Hey kid,
Yeah, it’s me. The one you’re going to become. And I know, right now, you’re probably curled up somewhere too quiet, listening for the wrong kind of silence. The kind that smells of fear and cheap antiseptic. The kind that makes your ribs hum like piano wires before the next blow. The kind that follows the word ‘faggot’ and lingers like a curse. I know you’re trying not to flinch. I know you’re terrified. And I know you think you’ll never stop being afraid.
Spoiler alert: You won’t. Not entirely. But it gets better. So much better. And what you learn is that peace isn’t the absence of fear. It’s knowing the fear’s still there—and choosing to rest anyway.
You were born into shame, weren’t you? A quiet transaction, sealed with a signature and a mother who looked like she’d rather be anywhere else. You thought you were fallout, born into damage control. And then there was your step father. He was a storm made human. You hid in closets , learned to play dead without closing your eyes. You clung to laugh tracks because they always hit their marks. You thought love was sugar, rationed in a war zone. And you got good at disappearing in plain sight.
Then came the beige house, Grandma’s sermons about ‘God’s plan’ and ‘purity’. And Grandpa’s silence, which was worse than yelling. You found words and worlds online, didn’t you? You were a sarcastic elf with great boots. But even there, they found you. They saw your truth. And they sent you to Arkansas, because apparently Jesus outsourced now. Camp Rebirth. Where shame was currency. Where you learned how to swallow lies like scripture just to get out with your bones still inside you. Where someone took parts of you that weren’t theirs to take.
When you got back, you thought you were a ghost. You ate to quiet the hymns , smoked weed to blur the edges , found brief anchors in friends who saw glimpses of you but never the whole haunted house. You tried to heal with a knife and lost flesh, not pain. And then you found your ex. You thought he was love. He was a trap. A haunting. A wound that kept bleeding you dry, stealing your teeth, your worth, your voice. He was just another man who thought cruelty was closeness, and you were just another project to fix. You stayed because you thought you deserved him. Because what came after him felt like nothing.
It wasn’t nothing. It was space. It was the RV named ‘Stripped’. It was Mimi, the tiny tyrant who gave you unconditional love and taught you how to breathe again. And then she was gone, too, and the bed was so goddamn empty. You thought you were alone. But you learned that grief makes you practical. And somewhere in that ache, you left the door open. Not to replace her—nothing could—but to be reminded that love shows up again, sometimes in the shape of a six-pound chihuahua with opinions and an attitude. Daisy didn’t just arrive. She answered.
Life kept moving, demanding more. You earned degrees, climbed ladders, ran nursing homes, then hotels. You tried to build something unshakable. But the system had other plans. It took your license. Branded you a felon for simply telling the truth. They called it ‘natural consequence’. As if betrayal is weather. You hated it. But that didn’t define you either.
And then came the big one. Cancer. And you hid it. Alone. Because that’s what you knew how to do. You ate soup and watched Buffy. You kept showing up. You performed. And you survived. Not because you were fixed, but because you were stubborn.
But survival was just the beginning. The real journey was finding light at the end of the tunnel. It started subtly, in the quiet strength of Shelby, Tasi, and Melissa—the friends who stayed. You saw their faces rearrange themselves when you finally told them you were sick. You let them see your cracks, and they showed you theirs. You built a tribe where laughter wasn’t a cover-up, and loyalty wasn’t a negotiation.
And then, Matthew. This goofball from Tinder. He listened without flinching. He saw you. All of you. The trauma, the cancer, the scars. And he said, ‘You’re fucking plenty’. He taught you that love isn’t something you earn by shrinking yourself. He brought you home, not just to an apartment, but to himself. He made you believe in safety that didn’t come with fine print.
You’re going to stand at the edge of the Grand Canyon, feeling alive. Have a rainbow appear behind you on the top of a mountain in Hawaii. You’re going to walk through the Redwoods, soaked and holy. You’re going to flip off Proud Boys in Nashville. You’re going to see Wicked again, and it will be oxygen. You’ll walk the streets of New York and DC, not vanishing, but choosing it. You’re going to propose, and Matthew is going to say yes like he’s been waiting his whole life. And he’ll look at you with quiet awe, and say, ‘Then let me hold you still’.
People will come and go in your life. Some deserve to be mourned, some don’t even deserve to be remembered. People will slowly leave, and some will vanish suddenly. The people that are meant to stay, will be there. The people that choose you are the only ones in the end that matters.
You’re about to start your life, kid. With the lights on, the window cracked, and no one coming to hurt you.
Trauma doesn’t define you. Cancer doesn’t define you. Others don’t define you. Only you define you.
Tits up, kid. Feel free to flinch. You’re going to be just fine. More than fine. You’re going to live.