Is This What Healing Feels Like?…

I’ve noticed something lately. A quiet shift.

I don’t write about Bully as much anymore.

Not because I’ve suddenly forgiven or forgotten, and not because justice somehow found its way to my door. Nothing external has changed. But I have. A little.

The Bully posts used to pour out of me like water from a burst pipe. Some days, I couldn’t type fast enough to catch the anger, the grief, the disbelief. My fingers couldn’t keep pace with my heart. I was bleeding onto the page in real time, trying to make sense of something senseless, trying to survive it. Back then, writing wasn’t a choice. It was an instinct. A way to stay afloat.

Now? It’s different.

Now, I only write about Bully when something triggers me, when a memory slams in sideways, or when I stumble into some new realization about just how much it all cost me. Then I write. I need to. But I don’t live in that place anymore. I visit it.

And that, I think, is new.

Instead, I find myself pulled toward other things. Lighter things. Stranger things. Daily prompts. Dreams. Food. Travel. Even playfulness. Some posts are funny, some reflective. Some are soft, or slightly ridiculous, or full of questions I may never answer. But they’re mine. They come from the parts of me that weren’t broken, the parts that went quiet for a long time but never disappeared.

Maybe this is what healing actually looks like.

Not a tidy arc. Not some neatly packaged “closure.” Just… space. A little more space between the punches. A little more breath in the lungs. Enough stillness to choose what I want to write about, rather than chasing down the next emotional fire.

I’m not done with the Bully story. That wound still itches in the dark, still flares red when something brushes up against it. There are moments when it burns as fresh as day one. But now, those moments pass. I don’t linger. I don’t stay up all night rearranging the wreckage in my mind.

And that’s new, too.

There’s still work to do. There’s still pain to process. But alongside it, there’s something else rising: the urge to create, not just to cope. The desire to connect through more than just shared suffering. And maybe even, dare I say it’s a bit of hope.

Hope that I can build something honest out of the mess.

Hope that I can reclaim joy.

Hope that I don’t have to wait for the story to be finished before I start living again.

So yes, I’ll still write about Bully. I’ll still speak the truth. I’ll still name the damage, because my voice is one thing that wasn’t stolen from me. But now, I’m also writing other truths. Quiet truths. Weird truths. Funny ones. Healing ones. The kind you only get when you’ve walked through fire barefoot and somehow come out carrying a pen.

Maybe I’m not “healed.”

But I’m healing.

And today, that’s more than enough.

Mae 🧡