I started with a new therapist.

She asked me what brought me in, and I explained some of the events since early 2020 that led me to where I am today. I explained to her about being laid off of my job of 15 years, my mom’s final suicide attempt and me resuscitating her, my “divorce”, my family business drama, being abandoned by my ex, which led to me losing my house…

“You abandoned yourself.”

She is right. I did. I got caught up in trying to keep somebody who was never going to stay. To the point where I lost my sense of self. I was so confused by his inability to be there for me, that I wasn’t able to be there for myself.

I wasn’t able to be there and fully present for my children. I pray they forgive me for that.

I forgot who I am. I am strong. I am kind. I am resilient. I am determined. Why did I need somebody else to recognize these things in me? Why did I allow them to change my perception of myself? Why did I allow myself to become a lesser version of me, and devolve into the false notion they had created of “me”?

They never truly knew me. They didn’t even try. How could they? They barely knew themselves. They projected those insecurities on to me. Proving myself to them was impossible. A logical fallacy.

A dual minded man is unstable and all his ways. It’s contagious.

Forgiveness is for ourselves, not for others. So I forgive him. I forgive him for being broken, and trying to break me. But I cannot be broken. I have been beaten and bruised, but wounds heal when you stop picking at them. I can do that.

I forgive myself for falling prey. I forgive myself for leaving me.

We are to love our neighbors as we love ourselves. That means we are meant to love ourselves. Not our lives, not what we have, but who we are and what we are capable of. Because those are gifts from the Lord.

We didn’t make ourselves. We have to love His creation. Perfectly imperfect, requiring transformation.

Metamorphosis is uncomfortable. I think of the caterpillar and the butterfly. I think it’s safe to assume that they experience severe growing pains. Remember how your legs would ache when you were a teenager? The last time you got a cut or scrape, it itched as it healed.

And after all that, there’s the struggle emerging from their cocoon. And what is the purpose of that final, arduous step? To make them strong for the outside world. If they can’t pull themselves out of their cocoon, they will die before their life even begins.

That’s where I’m at right now. I’m thankful to be alive. I’m thankful for the opportunity to change, and be prepared for someone who won’t try to mold me into something that I am not, and never wanted to be.

I’m thankful to be made stronger so that I don’t leave myself again.