This Is Not the End

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Dear Brave Soul,

Life hasn’t been easy up to this point.

That’s not something I say for sympathy. It’s just the truth.

Pain shaped me before joy ever had a chance.

I learned to shrink long before I learned to speak.

And for a long time, I thought surviving was all there was.

No one tells you how much you carry until your body breaks down.

Until your spirit goes quiet.

Until your smile starts to feel like a performance.

There were days I didn’t want to be here — not because I didn’t love life, but because I didn’t know how to live inside mine.

I survived things that fractured me.

Some of them were loud and visible.

Some of them were silent and slow… the kind of pain that never makes headlines, but lives in the nervous system like it built the place.

I’ve been through divorce.

Loss.

Abuse.

Moments I haven’t written about yet — not because I’m hiding, but because healing has its own timeline.

But here’s what I know now:

Naming the pain is part of reclaiming the story.

Until now, I thought I had to stay quiet to be safe.

Until now, I thought I had to prove I was okay.

Until now, I thought healing meant moving on.

But now… I see it differently.

Healing is not pretending.

Healing is saying: this happened and I’m still here.

So if life hasn’t been easy for you either, know this:

There’s nothing wrong with you.

You’re not broken.

You’re not behind.

You’re in the middle of becoming.

And your pain doesn’t disqualify you from joy.

It prepares you for it.

With love,

Kerri