I told myself, I have to write this. Despite my recent insecurities, which have been holding me back from writing, October 27th, will mark a milestone of my life that deserves to be merited.
I have already written a piece explaining the importance of mental health. It doesn’t matter who or what hurt me, I was in control of my reaction to my pain. I am a grown woman and at the end of the day I realized it doesn’t matter to me if my life isn’t perfect; it doesn’t matter to me if it’s in shambels.
What matters to me is if I am happy. What matters to me is if no longer hurting myself spares my loved ones from a little bit of their own pain and suffering then it is worth changing.
I didn’t have to have my life together to show my loved ones I’m okay. I needed to overcome my most unhealthy habits that were hurting not only myself but hurting them as well.
I was thirteen years old when I began self-harm. On October 27th, surrounded by all my friends in a state of intoxication, though, initially wild and fun, undesirably I witnessed a trigger to my trauma.
In the state I was in I isolated myself. My friends did their best to protect me from myself, but I chose to be lost in what I thought I couldn’t handle. I walked home alone and let my pain and addictions get the better of me.
The next morning, though no one suspected what I’d done I confided in them out of remorse. I had already told myself I needed to do better.
Despite every single hit life took at me while I was already down, I found peace and beauty in the mere fact that I am human. While, yes, sometimes I’ll have to deal with the worse parts of the spectrum, I have the pleasure of getting to experience the better sides as well.
I got to see my nieces be born, as well as see my younger siblings grow into amazing beings. I got to see my mother go through hell and still come out an angel. I got to travel the world. I’ve gotten to fall in love. I got to dance with my father at my wedding. Regardless of the pain that followed. I know that if goodness can proceed that pain, it can also ensue.
So maybe I don’t have a huge following. A year ago I needed help and my family was there to help me. A year ago I needed friends and though I made it impossible for them to find me, I learned they were still looking for me anyway. That’s all the following I really need. I learned I had some friends that really weren’t that great to me and didn’t mind seeing me hurt. So I let them go.
I learned that that’s okay because what mattered was I needed to see in me what all the people who do care about me see.
I absolutely still struggle with insecurities as a single woman.
Abstaining from self-harm for the first time in my life was proven daunting while many suitors failed to see my significance. I was challenged with seeing my significance for my own.
In losing love for another, I found love for myself. I was completely entitled to my own growth even if that meant out growing ones I loved. My significance was enough to be healthy and happy which I struggled with for a decade.
So I found peace in being alone. I found peace of mind in the quietness of relaxing baths, exploring narratives, creating beauty in composition, and in art. Beyond these pleasures there is still so much more to me to love. I feel beauty flowing through me. I feel my potential. I feel my significance despite my flaws.
That doesn’t need to satisfy anyone else. It just needs to satisfy me. In feeling that beauty and significance, a year passed. Despite the pain that still lingers, I was twenty-four when I last hurt myself, I am twenty-five now and haven’t hurt myself since.
“The rest is confetti.” The Haunting of Hill House
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