Warrior

Sometimes everything I've been through comes rushing back and leaves me a little breathless.

How I survived.

How I turned pain into purpose

and purpose into passion.

How my soul knew there was so much more than what I was experiencing.

How I forced myself to go on.

How I stayed.

How I thrived.

I don't think I allowed myself to fully recognize myself before this moment. I'd been heading here--years of transforming and healing and growing, evolving in confidence and self-love and recalling all those lost pieces of myself. But here in this moment I see myself in wholeness: in my strength, in my fire, in my compassion and love.

I can look back and see all of that pain and all of that trauma and all of that struggling... I can see that older version of myself begging for miracles, crawling my way towards hope, crying for relief

and I'm so damn proud of her. I'm so proud of her for what she survived and for who she became.

Who I became.

I hold her. I honor her. I love her...

This warrior I see in the mirror now.