I got here on St. Patrick’s Day, with nothing left in me.
A ghost of who I was.
A shell of everything my life had become.
It’s been a few months now, and I sit here reflecting on Independence Day.
It’s hard, really hard, to recognize the time I’ve put in. The work I’ve done.
Unlearning old stories.
Letting go of my faults, my flaws, the versions of myself I clung to just to survive.
Growing slowly.
Nourishing intentionally.
Trying my best.
And for the most part, I am proud of my growth.
I look in the mirror and I truly see someone different looking back at me.
And I’m proud of him. He’s softer now. But stronger, too.
Still, there’s a piece of me missing.
A part of me carved out so cleanly I barely noticed until it was gone.
And I don’t have the tools to heal it right now.
I’ve tried. God knows I’ve tried.
Tried to fill it. Patch it. Distract it.
That’s how I ended up here.
So I sit with it.
I feel it.
I study its shape, its ache, its weight.
I’m learning to be comfortable in the pain of knowing it’s not coming back.
That it was real, and it was mine, and it’s over.
Eventually, I know, my skin will stretch.
The wound will close.
And what’s left behind will be a scar.
Not gone.
Not back to normal.
But a reminder.
Of the loss.
The grief.
The love that changed me, and the self I had to become after it left.
And that… I have to learn to live with.
To accept as fact.
To make space for in my new wholeness.
A wholeness I’m learning can’t be given to me by anyone else.
Because the person who used to occupy that space…
doesn’t want to fit there anymore.
And maybe that’s the most painful kind of freedom.
But maybe it’s also the most honest kind of beginning.