There’s nothing I can’t teach myself to do.
I’m literally staring at myself in the mirror as I realize that.
I used to build my confidence like this. I danced. I practiced in front of mirrors. I paid attention to every tiny detail of myself, how I moved, what looked right, what didn’t, what I could control. And then I became self-conscious and stopped performing.
But why did I stop dancing?
Why don’t I start practicing again? Why don’t I perform again?
It doesn’t have to be for anyone else.
It can be for my fucking self.
I’m in my basement. I have the space. My bathroom is basically a fucking dance floor. I have mirrors. I have everything I need.
And God, dancing is cathartic. It’s expressive. It’s storytelling in the same way music is.
Maybe that’s why I’m so drawn to classical scores. I can’t compose music. I can’t read it. But I can fucking feel it. And when it’s done right, I can see the movement that belongs with it. You don’t even need words. The music tells the story. The movement tells the story.
It can be devastating and still be fucking beautiful.
And maybe that’s my brain too.
Organized chaos.
There is beauty in the fucking madness of my brain if I can learn how to understand it instead of constantly fighting it.
Because I can figure shit out.
That’s what fucking Google is for. That’s what all of this is for. If I don’t know something, I can learn it. If I can’t do something, I can practice it.
The problem isn’t that I’m incapable.
I’m scared of failing.
And I’m staring directly at myself in the bathroom mirror having this conversation because I know that’s true.
I am the one holding myself back.
I made the decisions that allowed me to just exist. I’m not putting that blame on anyone else. It’s me.
And maybe that’s another reason I need the mirrors again.
I used to sit in front of a mirror and have entire conversations with myself. I’d work through my emotions, every possible scenario, every possible reaction. Maybe that’s weird. And no, I definitely wasn’t mentally “in check” back then.
But maybe there’s something useful in it now.
Because I can look myself directly in the fucking eyes and call myself out.
I don’t cheat.
But I will absolutely take every shortcut I’m allowed to take.
There’s a big fucking difference.
If there is something I want to know, I’ll figure it out. If there’s something I want to learn, I’ll teach myself. If there’s something I want to become, I’ll practice until I become it.
I just have to stop doing it for everyone else.
Do it for me.
Because if I actually tried, really fucking tried, and stopped being so terrified of failing?
Oh my God.
I’d be unstoppable.
-
-
I’m not an expensive woman to love. But I am an intentional one.
I don’t need extravagant dates, expensive gifts, or someone constantly trying to impress me. I would take a handwritten note over something bought without thought. Send me a song because one line made you think of me, and I’ll probably listen to it a hundred times trying to figure out which one. Tell me something small that you noticed about me, and I will remember it years later. Take me somewhere beautiful, sit next to me, and just exist there with me.
I value experiences. I want to do ridiculous things, try things that scare me, laugh until my stomach hurts, explore somewhere we’ve never been, and occasionally do something that makes us question our decision making skills. But I also want the ordinary. Grocery shopping. Cooking dinner. Sitting outside doing absolutely nothing. I want a relationship where life itself is the experience, not something we constantly need to escape from.
I pay attention to the little things. Probably more than I should. I remember what people say, what they like, what they hate, the stories they told me once six months ago. When I care about someone, I want to know them. Not the version they present to everyone else. I want to know what makes them light up, what scares them, what they secretly want out of life, and all the weird little things that make them them.
And I want someone who wants to know me that way too.
I love deeply, but I’m learning that loving deeply does not mean loving without boundaries. I spent a long time believing that if you love someone enough, you stay, you fight, you fix, you forgive, you carry more when they can’t. There are beautiful parts of that in me that I never want to lose. But I’m learning that love isn’t supposed to require losing yourself to prove that it’s real.
So I don’t want someone to save me. And I don’t want to be someone’s savior.
I want a partner.
Someone who communicates even when the conversation is uncomfortable. Someone whose words and actions match. Someone who can be accountable without feeling attacked and who can hold me accountable without trying to hurt me. Someone independent enough to have his own life but intentional enough to keep choosing to build one with me.
I want trust. Consistency. Effort. Curiosity. Loyalty. Affection. Friendship. Chemistry. And laughter. A lot of fucking laughter.
I want someone who challenges me without trying to control me. Someone who lets me challenge him without believing it means I don’t believe in him. I want two people who can be strong separately and still have somewhere soft to land in each other.
Because underneath everything, I think that is what I’ve always wanted.
To be known.
Not managed. Not tolerated. Not needed because of what I can do for someone.
Known.
I want someone to notice the tiny things. To learn me because he genuinely finds me interesting. To know when something is wrong because I got quieter than usual. To understand that the smallest gesture will mean more to me than anything money could buy.
And I want to give someone that same kind of attention.
I’m still figuring myself out. I’m still learning boundaries, independence, trust, and what healthy love actually looks like. I’m not looking for someone to complete that process for me. That part belongs to me.
But if you’re going to seek my heart, come with intention. You don’t have to arrive with flowers. You don’t have to take me somewhere expensive. You don’t have to have all the right words.
Just mean the ones you say.
And if you happen to pick me a flower from the side of the road because it made you think of me?Yeah. I’m keeping that fucking flower.
-
I finally fucking booked it.
Sunday, I’m going skydiving. By myself. And I am unbelievably excited.
I need to continue with my list of everything I’ve ever wanted to do but haven’t, whether I was scared, kept putting it off, or someone else didn’t want to do it with me.
Fuck that. I’m done waiting.
I have this completely different outlook on my life right now, and I don’t want to waste it. I can’t become the best version of myself if I keep hiding from myself.
I wrote before that I need to sit next to the woman I have spent so much of my life begging other people to love. But first, I need to make sure I fucking love her.
That means sitting with my stubbornness, my darkness, and the parts of myself I know need growth. I’m self-aware enough to see my own patterns, but I don’t want to use that awareness to beat myself up anymore.
I want to use it to grow.
I want to spend time with myself. Figure out what I like when nobody else’s opinion is involved. Go places alone. Try things alone. Be scared alone. Be excited alone. Laugh my ass off alone. And learn that being by myself doesn’t automatically mean I’m missing something.
Because people aren’t going to enjoy being around me if I don’t even enjoy being around myself.
So Sunday, I’m taking myself skydiving.
17,000 fucking feet.
And I cannot wait to meet the version of me who lands. -
I absolutely cannot wait to go skydiving.
But I have to go skydiving by myself first.
I really am enjoying experiencing firsts and having fun doing them. But I also know that if I don’t continue doing things on my own, I’m going to start attributing the confidence I’m building in myself to him. Like I can only be this version of myself because he’s here.
And that’s not healthy.
Everyone has their addiction. Their drug of choice. Mine is love.
That’s such a weird thing to admit, but it is. I want to be loved more than almost anything in the fucking world, and I don’t think I have a healthy understanding of what love is supposed to look like.
That’s probably one of the most important things for me to figure out right now. What does healthy actually look like?
Healthy in myself. Healthy in friendships. Healthy at work. Healthy in relationships.
Because I don’t set boundaries.
Or maybe I do at first, but then I just keep moving the fucking line. A little here. A little there. I make an exception. Then another one. Then another one. Until eventually I look around and realize there isn’t a boundary anymore.
I’m incredibly disciplined in some areas of my life, and then I’m so fucking weak in others.
And I’m not saying that to beat myself up. I’m saying it because if I don’t face these things, talk about them, write them down, and recognize them, then how the fuck am I ever supposed to change them?
How am I ever supposed to improve how I see myself?
Because it genuinely makes no sense how much I hate myself.
It doesn’t.
I couldn’t even tell you exactly why.
And maybe that’s something I need to start changing too. Even just the language. Maybe I stop constantly saying I hate myself. Maybe changing the mindset really is that fucking small at first.
I need to write the three fucking affirmations on the board.
Three.
Something that simple, and I struggle to come up with three things to say about myself.
And immediately my brain goes, That’s stupid. That’s pathetic.
But girl, what the fuck?
That’s not me.
I became that fucking frog that sat in the water while it slowly started boiling and never jumped out.
Well, I finally fucking jumped.
And now I have this completely different look at my life, and I don’t want to waste it.
That doesn’t mean I’m going to rush into something. It doesn’t mean I need another person to give all of this meaning.
But I am going to start saying yes to the things I actually want to do, no matter what it is. If I enjoy it, I’m doing it.
I want to take chances.
I want to do stupid shit.
I want to go skydiving.
I want to have experiences that are mine.
Because I didn’t live for a long time. I sat there. I did nothing. I isolated myself from everyone except one person, and that is so fucking unhealthy.
We both did shit.
Actually, stop.
This isn’t about him.
It’s not about what he did. It’s not about anyone else.
It’s about me.
And I think for once, it needs to be. -
I got out. I chose me.
I’m not going to let anyone make me feel small anymore. I’m not going to be afraid to say the wrong thing. I’m going to make mistakes, and I’m learning that mistakes aren’t a bad thing. They’re an opportunity to learn. To grow. To do something differently next time.
Somewhere along the way, I stopped truly being me. No one made me do anything. Honestly, it was easier. And eventually I realized I was taking the easy way.
I’ve always been stubborn. I’ve always been the person who will not take responsibility for something I didn’t do. So when did I start doing exactly that? Yes, I’ve always been hard on myself, but when did I start blaming myself for things I had no fault in? Things I wasn’t responsible for?
How many times did I cry to Alex about something that happened and immediately follow it with, “But I did this,” or “But I did that”? Somehow always finding a way to make part of it my fault.
Eventually I started wondering if maybe I wasn’t the good person I always thought I was.
But I am. I know that I am.
That doesn’t mean I’m perfect. It doesn’t mean I’m always right. It means I can fuck up, learn from it and keep going without making myself smaller because of it.
His trauma created trauma. Hurt people hurt people. I don’t blame anyone for the things that happened to them or the ways they learned to survive.
But I’m no longer going to allow someone else’s hurt to become mine. That’s what I mean when I say I got out.
I chose me. -
Alex kept telling me, “Stop replying.” And I kept replying. If you tell me I did something I didn’t do, I’m going to defend myself. If you tell me I’m lying when I know I’m telling the truth, I’m going to explain it seventeen different fucking ways because some part of my brain still thinks if I explain it correctly enough, you’ll finally understand me.
I tried so hard to be honest and transparent. I told him I went on a date. I told him we kissed. I told him how I knew him, when we started talking, all of it. I answered questions I didn’t even owe answers to because I don’t want to be someone who hides shit. But none of my answers mattered. Going on one date meant I “jumped into something.” Knowing someone fifteen years ago meant apparently he’d been “waiting in the shadows.” Apparently I’d wanted someone else for years. Apparently I wanted our relationship to end so I could do this. “Be honest.” I fucking was.
And somehow me going on a date after our relationship ended became evidence that everything before it was a lie. That I didn’t want his attention. That I wanted someone “better.” That I gave up first. That I was somehow just as bad as him. No. I can acknowledge where I failed in our relationship. I know I wasn’t perfect. I know I withdrew and stopped being myself. But taking accountability for my shit does not mean accepting responsibility for shit I didn’t do.
I waited eight and a half years to be his wife. I waited for the kids we talked about. I begged for his attention. I stayed through things that hurt me because I loved him. I loved him more than I loved myself for a very fucking long time. Then our relationship ended.Going on a date, enjoying myself, feeling chemistry and kissing someone does not rewrite those eight and a half years. I can have loved him with everything I had and still enjoy someone else’s company now. I can be hurt by the end of our relationship and still laugh with someone new. Those things can exist at the same time.
What got me was how many times I said, “I’m at work. I’m done having this conversation. Please stop blowing up my phone.” And it just kept going. “Admit it.” “Be honest.” “Exactly.” At some point I realized he wasn’t asking questions because he wanted the answers. He was asking until I gave him the answer he had already decided was true.
And I kept falling for it. That’s the part I need to work on. Not learning how to explain myself better, but learning when to stop explaining myself. Tell me I’m dishonest and I’ll prove I’m honest. Tell me I’m hiding something and I’ll give you every fucking detail. Tell me something happened differently than I remember it and I’ll start building a goddamn timeline.
I don’t want to do that anymore. He is allowed to be hurt. He’s allowed to be jealous. He’s allowed to fucking hate that I kissed somebody else. I understand why it hurts. But his hurt doesn’t get to rewrite my history.
Transparency means I’ll tell you the truth. It doesn’t mean I have to keep proving it when you’ve already decided not to believe me. -
He said to me, “You literally have zero faith in me. It’s been like that our whole relationship.”
So I asked him, “If it was like that our whole relationship, then why did you stay with me?”
His response was, “Love.”
Part of this self-discovery and figuring out who I am on my own is also realizing and knowing that I was part of the problem. And I don’t want to be a person who ever comes across like I don’t believe in someone, because wholeheartedly, that’s the complete opposite of what I believe myself to be.
But that doesn’t mean how I come across or how I treat other people is always how I intended it to be.
Just because my intentions were pure doesn’t mean I was doing it right.
And now I have to navigate that and figure out what I was doing, what I was saying, or how I was acting that made someone feel like I didn’t have faith in them. Because that’s not something I ever want someone I care about to feel from me.
And I know this isn’t only something that exists in my relationships. It’s part of the reason I’m terrified to ever have people report directly to me at work. Because I know I micromanage. I know I unconsciously hold people to the same standard that I hold myself to, and that’s unrealistic.
I don’t want to do that. The problem is, I don’t know how to stop.
I don’t know what I’m doing in those moments that makes helping turn into micromanaging, or believing in someone somehow come across like I don’t trust them to do something themselves.
And that’s what I need to figure out.
Not so I can beat the shit out of myself for another thing I did wrong. Not so I can decide that everything was my fault. But because if there are things about myself that are hurting people or making them feel something that is the complete opposite of what I actually feel for them, I want to know.
It’s uncomfortable as fuck to realize that the person I believe myself to be might not always be the person someone else experiences.
I know my intentions. Other people only get to experience my actions. And apparently there are places where those two things aren’t matching.
That’s part of figuring out who I am on my own too. -
Doctor’s appointment today. Nothing major. Just a quick mole removal.
Except, of course, it has to be biopsied because it didn’t look good.
And I’m trying really hard to be optimistic in this new version of me. Realistically, it’s probably fine. I know that. But holy fuck, sitting in that chair was scary.
The weird part is that I genuinely love the science behind all of it. She numbed the area, I couldn’t feel a thing, and then she just cut it off, dropped it into this tiny specimen container to be sent away for testing, and cauterized where it had been. I could hear my skin burning. She even warned me that I might smell burning flesh, which thankfully, since COVID fucked with my sense of smell, I didn’t.
Scientifically? Fascinating.
Being the person whose skin is going into the little biopsy container? Completely different experience.
I’m sitting there sweating because cancer runs on both sides of my family, and my brain immediately starts pulling up everything I have ever learned about suspicious moles.
ABCDE.
Asymmetrical? Yep.
Border? Yep.
Different colors? Yep.
Diameter changed? Yep.
Evolving? Well, it changed and became elevated enough that now we’re cutting the fucking thing off.
So naturally every alarm in my head is going off at once.
And I know how this sounds. Why not throw myself a little pity party and add one more thing to the giant pile of shit already happening? But that’s not really what this is. It’s just how my brain works. I remember things. I connect dots. I know enough to know what they’re looking for, which means I also know enough to scare the absolute shit out of myself while I wait.
But I’m trying to do this differently.
I don’t know what the biopsy is going to say yet. I can spiral every possibility between now and then and it still won’t change the answer.
So I’ll do what I always do. Push the fear down enough to keep moving. And wait. -
You keep saying you want to find yourself again, but I don’t think you’re actually missing.
I think you’re waiting for yourself.
And if I’m actually being honest with you, you aren’t going to wake up one morning suddenly loving yourself. You’re not going to have some huge breakthrough where everything clicks and suddenly you’re motivated, confident, taking care of yourself and excited about your life again.
You’re going to have to build her back in really fucking boring ways.
Get out of bed when you don’t want to. Take a shower. Brush your teeth. Drink some water. Eat something that actually makes your body feel good. Put on clothes you feel good in even if nobody is going to see you. Do your hair because you like your hair that way. Go outside. Move your body. Clean one thing instead of staring at the entire mess and deciding it’s too much.
Stop waiting until you feel better to start taking care of yourself. Taking care of yourself is part of how you’re going to feel better.
And stop making every little failure evidence that you haven’t changed.
If you spend an entire day doing nothing, okay. Tomorrow you try again. If all you have is 10%, give the fucking 10%. You already know that.
You don’t need to reinvent your entire life right now. You need to start keeping tiny promises to yourself.
That’s it.
Because you’ve spent a lot of your life being incredibly good at showing up for other people. You’ll inconvenience yourself. Lose sleep. Rearrange your day. Remember the tiny details. Make sure everyone is okay. You’ll defend the people you love even when you’re pissed at them.
So start putting yourself on that list.
Not at the top every second. That’s not realistic. Just on the fucking list.
Talk to yourself like you’re someone you actually like. Celebrate the stupid little wins. Be proud when you do something today that you couldn’t make yourself do yesterday. Stop moving the goalpost every time you accomplish something just so you can tell yourself it wasn’t enough.
And for fuck’s sake, stop requiring perfection before you’re allowed to be proud of yourself.
You don’t need someone else to notice you’re doing better before it counts.
You noticed.
You got up.
You did the thing.
You tried.
You kept a promise to yourself.
You made one decision that the version of you six months from now will be grateful for.
Count it.
I want to become my biggest fan, but that means I actually have to start rooting for myself while I’m still losing sometimes.
Anybody can love the finished product. I need to learn how to love the girl doing the work.
So tomorrow, don’t worry about becoming her. Just do one thing she’d be proud of. Then do it again the next day.
That’s how I’m going to find her.Not all at once. Little by little. Until one day I realize I wasn’t trying to find myself anymore.
I was building someone I could finally fucking count on.
Me. -
When I worked there, I think I was the most me I have ever been.
People knew the tiny, intricate, completely random details that made me who I was. They knew I don’t turn left. They knew I hated pickles. They knew I was the OCD freak with multiple calendars who would sit at the bar studying and still work my ass off. They knew I organized everything. They knew I could be loud, ridiculous, and completely comfortable being the center of attention.
They also knew not to fuck with me.
For the longest time, nobody even believed I had feelings. I was cold. I had this hard exterior, and I liked it that way. But somehow, those people still knew me underneath it. They knew all of those weird little pieces of me without me having to explain who I was.
And I don’t think I’ve realized until now how much I miss that.
Now I find myself telling people stories about who I used to be instead of actually being her. Nobody here really sees me. Not because they’re incapable of it, but because I don’t let them. I don’t trust anyone enough to.
That’s a crazy realization to have when I genuinely love my job and love where I work. I trust the people I work with to do their jobs. I just don’t trust people with me.
I don’t want to go backwards. I don’t want my old life back. I just want to find that version of myself again. I want to let her out. I shouldn’t have to keep hiding pieces of myself or slowly giving them up because they’re inconvenient for someone else.
And that’s where the harder realization comes in.
Nobody made me give those pieces up. Little by little, I did it myself. Maybe someone asked. Maybe something about me bothered them. Maybe changing myself made something easier or kept the peace. But I still made the choice.
Everything was my choice.
That’s part of the problem. Maybe one of the biggest parts.
I became so good at adjusting myself to make life easier for other people that eventually I stopped noticing how much of myself I was putting away.
And now I don’t want to go back and find her.
I want to figure out how to be her again.
