This isn’t meant to be some big announcement and I imagine I’d be speaking to just the void anyway.

(After writing the above line I had decided what my blog name would be :D)

Speaking to just the void feels liberating.

So why am I writing again?

Well I’m going through a tough time right now. But then again, it’s been a recurring theme so far in my 35, near 36, years of existence. Occasionally, life will grant me some brief respites. But inevitably it will later announce they’re over. I’m tired of this cycle. Yet I know I’ve caused my most recent grief. I am the common thread in my series of unfortunate events. I knew better but still I let it happen to me. I thought I was healed and wiser, but my last relationship has revealed that, in fact, I was not.

My life hasn’t been easy. I spent most of it in survival mode. For years, I toiled to better my circumstances, pushing forward with no time to look back. Now that I worry less about money, I could afford to see how much I’ve neglected the other aspects of my life, my two daughters especially.

Until recently, I never took the time to sit down and unpack the trauma that is my life. For years, I wrote it off as simply ‘the cards I’ve been dealt’, and convinced myself that my only job was to play them the best I could. A friend I met on Bumble BFF said that this is the Asian way. I used to take pride in how my particular mix of circumstances has toughened me, but now I question if that toughness has amounted to any healing at all.

Lately, I’ve started to think more about how all this unprocessed trauma might have tainted how I approach my life. For the longest time, I believed it only affected my romantic relationships. But now I can see how it’s seeped into everything.

Like how I’m scared to make art, even though I used to plaster the walls of my childhood room with my portrait drawings. How inhibited I am at work, afraid to be bold, and explore beyond the status quo. How I toddle back and forth between being an agreeable people pleaser, and a detached person needing nothing from anyone. And worst of all, how I raised my children to be tough and self-reliant, only for them to end up feeling neglected, isolated, and resentful.

Beyond this blog, I’ve decided I was going to start seeing a therapist too. I didn’t think I needed to— until I found myself still chasing after a man who, for three years, had made it painfully clear that he wasn’t good for me. It was déjà vu. I hadn’t changed, I realized.

Because before him, there was another. Someone I begged to keep trying, even after he betrayed me. Both times, I was told—point-blank—that it was over. And yet, I stayed. I fought for people who had already walked away. It sickens me to think that I let myself sink so low.

I know there are many people who have it worse than I do. I am aware of it—every single day. Maybe that awareness is what has kept me from fully acknowledging my own struggles. At the same time, I sometimes feel like my stories are too harrowing to share with those who have lived more privileged lives. I know because I’ve seen it happen—the discomfort I’ve caused just by recounting the life I’ve lived. So, most of the time, I’ve kept quiet. Comparison is a thief, I think. Not just of joy, but of healing.

So I’ll confront my grief through writing. With brutal honesty. So that none of my demons are left unturned. This will be the space where no one will dictate how I should feel or think. I want to be released of these thoughts that weigh me down everyday. And I hope that by consciously setting them into words, I can finally unburden myself—and begin to truly heal.

(BRB crying)

A second reason for writing again? Well… I’ve simply missed it. I can’t remember the last time I expressed myself freely. On social media, I edit myself. I try too hard to sound like I have something meaningful to say. It became exhausting, and I don’t want to care anymore.

I don’t like being in such low spirits, but this is where life has me right now. I’ve come to terms with it—I’ve decided to just ride it out. So, dear void, brace yourself for unfiltered, messy, and, every so often, melancholic musings. Here’s to hoping they’ll become my pathway to true healing.