into the night. Some nights I was up until two, sometimes three in the morning, chasing a degree that felt like survival, not ambition. People… Continue reading
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For Me. For Him. For Us.
I used to think healing meant finding the right words to make people understand. To explain why I stayed so long. Why I kept hoping. Why I kept trying to make it work when it was already broken. I wanted… Continue reading
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Where the Shaking Comes From
I used to spiral when it happened. The tight chest. The sudden urge to flee a room that felt perfectly safe a second ago. I’d call myself dramatic. Weak. I’d ask what was wrong with me, why I couldn’t just… Continue reading
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Why I Always Kept One Foot Out the Door
He asked why I always seemed half-in. Why I’d smile with my whole face but hold something back with my body. Why I wouldn’t let him pick me up from the airport or leave a toothbrush at his place. He… Continue reading
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What My Chest Has Been Trying to Say
There’s a pressure in my chest I can’t always name. It comes quietly, without cause, and settles in deep. It’s not sharp like panic or loud like heartbreak. It’s steady. Ancient. Like something that has been waiting a long time… Continue reading
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Every Yes Costs Me Something
What they don’t see is the hesitation sitting in my chest before I even open the message. The way my heart races while my fingers hover over the keyboard. The way I read the same invitation three times, weighing every… Continue reading
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The Ache Beneath the Armor
It’s hard to ask for help when your trauma taught you that needing anything makes you a burden. So I don’t. I keep it in. I figure it out. I carry what’s too heavy because somewhere along the way, I… Continue reading
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He Measured Me Like a Threat
He used to stand in the doorway like a gatekeeper, arms crossed, eyes moving over me not with admiration, but with possession. There was something cold in the way he looked at me – like he was searching for something… Continue reading
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Slowness Is How I Know I’m Safe
I don’t play hard to get. That’s never been my game. I don’t need to be chased or proven right. I just move slowly where I’ve learned to be cautious. When you’ve handed your heart to people who held it… Continue reading
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Too Much for the Wrong Hands
He kept calling me complicated, like it was a flaw I hadn’t yet apologized for. He said it in that tone people use when they’re tired but won’t admit they’re out of depth. The thing is, I’ve been called complicated… Continue reading
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The Vows We Don’t Talk About
No one really talks about what happens after the vows. After the dress is packed away, the champagne glasses are cleared, the photos are posted. We’re sold this picture – glowing rings, perfect captions, the dream of finally being chosen.… Continue reading
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The Softest Revenge Is Becoming Untouchable
He always made sure I knew I didn’t belong. Every dinner with his friends was a reminder. Every joke that landed at my family’s expense, every time he corrected how I spoke or looked at me sideways when I mentioned… Continue reading
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A Version of Me He’ll Never Touch Again
She used to cry in silence, then wipe her face before anyone saw. Now she doesn’t need to hide. The tears taught her things no comfort ever could. She learned how to grieve without breaking, how to burn without turning… Continue reading
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Mercy, Even When You Could Burn It All Down
I remember the rage. How it sat in the corners of the room after he mocked the way my father spoke. How it built in my chest every time he introduced me to his colleagues with that tone that made… Continue reading
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When the Goalpost Keeps Moving
I didn’t recognize it as abuse at first. There were no bruises, no screaming matches, nothing you could point to and say, this is what’s wrong. What there was, instead, was me – exhausted, constantly second-guessing myself, walking on eggshells… Continue reading
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No One Told Me I Could Let Go
It took me years to realize the weight I carried didn’t belong to me. I was just a child trying to hold the cracks together with silence and obedience, hoping love would come if I could make everything feel okay.… Continue reading
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Twelve Years of Disappearing
I thought marriage meant partnership. I believed it was where two people showed up, equally, choosing each other through the hard things. I didn’t know mine would feel more like a stage play I never auditioned for. For twelve years,… Continue reading
Light Calls To Light 