Hey Sweets,
I’ve been sitting with some hard emotions lately. Not because something new has happened, but because life has finally quieted enough for the feelings I’ve been carrying to speak up. That’s the tricky part about healing. It doesn’t always announce itself. Sometimes it shows up in the stillness, in those soft spaces where you’re no longer distracted by survival.
I’ve been thinking about what it means to carry conflicting emotions at once. How you can be sure of a decision and still mourn what it cost you. How you can be grateful for a new beginning and still ache for what’s no longer an option.
I’ve been living in that tension for a while now, quietly and deeply, and I think it’s time I gave it language.
After my hysterectomy, I told everyone I felt fine. And I mostly did. I was cancer-free, healthy, and focused on getting back to myself. But what I didn’t say out loud was how heavy it felt to close a door I didn’t even want open anymore.
I had already made peace with not having more children, but the finality of it brought up a quiet kind of grief. I wasn’t mourning a future I had planned, but the loss of possibility. That unexpected ache.
And as a single woman, that grief got tangled with something else: anxiety. How do I share this with someone new? Will I still be seen as whole?
Logically, I know I am. But emotions don’t always follow logic. Some days, I feel grounded in who I am. Other days, I sit with the ache and let it be what it is.
That same practice of letting things speak led me to take FMLA. I needed rest, badly. But rest felt radical. Almost reckless.
When survival mode is your default, slowing down feels like rebellion. Even with support, I still wrestled with guilt, fear, and the what-ifs. Would I fall behind? Could I afford the pause?
But I also knew I couldn’t afford not to. Choosing to rest reminded me that being human is reason enough. That I don’t have to prove I’m worthy of rest. That I don’t have to burn out just to be taken seriously.
Lately, I’ve also been mourning the loss that comes with setting boundaries, the ones that protect my peace but cost me comfort.
It’s strange how something so necessary can still break your heart a little. Letting go of dynamics, people, or patterns that once felt familiar, even if they were harmful, comes with grief.
Some days, I feel strong and clear. Other days, I grieve what I thought would work if I just held on a little longer. I’m learning that loving myself out loud won’t always feel like a celebration. Sometimes, it feels like silence. Like distance. Like starting over.
But it’s still love.
It’s still becoming.
It’s still choosing me.
What I know now is that duality doesn’t mean confusion. It means truth.
I can miss what I left behind and still know I was right to walk away.
I can hold gratitude and grief in the same breath.
I can be proud of my growth and still feel the weight of it.
And to you, my sweets, if you’re feeling torn between what you had to release and what you’re stepping into, I hope you know there is nothing wrong with you. There is no timeline for making peace with your own decisions. You are allowed to cry over the things you had to let go of. You are allowed to miss what you outgrew. You are allowed to feel sad about choosing yourself, even when you know it was the right thing.
You are not broken for feeling more than one thing at once. You are becoming. And becoming takes courage. You are doing better than you think.
With love,
Tru
Magnolia Tru 