Story Teller

 Dear Me, I know you're tired. Tired of trying, tired of starting over, tired of pretending you're okay when you're not. I want you to know something — I see you. I see how hard you've been trying, even on the days no one noticed. I see the nights you cried in silence because you didn't want to worry anyone. I see the strength it takes to get up when your heart feels heavy. You have been through so much, and yet you are still here. That alone is worth celebrating. I want to say thank you. Thank you for not giving up when things felt impossible. Thank you for loving people who didn't always love you back. Thank you for staying kind in a world that tried to make you bitter. Thank you for choosing to grow, even when growth was painful. You don't need to have everything figured out right now. Life is not a race. Some seasons are for resting, some are for rebuilding, some are for dreaming again. It's okay to pause. It's okay to start small. It's okay ...

 I used to think strength was about never crying. About holding everything together without breaking. But being a single mom taught me that real strength looks completely different. Strength is not loud. It's quiet. It's in the small moments no one sees. 1. Strength is waking up and choosing to continue. There are mornings when I am so tired. The baby didn't sleep, the house is a mess, and my phone has no data. But I still get up. I make breakfast. I smile at my baby. That choice, every single day, is strength. It's not because I feel strong. It's because love doesn't give me another option. 2. Strength is asking for help without feeling ashamed. For a long time, I thought asking for help meant I failed. Now I know it means I am wise. I cannot do everything alone, and that's okay. Allowing my mom to hold the baby while I write one article, or allowing a friend to listen to me vent — that is not weakness. That is how I survive and grow. 3. Strength is protect...

 I used to think healing had a deadline. 30 days to move on. 2 months to be okay. 6 months to be completely fine. If I wasn't okay by then, I thought something was wrong with me. But healing doesn't work like that. Healing is not a race. It doesn't have a finish line that you have to cross quickly. For a long time, I rushed. I rushed to smile when I still wanted to cry. I rushed to say "I'm over it" when my heart was still hurting. I rushed to be strong for everyone, while I was breaking silently inside. And rushing only made the wound deeper. Because when you rush healing, you don't heal. You just hide. This is what I learned slowly: 1. Some days will be heavy again — and that's okay. Healing is not a straight line. Some mornings you will feel light. Some nights you will feel heavy again. It doesn't mean you failed. It means you are still human. 2. Silence is also healing. I stopped explaining my pain to everyone. I stopped needing everyone to und...

 Dear younger me, If I could sit next to you right now, on that small bed where you used to cry quietly so no one would hear you, I would not start with advice. I would just sit with you. I would hold your hand and let you know, you don't have to be strong today. I know you think you are behind. You see other girls smiling, getting it together, and you wonder what is wrong with you. Nothing is wrong with you, my love. You are just feeling things deeply in a world that told you to hurry. I want to tell you a few things I wish someone told you then. First, you don't have to earn love by being perfect. You spent so many years trying to be the good girl, the quiet one, the one who never complains. You thought if you were easy to love, people would stay. But love that needs you to shrink is not love. The right people will love you even on the days you are messy, tired, and not smiling. Second, that heartbreak that feels like the end of the world? It is not. I know it feels like you ...

 For a long time, I thought healing had to be big. I thought I needed more money, a new life, or to finally become the woman I imagined in my head. But healing didn't come that way for me. It came in small, boring, quiet habits that nobody posted about. These 5 small habits are what actually saved my mental health: 1 . Making My Bed Every Single Morning This was the first one. Before I checked my phone, before I thought about my problems, I made my bed. It took 2 minutes. But it gave me one win before 8am. On days when my thoughts felt messy and out of control, I could look at my bed and say, "At least I did that." Sometimes you need one small proof that you can still show up for yourself. 2. Stepping Outside for 10 Minutes With No Phone I started forcing myself to go outside. Not to jog. Not to be productive. Just to sit. I would leave my phone inside and sit on my chair or under a tree. I would watch the clouds, listen to people passing, feel the sun on my face. I reali...

 For years, I lived in the shadow of other women. I would scroll and see a woman with perfect skin, perfect relationship, perfect business, and I would ask myself, "What is wrong with me? Why am I behind?" I compared my body to hers. My healing to hers. My motherhood to hers. My bank account to hers. And every time I compared, I felt smaller. The truth is, comparison never told me I was inspired. It only told me I was not enough. This is how I finally stopped. 1. I realized I was comparing my real life to her highlight. That woman I envied? I didn't see her crying at 2am. I didn't see her debt. I didn't see her loneliness. I was comparing my full, messy, real life to a 5-second edited photo. It was never a fair comparison. 2. I muted what made me feel small. This was hard. I unfollowed accounts that made me feel like I had to compete. Not because they are bad women – they are beautiful – but because I was not healed enough to watch them without hurting myself. Pro...

 Healing is lonely. No one tells you that part. They tell you "time heals" and "stay strong" – but they don't tell you that at 2 AM in Durban, when your child is sleeping, you will sit alone with your thoughts and wonder if you will ever feel normal again. I am there right now. And if you are too, this is for you. 1. Healing is not a straight line Yesterday I felt powerful. I posted my story, I smiled, I cooked, I felt okay. Today I woke up and cried in the shower. That doesn't mean I failed. It means healing comes in waves. Some days you swim, some days you sink, but you are still in the ocean moving forward. 2. You will outgrow people while healing As I heal, I speak less. I go out less. I say no more. Some friends don't understand why I am quiet now. But healing needs space. You cannot heal in the same noise that broke you. It's okay to be alone for a season. 3. Loneliness is not abandonment Being alone while healing is not punishment. It is prepa...

 I loved him when he was still healing from someone else. I knew it. I saw it in how he would go quiet after we laughed. I saw it in how he kept his phone face-down. I saw it in how he said "I like you" but never "I need you". But I stayed. Because I thought my love could be enough to fix him. Ladies, let me tell you what I learned the hard way – you cannot love someone into loving you. When a man is not ready, your extra love will not make him ready. Your extra patience will not make him ready. Your extra beauty, your extra cooking, your extra forgiving – it will not make him ready. He has to be ready on his own. In his own silent season. And while you wait for him to be ready, you are breaking yourself. You are shrinking your own heart to fit into his unhealed spaces. If you are reading this and you are loving someone who is half there, hear me: You are not hard to love. He is just not ready to love anyone properly yet – not even himself. So what do you do...

  I spent years waiting. Waiting to be chosen by friends. Waiting to be chosen for opportunities. Waiting to be chosen in love. I was always sitting in the waiting room of my own life, hoping someone would open the door and say "We pick you." So I made myself smaller to be more likable. I worked harder to be more noticeable. I waited quietly, hoping my patience would be rewarded. But no one came. Not because I wasn't worthy, but because I was waiting for permission to live my own life. Then one day, I got tired. Tired of waiting. Tired of checking my phone. Tired of wondering why I wasn't chosen. And I asked myself a question that changed everything: What if I choose myself? That day, I stopped waiting. I stopped waiting to be invited and I created my own table. I stopped waiting to be validated and I started validating myself. I stopped waiting for someone to tell me I was enough, and I started acting like I already was. When you stop waiting to be chosen, something ...

For a long time, I was scared of being alone. Not because I didn't like my own company, but because I thought being alone meant I was unlovable. I thought if I was alone, it meant something was wrong with me. So I kept people around even when they hurt me. I stayed in conversations that drained me. I said yes when I wanted to say no. All because I was scared of that quiet moment when it would just be me. But life taught me how to be alone, not by choice, but by necessity. People left. Plans failed. And there I was, alone. At first, it felt like punishment. The house was too quiet. The nights were too long. I kept reaching for my phone, hoping someone would fill the silence. Then one morning, I made myself a cup of tea and sat with myself. No phone. No music. Just me and my tea. And for the first time, being alone did not feel lonely. It felt peaceful. That was the day I learned the difference. Loneliness is feeling like you need someone else to complete you. Being alone is realizin...

 I did not start writing because I wanted to be a writer. I started writing because I was hurting and I didn't know where to put the pain. For years, I carried stories inside me that had nowhere to go. Things people said to me that stayed in my chest. Moments I was not able to speak up. Feelings I was told were "too much." I would smile in the day, but at night my mind was heavy. I had so much inside, and no place to release it. One day, I just picked up a pen. Or actually, I opened my phone notes. And I wrote one sentence: "I am tired of pretending I am okay." That one sentence turned into a paragraph. That paragraph turned into a page. And that page saved me. Writing became my safe place. The only place where I did not have to filter myself, where I did not have to be strong, where I could just be honest. This is why I write. I don't write to impress anyone. I don't write to sound perfect. I write because writing is how I heal. Every time I turn my pai...

  Everyone talks about healing like it's loud. Like you have to announce it, post about it, prove that you are getting better. But my healing happened in silence. It happened on days when no one checked on me. On nights when I cried and no one knew. In the small moments when I chose to keep going even though no one was clapping for me. For a long time, I thought healing required an audience. I thought I needed someone to validate my pain, to say "I see you, you are hurting." I waited for someone to save me. To notice that I was not okay. No one came. At first, that broke me even more. I felt invisible. Forgotten. Then, something shifted. I realized that waiting for someone to witness my pain was keeping me stuck in it. I was giving away my power, hoping someone else would give me permission to heal. So I started healing in silence. I started with small things. Drinking water. Making my bed. Opening the curtains. I stopped explaining myself to people who were committed to ...