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Positive mind. Keep rising.

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Positive mindset will see you through, you are not broken, you are becoming.

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Healing can leave you stressed and recalling the past, be.prepare for the journey, you will break, but you will be better for clarity. Allow yourself to open those doors you locked shut and remember you are worth the healing. You are worth the love.

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Love whilst healing from childhoid abuse can be hard. But when true healing begins, you will start to see your worth.

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Still Alive.

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Healing my inner child.

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I seeYou! It's important to heL the child inside whilst on your healing journey, speak up, share your experience so others can know. you are not alone! Because I have face the abuse and still I'm rising, it will be hard to look at but you will ruse from the pain.

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And still I rise, despite our start in life and the varrietsvwe conyinue to break within our own healing journey, still we rise.

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I don't over think because I'm anxious, I overthink because 8 survived.

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Today's afermation.

You are worthy keep healing

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Caught Between Good and Evil: The Poison Wrapped in Kindness

How do you mourn the man who broke you, But also fed you?

I got a message from my older sister today.

Two words:

“Pound dead.”

I didn’t cry.

I didn’t feel anything.

No rage. No sadness. Just silence.

And then:

“I wonder how she’s taking it the sister he molested.”

Trying to Understand What I Still Don’t Fully Understand

The thing about working through childhood trauma is that it’s not clean.

There are things I’ve buried so deep I’m scared to even name them.

Things that sit in me like a knot, things I fear will sound crazy if I say them out loud.

And yet they’re real.

They show up in the quiet.

In the happy moments I can’t fully enjoy.

In the way, I keep waiting for the mask to slip

for someone I love to turn into someone I fear.

We called him “Dad.”

He wasn’t our biological father, but he stepped in when no one else did.

He fed us.

Clothed us.

Took care of us like we were his own.

He worked hard, sold his produce, and supported the family.

To everyone else, he was a good man.

To me, for a while, he felt like safety.

But then it changed.

Because love doesn’t erase what he did to my sister.

What he chose.

What he broke.

And when I read “Pound dead,” it wasn’t relief or closure I felt.

It was numbness.

Like my body knew it had already grieved him

the moment he touched her.

And then came the other thoughts.

Not about me.

Not even about her.

But about them

my mother’s other children.

The ones he fathered.

The ones who knew him as Dad

and still do.

The ones who loved him because

he never hurt them.

Because their experience of him is different.

I think about how they’re coping.

Coping with the loss of their dad.

The man they knew as provider, protector, parent.

Their grief is real.

Their loss is valid.

But so is mine.

And it’s hard

to hold space for their mourning

while I carry trauma in my body from the same man.

It feels like we lived in two houses

under the same roof.

They got a father.

I got a warning.

And then there was my uncle.

My story.

He brought me from Jamaica.

He said he wanted me to have a better life. He smiled. He showed up.

He made me feel seen, safe, loved

He bought me books and clothes, gave them to my mother, and fed the community. He preached. He hugged me. He told me I was his favourite. And I believed him. Even as he broke me.

Even when the abuse went on, from twelve to nineteen.

Even as I ran away with nothing but my will to live.

What I’m trying to understand

what I’m still sitting with

is how people who once made us feel safe

could also be the ones who shattered that safety completely. And, how do you hold the memory of someone who fed you next to the memory of what they did in the dark? How do you process a kind hand that also became violent? How do you explain to anyone else that

you loved them, and still had to survive them?

This is the part no one prepares you for. The emotional whiplash.

The confusion. The way that love and trauma tangle so tightly

you can’t always tell where one ends and the other begins. It’s not just what they did , it’s what it taught me to expect from the world.

Now, I don’t trust anyone fully.

Even in joy, I’m bracing for the fall.

Even when someone holds me kindly,

part of me whispers, “wait…”

Because I’ve seen monsters wear angel faces before.

I’ve kissed the hand that hurt me.

I’ve slept under roofs that fed me and broke me in the same breath.

Am I the only one?

Some days I wonder if I’m the only one who feels like this.

The only one who loved their abuser.

The only one who misses the good moments and hates themselves for it. But I don’t think I am. I can't be.

And if you're reading this, maybe you're not either.

What I’ve Learned and Am Still Learning is you can love them.

And still never want to see them again.

You can remember their kindness.

And still never excuse their cruelty. You are allowed to feel the contradiction. You are not broken for being confused. You are human. You are healing. You are not alone.

You don’t have to show your face to speak your truth.

You don’t need all the answers to begin healing.

You just need to stop pretending it didn’t happen.

We’re not crazy. We’re surviving.

And we don’t have to do it alone.

If you're looking for someone to talk to, to just share your story, please drop me a message, lets heal together

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Healing The Child in Me While Raising the Ones in Front of Me

I'm healing, parenting, surviving, and still searching for God.

There are some days where I show up in my life, but I’m not alive in it.

I’m there, yes. I’m feeding the kids, tidying up, and playing with the baby. But inside, I’m locked behind my own eyes, watching life move around me like I’m underwater.

I know what I need to do, shower, breathe, go outside, but I physically can’t. It’s like my body is frozen in place, even though my spirit is screaming to get out.

I call it the "mind lock."

And for five long days, I lived in it.

I slept on the sofa. Ate on the sofa. Prayed on the sofa.

Tried to shake the fog by playing music, whispering affirmations, and even journaling, but it all felt hollow.

I kept telling myself, “You are better than this.”

But even those words bounced off the numbness.

Still,I prayed

Even in that silence, I prayed.

In my dreams, in my whispers, in my darkness I kept praying.

Not fancy words. Just raw, broken sentences.

“God, find me.”

“God, please don’t leave me like this.”

"I need you"

"Why have you abandoned me"

“God… are You still there?”

I’ve always believed in God. Deeply. Since I was a little girl in church, singing in the choir, surrounded by the warmth of faith. Back then, I felt Him so clearly around me, within me. He was real.

But then it changed, life happened, he happened.

I was broken, robbed

My innocence shattered by someone who dared to use God’s words while doing evil things.

He stood in front of people, preached with conviction and destroyed me behind closed doors.

After that, something in me got ripped out.

Not my belief, I still believe but the feeling of God. The closeness. The safety.

Searching for a God Who Doesn’t Feel Close

I’ve visited different churches. I’ve spoken to pastors, got baptised, sang on quires,

I’ve studied with Jehovah’s Witnesses.

I’ve looked for Him in the pages of scripture and the faces of community.

But every time I sit in a pew and listen to someone speak with authority I flinch.

Because I’ve seen what happens when a man hides behind God’s name.

And now, even kindness feels suspect. A smile to me is just a mask.

Still, I pray.

Still, I hope.

Still, I whisper in the dark: “I remember You, God. I remember what You felt like when I was little. Please... come back.”

The Reality of Healing While Mothering

It’s a strange thing, healing my own inner child while trying to raise my three actual children in the present.

How do i show up for my babies when the little girl inside me is crying too?

How do i pour love, safety, stability into their hearts when mine feels cracked open?

This morning, something shifted.

I woke up and decided to move.

I told the boys, “We’re getting out of this house today.”

I played music. I cleaned deeper than usual. I journaled, even if the words felt dry.

I reminded myself: This fog isn’t forever.

This isn’t who you are. This is what you’re healing from.

And somewhere between the dishes and the dance break with my toddler, I felt a spark. Not fireworks but hope.

Just enough to say: Okay. I can do this one more day.

What I’m Learning through my talking therapy journey And What I Hope You Know Too

You can still pray even when you don’t feel God.

You can believe and be broken at the same time.

The child in you that felt God before the pain, She’s still in there waiting for safety to return.

Healing is not an easy road, it's not pretty, not Instagrammable. But it is holy.

Showing up for your kids, even in silence, is an act of bravery.

If you’re parenting while healing

If you’re searching for God through trauma fog

If you’re mothering with one hand and holding your broken soul with the othe

You are not alone.

We’re not just surviving.

We’re healing.

We’re returning to ourselves.

And God is still reaching for us even when we can’t feel it yet.

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@shellshockers Thank you so much for sharing your story with me. I'm so sorry for what you went through no child, no young person, should ever have had to carry that kind of hurt. I feel your strength and your heart in every word you wrote.

I understand so deeply what it’s like to carry shame that never belonged to us in the first place. To be made to believe we were the broken ones when we were only ever innocent. You are incredibly brave, not just for surviving, but for choosing to heal, to reach out with kindness, and to find your worth again in God’s love.

Reading your words made me feel less alone, and more hopeful too. Thank you for reminding me and everyone who reads this that healing is possible, that we are loved, and that we are not defined by what was done to us.

Sending you so much love and a big hug back.❤️

Broken: By the little girl I used to be

There are some things words can’t explain fully pain that’s too deep, memories that linger long after the world thinks you’ve moved on. Sometimes the only way I can speak is through writing. Through poetry. Through the voice of the little girl I used to be.

This poem came from a place I rarely allow myself to go. A place of truth, fear, and survival. It was written in the voice of my younger self the child who never got the chance to say, “This wasn’t my fault.”

This is for her. For every little girl (or boy) who was never believed. For every survivor still learning how to live in a body that remembers everything.

This is called Broken.

Broken. Damaged. Living inside this skin. With eyes so terrified, I never let anyone in.

Not really.

Even if they smile at me, Even if they say they know me, They never truly do Because I don’t even know who I am, Outside this prison.

Behind these bars of skin I wear, A shell, a mask, a quiet stare. I never forget the pain I bear. The words, the hands, the nights of fear, The way he said, “No one will ever love you more than me, dear.”

I was a child.

I should’ve been safe. I should’ve been wild with joy, Not waking up to his breath, His weight, His lies masked as love.

He said I was his. That I was meant for him. And somewhere in that twisted world, I believed it Because I didn’t know better. Because no one came to save me.

I made a fairytale in my mind A prince, a horse, a rescue, Someone kind. But fairytales don’t visit girls like me. Girls who cry silently, Tap their knees on the bus, Who freeze at smells, Who learn to disappear in plain sight.

I was twelve, And he took what was mine. The part of me I should’ve chosen To give, To someone I loved, When I was ready.

But he stole it. And worse They blamed me.

My mother said I must’ve wanted it. That I wasn’t some fool. But I was a child. How could she be so cruel?

Now I wear my pain like second skin. A quiet kind of screaming from within. And I smile Not because I’m okay, But because it keeps the questions away.

Still, I hope...

That one day, Even broken things can heal. Even girls like me can feel Whole. Loved. Real.

But for now, I’m just trying to breathe Inside this skin I didn’t choose. Trying to remember: This wasn’t my fault. I didn’t lose. He stole. They failed. But I I survived.

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A Letter to My Mother

Dear Mum,

I’ve carried these words inside me for most of my life. I’ve cried them in silence, whispered them in my mind, buried them under years of trying to survive. But I’m ready now not because I think you’ll hear me differently, not because I expect you to change, but because I need to speak.

I need to be free of the weight of everything you didn’t see. Everything you refused to protect me from. Everything you still refuse to acknowledge.

You sent me away believing it was for a better life. Maybe you truly thought it was. Maybe you thought sending me to England would open doors for me, make me into someone who could come back and lift the whole family. But you didn’t see where you were sending me. You didn’t see what you were giving me to.

And when I finally tried to tell you what happened What he did to me. How he touched me. How he stole from me something I will never get back You blamed me.

You said I must have wanted it. That I was twelve. That you didn’t send a fool to England.

Mum, I needed you. I needed you to look at me and see a child in pain. I needed you to wrap your arms around me and scream at the world that your daughter had been hurt and that you would never let it happen again.

But instead, you turned away. You protected him. You shamed me. And you walked me right back into silence.

You made me believe I was nothing. That what happened to me was somehow my fault. And I’ve spent my whole life trying to unlearn that lie.

Even now, all these years later, you’re still protecting the wrong people. Still covering abuse. Still choosing to ignore what’s in front of you. And I can’t be part of that anymore.

I’ve watched my sisters crave your love like I once did. I’ve seen them try, still hoping that maybe one day you’ll soften. But I can’t. I’ve loved you from a distance, and even that distance still hurts. Because deep down, I always wanted you to be the mother I needed.

The one who would believe me. The one who would fight for me. The one who would hold me and tell me it wasn’t my fault.

But you didn’t.

And now, I know you never will.

So this letter isn’t about asking you to change. It’s not about demanding answers or begging for love.

It’s about letting go. Letting go of the hope that you’ll become who I needed. Letting go of the guilt I’ve carried for things that were never mine to carry. Letting go of the silence.

I am speaking now. Not for you. But for me. For the little girl who lived in fear. For the woman who is still learning how to heal.

I am not nothing. I am not broken. I am not the shame you tried to hand me.

I am a mother now the kind I never had. I am raising my boys with softness and truth. I am protecting them the way I was never protected. And I am healing, even if it takes the rest of my life.

So here is my goodbye To your silence. To your blame. To the version of you I kept waiting for.

You couldn’t give me what I needed.

But I can give it to myself now.

Goodbye, Mum. I release you. I release me.

Your daughter, Still surviving. Still healing. Still here.

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The Words I’ve Never Said: Writing to My Mother

I’ve thought about writing to my mother for years.

In moments of pain. In moments of anger. In moments when I felt invisible, unheard, and desperate to be seen by her.

There’s always been a part of me that longed for her love. Not just in the way she provided or did what needed to be done, but the kind of love that sees you. That softens at your pain. That says, “I believe you.”

But that wasn’t the kind of mother I had.

My life has been shaped by her absence, even in her presence. She sent me away, believing she was giving me a better life a new start in a new country. I became the hope for my siblings, the one who would make something of herself and come back to help them all. But the reality was much darker.

I didn’t become the success story. I became stuck in a cycle of abuse physically, emotionally, and mentally. I was handed over to a man who smiled in public and destroyed me in private. And when I finally found the courage to escape, to speak she didn’t protect me. She blamed me.

That has followed me into every part of my life. Into my motherhood. Into my relationships. Into my view of myself.

And I’m not the only one.

I’ve watched my siblings especially my sisters crave her love, just like I have. The only difference is, I’ve stopped trying. I’ve taken myself away. I love her from a distance, in silence. Because I can’t bring myself to speak to her, knowing what she’s done and what she’s still doing. Still covering up abuse. Still turning away from truth.

But my sisters still try. They still speak to her. Still hold onto hope that maybe one day, she’ll soften. Maybe one day, she’ll see us.

I’ve never understood it not fully but I know where it comes from. That ache. That hole. That longing to feel wanted, to feel loved.

We all carry it.

But I’ve given up the fight. Not out of bitterness but out of clarity. She will never be the mother I needed her to be.

And so, I’ve stopped waiting for her to change.

But I still have something to say.

This isn’t about revenge. It’s not even about her, really. It’s about me. Reclaiming my voice. Naming the pain. And letting the little girl in me speak freely, without shame.

So here it, is the letter I never had space to write. The letter my mother may never read. But the one I needed to let go of the silence I’ve carried for far too long.

Next: A Letter to My Mother ....... will follow in my next post

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Do I Keep Going? : Wrestling With the Weight of Healing

After my first therapy session, I felt like I’d been hit by a wave I didn’t see coming. A wave so strong, it pulled me under.

I left that room feeling worse than when I walked in. The tears I cried, the memories I spoke aloud they opened something in me that I didn’t know how to close. I thought therapy would help me feel lighter, that speaking my truth would feel freeing. But instead, it made me feel like that scared little girl again helpless, vulnerable, exposed.

For days, I couldn’t eat. Couldn’t shower. Couldn’t look at myself in the mirror. I only moved because my baby needed feeding, because my children still needed me to show up. But after I did what needed to be done, I sank. Quietly. Silently. Alone.

I started to ask myself: Do I really want to keep doing this? Is therapy helping or is it just making me fall apart?

Because facing my past, facing my emotions, is something I’ve avoided for years.

I’ve stayed busy with work, with motherhood, with routines. I’ve never given myself time to stop and feel. To cry. To grieve. To fall apart. Because I know, deep down, if I ever truly allowed myself to break I might not know how to put myself back together.

I’ve always believed I had no choice but to be strong. I’ve had people depending on me especially my boys. They need me sane. They need me present. They need the mother I never had. The mother who protects, who listens, who sees.

But that therapy session it forced me to sit with things I had buried so deep, I forgot I was even carrying them. It made me look at my mother. It made me remember why I never told her what was happening to me. It reminded me that silence in our home was survival, and that speaking only led to blame.

Let me take you back for a moment

I was eight. My sister was ten. I remember it clearly ike it just happened yesterday.

That night, my mother had gone outside to take a bath. My sister was alone inside the house, in the room with our stepdad. I didn’t know much then, but I knew something felt wrong. My sister was scared. I begged her to tell our mother. But she was too afraid.

Then it happened.

My mother came back into the house for a bar of soap. The room was dark. my stepdad tried to block her way but she got in, She had to feel around to find it. That’s when she touched something unexpected, my sister. Naked. On the bed. In that moment, I thought, Finally, she’s going to protect her. She’s going to see what’s really happening.

But that’s not what happened.

Instead, my mother turned on my sister. She dragged her outside. She shouted at her, she beat her. She accused her, a ten-year-old child of trying to steal her man. She blamed her for what had been done to her. She chose him. my stepdad.

She is still with him.

That memory has haunted me for years. It shaped everything I believed about safety. About trust. About women. About mothers. About me.

It’s the reason I never told her what her uncle was doing to me when she sent me away. Because I already knew she wouldn’t believe me. Or worse, she’d blame me too.

And she did.

Even now, after all these years, when I’ve tried to speak to her, to tell her what happened to me, all I ever receive is shame. Blame. Silence.

So when I sit in that therapy room, when I’m asked to go back to those places, when I’m asked to feel, it’s not just hard it’s terrifying. Because I’ve spent my whole life learning how to not feel. How to survive.

But now, I’m starting to wonder.

Maybe surviving isn’t enough anymore. Maybe the reason I’m still struggling is because I never stopped to grieve. Maybe I need to let myself feel this pain even if it breaks me for a while so that one day, I can start to heal.

So here I am. Still scared. Still unsure. But I think I’m going back to therapy.

Not because it feels good. Not because I feel brave. But because my boys deserve a mother who is free not just functioning.

And I deserve that too.

[pow3tage]

A Letter to the Girl I Used to Be

In my second therapy session, my therapist asked me a question that hit a place deep inside me a place I’ve avoided for most of my life.

She said, “What would you say to yourself the little girl you once were if she sat in front of you and said, ‘It was my fault’? What would you say if she told you she was to blame?”

At first, I didn’t know how to respond, my throat tightened. My eyes filled. And for a moment, I couldn’t speak because I have blamed her. I’ve blamed myself.

From the age of twelve, I was no longer a child not in the way I should’ve been. I was treated like a lover. Like someone’s property. His. To do with as he pleased, whenever he pleased.

Waking up in the middle of the night to be touched, to be used, became my life. I stopped fighting. I stopped questioning. It became… normal. And in that normal, I lost myself.

I existed, but I wasn’t really living. I smiled. I laughed. I went from home to school and back again, wearing a mask I didn’t even know I’d put on. Inside, I created a fairy tale. A world where maybe one day a prince would come and rescue me. Where someone anyone would see me, save me, love me.

But no one came.

And when my therapist asked me what I’d say to that little gir, I froze. Because all this time, I’ve been holding her responsible for the pain we both endured.

But she wasn’t the problem. She was never the problem

What would I say to her?

I didn’t have the words in that moment. But I do now.

This is what I would say to her to the little girl inside me who still needs to hear the truth.

Dear little me,

I see you!

I see how hard you tried to be strong when you shouldn’t have had to be. I see how you stayed silent, how you tried to disappear, how you thought maybe if you changed the way you looked, the way you smelled, the way you existed it might stop.

I want to tell you something I wish someone had said back then: It wasn’t your fault.

Not one bit of it!

You were just a child a little girl doing the best she could to survive in a world that failed her. You didn’t invite it. You didn’t want it. You didn’t understand it, and you shouldn’t have had to. It wasn’t your job to protect yourself. That was the job of the adults around you and they failed you.

You did nothing wrong.

You didn’t deserve what happened. You didn’t deserve to be sent away, left alone with someone who hurt you. You didn’t deserve to be blamed by your own mother, to hear her say, “You must’ve wanted it.”

That wasn’t love. That wasn’t care. And none of it was your fault.

You have carried so much shame, and it doesn’t belong to you. It never did. You were not damaged you were hurt. You were not weak you were surviving.

And still, you are here.

Even now, as a grown woman, I can see you. In the way I hold my children too close. In the way I flinch at certain smells. In the way I freeze on a bus when a memory hits. I see you, and I finally understand: you didn’t need to be stronger. You needed someone to protect you.

And now, that someone is me.

I will not abandon you again. I will not silence you, or shame you, or blame you. I will love you fiercely, gently, and completely. The way you always deserved to be loved.

You were never the problem.

You were always the light.

Love, Me The woman you became, still healing, still here