My presence carries more weight than pressure! For a long time, I apologized for things that didn’t actually require an apology. Sorry for asking a question. Sorry for needing clarification. Sorry for saying no. Sorry for changing my mind. Sorry for speaking up when something didn’t sit right with me. Sometimes I would even start a sentence with “sorry” before I had done anything wrong. And the crazy part is, I didn’t realize how often I was doing it. I thought I was being polite. Respectful....

Because making yourself smaller isn’t always as obvious as you think. There was a time when I thought shrinking meant being quiet. Not speaking up. Staying in the background. Letting other people take up the room. But I’ve learned that shrinking can look a lot different than that. Sometimes it looks like rewriting the message three times because the first version sounded “too direct.” Sometimes it’s saying, “It’s fine,” when it absolutely is not fine. Sometimes it’s knowing exactly what you...

Everyone celebrates when you leave. And then they go home. And you're left standing in the middle of your new reality, wondering why it doesn't feel like freedom yet. The phone wouldn't stop. Calls back to back. Texts flooding in. I miss you. I'm sorry. I've changed. Please come back. Over and over until you finally changed the number, and even then, the silence felt louder than the noise did. Because somewhere in the middle of all those "I'm sorrys," a part of you wanted to believe them. A...