Still Healing, Still Here.

I'm going to start by saying that I'm all over the place mentally and emotionally. I keep trying to convince myself that I'm okay, but deep down, I know I'm not. I'm hurting.

At the same time, I'm healing.

Before I get into the hard stuff, let me acknowledge the positives. I recently moved into a new apartment, and I absolutely love it. It's beautiful. It's modern. It's me. I also landed a new teaching position for the 2026–2027 school year at a new school, where I'll be teaching second grade. This December, I'll graduate with my MFA in Creative Writing. I even got a new car this past December.

So, what exactly is keeping me from being okay?

Well, I recently got out of a short-term relationship. It only lasted two months. I originally met the guy in 2023, but after a few weeks, I broke things off. At the time, he wasn't the man for me. Then, in December 2025, I decided to give him another chance. Trust me, I had my reasons.

Had I known it would've ended the way it did, I would've left him exactly where he was—a ghost from the past.

My birthday was in December, and honestly, I needed the money to celebrate myself because I had just gotten a new car a week or two earlier. So, I let him come back around. I know we're not supposed to live life with regrets, but I regret that decision.

He came to my house on my birthday with flowers and a card that had money inside. I was happy. In all 28 years of my life, I had never had a man buy me anything for my birthday.

From that point on, he moved intentionally. We were going on dates three times a week. He opened and held doors for me. He paid for car repairs. He refused to let me pay for or even pump gas. He paid bills. He took me shopping. He took me on vacations. Shit, he was doing it all.

I even had his card on my Apple Pay.

But it wasn't just the financial things. Sometimes I'd come home, and he'd already have a meal cooking on the stove waiting for me. Other times, we'd cook together in the kitchen, laughing and talking while we made dinner. We'd take turns cooking for each other. We laughed a lot back then. Looking at where things ended up, it's strange to think about how someone I shared so many laughs with is someone I don't even speak to anymore.

But looking back, his asking me to be his woman just a week after we rekindled things should've been a huge red flag.

Fast forward to February. He took me to the Virgin Islands for Valentine's Day and paid for everything—my clothes, my nails, my flight. The only thing I paid for was my hair.

I'm not trying to keep bringing up what he did for me financially, but I should've looked at those experiences differently. For the most part, I loved the trip—except for the part where we almost died falling off a jet ski.

Being with a man who proudly showed me off both in the city and outside of it was something I hadn't experienced in years. It felt like I was living in a fairy tale.

I wasn't.

It was more like a nightmare.

When we got back from vacation, I noticed a shift. A drastic shift.

His attitude toward me changed. He crossed a boundary twice—one that I had clearly communicated before we even got into a relationship and one he agreed to respect. Then he ghosted me.

Mind you, we were supposedly in a whole relationship.

After that, everything went downhill.

In late March, I tried to fix things. That was my mistake. By then, the man had already shown me he was a professional ghoster.

The next thing I knew, I was bruised up. His lip was busted. And we were both in handcuffs.

The love I thought was genuine wasn't.

I was dancing with the devil the entire time and didn't even know it.

What he did changed my life, but it didn't define it. The man I thought I loved turned out to be an enemy in disguise.

I think about how I used to get on my knees every night and pray for him and for us. Looking back, it feels like I wasted those prayers. God forgive me for that.

But the truth is, I had several opportunities to walk away before things got bad.

I didn't.

During the legal situation, I realized that I had been love-bombed for the second time in my life. The second time.

When I really think about it, the first time happened back in 2020, and that situation ended badly, too.

So where am I today, at this exact moment as I type this?

I'm alive, thank God.

I don't talk to him anymore.

Sometimes I think about how messed up the entire situation was. Sometimes I think about how I was in an abusive relationship the whole time and didn't fully realize it until things became physical.

After everything happened, I cried for about a week straight. I didn't want to talk to anyone for a week or two either.

It's been two months now.

Some days, the healing feels small. Other days, it feels significant.

I'm still working on getting my life back on track. The experience changed me. It taught me lessons I never wanted to learn but needed to.

One of the hardest parts is accepting that someone who once felt like such a big part of my everyday life is now completely absent from it. The person I used to laugh with, cook with, pray for, and make memories with is now someone I no longer know. Some days, that reality doesn't bother me. Other days, it hurts more than I'd like to admit.

What I've come to realize is that it's okay to not be okay sometimes.

Healing isn't linear.

Right now, I'm still picking up the pieces.

One day at a time.