life – Page 3

7 May 2025

I’ve been writing since I was seven years old; basically as long as I’ve known how to hold a pencil and form letters with it and put those letters into (often misspelled) words and string those words into semi-coherent sentences.

When people would ask, I would say, “I’ve been journaling since I was twelve” because I knew I was not-quite-thirteen when 9/11 happened and I somehow forgot my diary at home that day so, even though it went against my perfectionist self, I wrote my thoughts on a piece of notebook paper as the teachers of my private school rolled the TV into our classroom “so we don’t scare the little ones”.

But thinking back on that 2001 diary, I knew it wasn’t first. I bought it in what we called a “merit store” with all the “merits” I’d accumulated for overachieving or whatever. My mom was volunteering and since I had the most points I got to go first and mom pointed out the diary because she knew I was “into that sort of thing”.

Recently, I found a box unearthed by Hurricane Harvey that destroyed our town in 2017. This box was in a storage unit my dad built on our property when we moved there in 1999 and it’s where we housed the boxes we’d packed before we moved into a 5th-wheel trailer on the property as they “finished the house”. (Plot twist, it was never fully finished until after the Harvey repairs.) I packed these boxes as a ten-year-old and naturally most things that mattered to me then didn’t hold much worth to me now. Tucked in this box were a few notebooks and diaries—two of them Lisa Frank, thank you—that I had all but forgotten yet instantly recognized. The oldest was from 1995, when I was seven. The entries were scant, the handwriting atrocious, yet the statements were powerful. Somehow I managed to document in my dozen or so entries some of the most momentous occasions of my young life.

Clearly, something in the practice of documenting, of writing, or scratching pen to paper and tucking it away has stuck. I’ve filled countless journals, written on a semi-successful ballet blog over the years I was dancing, had two poems published and many never seen the light of day. Writing is what I do. I don’t know that I’m necessarily any good at it, but how I feel when I’m writing – either on paper or typing up one of these fella’s to shout into the void of the interwebz – is a high I’ll chase for the rest of my life. It simultaneously brings me comfort no one else can give and helps me to feel centered in a way I struggle to explain to anyone who doesn’t also experience this with something. I write because I have to, no matter what ends up happening with those words.

I’ve been debating starting this Substack for a bit. I love the concept of blogging and really enjoyed it when I was documenting my dance adventures. That chapter of my life has all but closed, yet I still feel drawn to this particular form of expression. I just watched a live stream (after the fact) with Glennon Doyle, Abby Wamback, and Amanda Doyle in honor of their book that just released called We Can Do Hard Things and one of the notes I took was of something Glennon said, sort of off handed, that lead into a deeper realization and conversation,

“You will never leave you”.

I don’t know how frequently I’ll post here. What I can tell you is that it’ll likely be a lot of brain dumps (like this) along with random poems every now and again, and probably some pictures occasionally. It’ll have a lot of thoughts and feelings and probably not have any sort of theme other than this is my life and I feel compelled to write about it. I’ve been in therapy a little over a year now with an absolutely incredible therapist and it’s only now that I really feel like I’m beginning to be able to sort through the muck I have surrounded myself with as I have muddled through to survive this life and starting to see the connection to all the deeper parts of me and what they’re trying to tell me – what I can learn from it.

I don’t plan on really advertising this. If you’ve found it, I feel that truly means you were meant to. I hope if you feel compelled to stick around that you feel good about it and maybe have a moment of reflection or two yourself.

Mainly, I hope you’re able to find a way to live your life in a way that feels like home to you.

May we all be so lucky.

This is for you, stranger, person who may know my name but have never had the chance to know me. May this space be the proverbial seat on a train next to a stranger or meet-cute in the grocery store—that interaction you weren’t expecting but leaves you feeling warm inside. Thanks for coming along for the ride.

❤ me

For a moment, I had entertained the idea of moving over to Substack from WordPress. It seemed the thing everyone else was doing, so maybe I should see what all the fuss is about, right? And then someone I follow pointed out how Substack allows Nazi’s to post on their platform, so I’ve decided that’s not for me, and I’m going to bring back here what I had taken there.

There are a few posts I made that I will post in order, then post new ones from there. I debated deleting my old posts and “starting fresh”, but I don’t really think that’s necessary. I’ve lived a lot of life since my last post on this blog almost 2 years ago, but a simple post can help catch everyone up, and then we can move forward.

The end of 2023/beginning of 2024 really felt like (another) turning point. There was so much I was feeling and couldn’t quite explain. I’d survived my first season working for the Ballet, which was intense to say the least, and I was finding new layers of myself I hadn’t known before and trying to sort out where everything belongs in the grand scheme of things.

In January 2024, I started therapy.
My insurance through work covers therapy, but you have to choose from their list of approved people for them to cover it. I was apprehensive, to say the least, given the town I live in. I’m born and raised here. I don’t know everyone, but everyone seems to know someone I know and word gets around fast. What’s more, the people who knew be in my “great before” seem to have missed the memo of who I am now, whether that be intentional omission, not paying attention, or the people in my life now having more discretion, I’m not sure, but I don’t mind it. It can just get a little awkward when people expect a certain version of me to be met with someone who is staunchly Not That. Not one to rock the boat, I don’t make a big song and pony show about it all, so it can be easy to miss if you’re not looking for more than what I can add to your life (versus actually knowing me as a person) and if you’re not safe I’m not about to go into any sort of detail of “How are you? How’s life?” more than I’d give to anyone else. Ironic for someone with a blog, but still. If you’re reading this, you’re either open minded or genuinely curious, and the nature of your curiosity is none of my business. No one’s forcing you to read this. You can click away and carry on with your life at any time. All this to say, I didn’t want a therapist that would either know the players in my story, nor would bring a certain religious opinion in to the session.

What I have found is the most perfect therapist for me. I didn’t really know going into it, based on some past experiences, that therapy was supposed to feel this safe. I knew it was supposed to be where you could say the things and receive the help or whatever. I have had one counselor before, ironically attached to a religious organization, who was the first to really make me feel like I wasn’t some hopeless lost cause that couldn’t amount to anything more than I was. She was wonderful, and I’m grateful for the work we did. Still, it wasn’t what I have found therapy to be this time. The person that I had seen (unintentionally) during Covid lockdown meant well, but wasn’t good for me. She brought in a lot of her own stuff and me, being an empathetic person who wants to make sure everyone is taken care of, ended up holding space for her as much as she for me. It wasn’t any big unloading on her part, but I can feel everything she was carrying, and that made it difficult for me to feel safe to give her my burden as well, even if it was her job. After three months she told me, “you have really good instincts, I don’t think there’s anything else I can do for you.” and what I wanted to reply with was, “okay, but I still want to die more often than I think a person should” but what I said was, “Okay, thank you.”

My therapist now is the boundary poster child, while still managing to be relatable. She is the safest person I’ve ever been around and is so damn good at her job I make sure to tell her as often as I can because I’m sure not everyone feels that way. People are people, after all. She’ll reassure me if and when I need it, but also won’t hesitate to call me out on my bullshit when necessary. I’ve seen exactly one tear fall from her eye, and that was the session after Honey died. Her expression of emotion and the radiating empathy showed me that I’m actually allowed to feel this loss. That dogs matter, sometimes more than people, and this wasn’t any small matter to be facing. After seeing that one tear, I went into, “oh gosh, are you okay?” mode and she promptly shut that down with, “This isn’t about me” and we carried on. I did ask the next session if she was okay, or if that was for me because I didn’t want to be presumptuous. She thanked me for asking, and said it was for me, and I told her how that made me realize all the things I’d realized about being allowed to feel because if my loss was enough to make my therapist cry, surely I was allowed to as well. Another layer peeled back on myself, revealing more things I didn’t know were there the whole time.

Recently, I’ve found myself keeping to myself more, which would have felt counterintuitive or even illegal to the me who was last writing here. Instead, I’m learning it’s not only allowed but encouraged. It’s a good thing to me to feel safe enough to keep to myself and know my world isn’t going to fall apart with my sadness. Emotions happen, and they’re allowed to, I’m going to be okay. I don’t have to tell other people about it to be safe. I’m safe with myself. I’m not a danger.

I, of course, am also not an island, and this doesn’t mean I don’t need people, on the contrary. We are such social beings we’re hardwired to need others. I still vent to friends or whatever, keeping them in the loop of the things that matter. It just means I don’t have to look to them to carry everything. I have my own two shoulders, and they’re strong, and some of this is stuff only I can carry. This is all done, thankfully, under the guise of my therapist and I am grateful every day for the privilege of knowing and working with her. How did I get so lucky to find her, first try even? All I did was look on our list of approved providers, paid attention to how each name made me feel, looked up websites, and called (after hours so I wouldn’t get an actual person, that’s too much). She actually lives about 4 hours from me, though she has an office here locally, but all the clients local to me are virtual. The best of both worlds–not here, but from here enough to know the places I’m talking about but not enough to know everyone I’m talking about. And even if she did know everyone I’m talking about she’s so good with boundaries that she won’t let on one bit. I’m learning this is how it’s supposed to be; who knew?

Now that it’s been a year and a half, I feel like I’m finally in a place where I can start writing again. I mean, I’ve never stopped. I journal and slap together stanzas I call “poetry” and what have you, but now I feel I’m in a place where I can write here again, in a more public setting and in a way that’s authentic without worrying about saying too much, or whatever. I don’t need this to be what holds the space for me; I’ve learned how to hold space for myself.

The next few posts will be from my Substack. I’ll put the publish date on them, so you can keep up with the timeline or whatever.

Thanks for coming along for the ride, I’m glad you’re here.

Tag: life

for the stranger

I’m back, here.