We spoke about the future slowly, gently. For the first time in years, sharing a life didn’t feel like a burden. It felt like hope.
Looking back on my life with Zack, I feel no regret. That life gave me children I adore, lessons I carry, and strength I didn’t know I possessed. But staying would have meant sacrificing the second half of my life to preserve the first. And I couldn’t do that.
If there’s one message I hope other women hear: sometimes the life you’ve built isn’t the one you’re meant to keep. Love can fade into habit, habit into silence, silence into erasure of self. You don’t need permission to want more. You don’t need to apologize for choosing yourself. That choice is not selfish—it’s sacred.
Now, I wake to sunlight pouring through my windows. I brew my coffee and step onto my balcony, inhaling the ocean air. Some mornings, I still mourn the woman I was—the one who tried so hard to make it work. But then I remember the woman I am now: grounded, open, becoming.Continue reading…
