My steady refusal of gifts and staged harmony—in place of healing, repair, and honest connection—made something clear: I was no longer willing to bypass necessary mending. Real healing would have required acknowledgment of pain caused and pain felt. In my family of origin, denial of pain posed as strength and moral superiority. I no longer believe that. There is a lot of pain.
My mother and sister quickly informed others of my unreasonable, grudge-holding, hostile abstinence. Why would I not bring my young children to sit at a table with people who had slandered and diminished their mother—openly and privately? Who did I think I was, expecting something better?
The use of my ex-husband was anticipated. Predictable. A betrayal and emotional assault that served as final confirmation. Jen Hatmaker writes in Fierce, Free, and Full of Fire that those who love us are never comfortable with our diminishment. That truth landed hard.
I knew, even before they met in 2015, that my sister and my ex would align easily. That they would collude to put me in my place while casting themselves as saviors or victims. There was always a claim to one or the other.
My earliest experiences of love and womanhood—through my mother, her mother, and my sister—taught me to loathe myself. Perhaps that was our common ground. We hated me and my feelings. When I stopped participating in my own diminishment, everything collapsed. Permanently.
Unsurprisingly, I entered a marriage that mirrored this dynamic. It felt like home. And home was not safe for me. I mistook emotional vacancy for strength and superiority. That marriage nearly destroyed me, but it also taught me what love is not. And finally, what love must be. Healing became non-negotiable.
It became clear that choosing healing would mean doing it alone. My first choice was to heal together. My second choice was to heal anyway.
I cannot ignore the privilege of having been born into a thin, non-Black body. That unearned protection shaped my survival in ways I am still reckoning with.
I continue the work, one day at a time. Unlearning beliefs I never knew I carried about love, worthiness, privilege, shame, trauma, authority, dignity, and truth.
I am a work in progress.
