Press Play

There’s a quiet kind of grief that doesn’t announce itself.

It doesn’t always look like tears or staying in bed. Sometimes it looks like functioning. Showing up. Smiling in the right places. Getting things done. But underneath it all, there’s a heaviness you can’t quite name, and after a while, you stop trying to name it.

For three years, that’s where I lived. I called it a “hard season.” Stress. Just getting through. But the truth is, something happened that made me question my worth, my value, and my calling. And when you start questioning who you are, you slowly stop showing up as her. I stopped writing. I stopped speaking. I went quiet in places where I used to be bold. I shrank in spaces where I used to take up room.  The scariest part is that I got used to it. Until one day, I didn’t. There wasn’t a big moment. It was just a quiet realization: this isn’t me.

Not the me I know. Not the me I was created to be. And that realization was both heartbreaking and freeing. Heartbreaking, because I had to face how long I’d been living beneath myself. Freeing, because it meant I didn’t have to stay there.

So now, I’m choosing differently. I’m choosing to write again, not because everything is healed, but because my voice isn’t something I earn when I feel worthy. It’s something I carry, even when I don’t. I’m choosing to speak again. To show up again. Not as a “fixed” version of me, but as a returning one. This is me coming back to myself. Reclaiming what felt lost. Remembering that my worth was never up for debate, even if I believed it was. If you’ve been questioning, shrinking, going quiet… you’re not as far gone as you think. You’re not disqualified. You’re not done. Sometimes you’re just paused. Whenever you’re ready, you can press play again. I am.