I have without a doubt been silencing myself.

In the last couple months I’ve started more blogs and more pieces of words than I care to admit.

I’ve absolutely written the things that I deem safe sans one collection of words back in June.

Ever since those words I’ve been afraid that anything I write about the dark things I feel would negate the words I wrote then, the things I know to be true. The light I know I am.

That me speaking of the things that have been hard would negate the things I know to be true.

I have had a lot of beautiful, sparkly moments this summer. Moments with friends where I belly laugh and sitting in the sun and enjoying every moment.

But, then there have been more moments than I can count that feel like depths I haven’t been to in awhile.

And that is really damn scary to say.

I’ve written in spaces that say I’ve moved past them but in reality the mornings I’ve been awake til 2 or 3 am and the days at work I’ve survived on 3-4 hours of sleep are more then I would care to admit.

When I was at camp and had spent an evening on the absolute verge of a panic attack and I admitted to it Susan one of our directors-she asked if I had a mantra, something to say that grounded me in the moments where I felt like I could keep my breath or my head out of the darkness.

I didn’t. But I came up with one.

I am here.

It’s a play off of the words of Hannah Brencher “be where your feet are”

My feet are here.

I am here.

Then there is this:

My word of the year this year is again.

And I’ve had to work really damn hard to not tack the word on the sentence: it’s 2009, again.

Because that’s honestly all that’s been in my brain. The recesses of my brain that hold dates and memories and pain just keep telling me that I must not be strong enough since I’m here, again.

I want you to know human being reading this that I know, in my absolute knower, that it’s not true.

I know I’m stronger, bolder, and so many things in between.

I know.

But, good god, I never want anyone to feel less than if they feel as if they’ve met the pages they’ve been in the book before.

Something a Nigerian med student told me in a small village on the border of Russia in Ukraine (it’s just a fun sentence I had to say) was that he was never going back to Nigeria. He wasn’t the same so he couldn’t go back, he was going forward to Nigeria.

I’ve been silencing myself because it feels like I’m going back.

I’ve been silencing myself because I’m so afraid that the strength I have will be diminished if I admit I’ve met some mountains that have to be climbed that just so happen to look foothills I’ve climbed before.

I’ve been silencing myself because I’m so afraid that people will think I’m a fraud that can’t just get over it.

I’ve been silencing myself because it feels like 2009 and I don’t want to live through that again.

But, when I silence myself I can’t get to the end of the sentence.

When I silence myself, you don’t have the space to get to the end of the sentence in your book,

The end of the sentence is this: it feels like 2009 again, but it’s not.

And if we don’t get to the “but” we can’t negate everything that came before it.

It feels like 2009 again, but I’m stronger.

It feels like 2009 again, but I’ve rebuilt and I will again.

It feels like 2009 again, but I am Meg in 2024.

I don’t know how you are silencing yourself.

I don’t know if you won’t let yourself get to the “but” that negates the thing that scares you that comes before it.

To get to the overcoming we have to get to the “but” in the sentence.

We have to change our language and our outlook.

I don’t know if you feel up for sharing the end of your sentence and if you do please drop it in the comments or shoot me a message.

Here’s mine (sorry for the language):

It feels like 2009 again but, for fucks sake I’m still here.

With love,

Meg