Growing older didn’t answer every question. It simply taught me which ones deserved gentleness.
Like I’ve always said, I grew up as an emotional ball.
And a thinker.
My mind was always occupied by what ifs and every imaginable WH and H question.
Like…
What if I hadn’t said yes to him?
What if I hadn’t left?
What if he hadn’t hurt me?
What if we stayed?
Then came the questions that were even heavier.
Why did I have to experience this?
When did everything begin to shatter?
Who hurt whom more?
How did it all end like this?
Being the overthinker that I was, I sat with those questions for days.
Weeks.
Months.
Years.
Even a decade.
I pondered.
Wondered.
Contemplated.
I searched for explanations that never fully came.
And although I never arrived at every answer, I eventually learned to become gentler with the things that mattered most.
My peace.
My happiness.
Myself.
No, I didn’t erase the pain.
I didn’t hit Escape.
I didn’t press Backspace.
Neither did I delete the chapters of my life I wished had never happened.
Or the decisions I regretted.
What changed wasn’t my past.
It was the way I responded to it.
Perspective quietly turned the tables for me.
I wasn’t trying to become a toxic optimist.
Nor was I lying to myself by pretending everything happened for a reason.
Some things genuinely hurt.
Some people genuinely left scars.
But in the years that followed every heartbreak, I slowly learned to become kinder to myself.
I unlearned the unnecessary burdens that no longer served me.
Sometimes, we have to open the cage ourselves.
Not because someone rescued us.
But because we’ve finally realized the door has always been unlocked.
So I walked out.
I let liberation replace resentment.
I let acceptance quiet the noise.
I became softer.
Because the truth is, we don’t have to remain the version of ourselves that was hurt.
A painful season doesn’t have to become our permanent personality.
Pain is temporary.
Not because it disappears.
But because, over time, it becomes bearable.
The memories stay.
The perspective changes.
And somehow…
That changes everything.
There were nights when I willingly revisited my old wounds.
Not because I enjoyed suffering.
Not because I was a masochist.
But because those memories reminded me that I had loved.
That I had cared.
That I had been human.
And perhaps someone who feels that deeply deserves gentleness too.
I’ve always had a habit of keeping score.
Of carrying grudges.
Of comparing notes.
Of remembering who said what and when.
Sue me.
It’s one of my flaws.
Every now and then, I still catch myself revisiting those records.
Not because I enjoy bitterness.
But because healing isn’t always linear.
Sometimes I contradict myself.
Sometimes I forgive.
Sometimes I don’t.
Sometimes I think I’ve moved on.
Sometimes an old memory reminds me that I’m still moving through it.
And maybe that doesn’t make me two-faced.
Maybe it simply makes me human.
I’ve spent countless nights talking to myself.
Convincing myself.
Encouraging myself.
Sometimes even lying to myself just enough to survive another day.
And somewhere between all those conversations…
I think I’ve healed.
Not perfectly.
But honestly.
With scars.
With wounds that occasionally reopen.
With invisible marks left by battles no one else could see.
Looking back, I realize my gentleness often arrived disguised as self-sabotage.
My rationality has never been perfectly stable.
There were days painted in gray.
There were nights filled with quiet victories.
But little by little…
I learned to love myself.
To become gentler with the younger version of me.
To appreciate her.
To forgive her.
To understand that every decision she made—even the wrong ones—was her way of trying to protect the woman I would eventually become.
So I carried her with me.
I tried to become better.
To make her sacrifices worth something.
To prove that every tear she cried wasn’t wasted.
To become the light she searched for while sitting beside that little lamp, filling pages with sad prose and hopeful dreams.
Looking back now, I realize that no matter how many times I scramble and unscramble the past, I cannot undo the chaos.
I can only decide what I do with it.
I cannot rewrite what happened.
But I can refuse to become another casualty of it.
Because the truth is…
Maybe I’ll never be completely repaired.
Maybe no one ever is.
The damage exists.
But it doesn’t define the entirety of who I am.
I’m still me.
With my wounds.
My victories.
My fears.
My softness.
Everything that happened shaped me.
It made me who I am.
Now, whenever the abyss calls my name, I no longer wrestle it with violence.
I simply acknowledge it.
Sit beside it.
Pat it gently.
Then remind it that it no longer gets to decide where my life goes.
After all…
I’ve always been the person they called Joy.
Maybe it’s finally time I become one.
