Through the Fog

Tag: letting go of the past

  • The Things That Almost Broke Me

    There are things

    I don’t talk about anymore.

    Not because they stopped hurting.

    Because I’ve carried them

    for so long

    they’ve become part of me.

    Old heartbreaks.

    Old mistakes.

    The kind of memories

    that show up uninvited

    and sit quietly

    in the corner of your mind.

    I used to fight them.

    Argue with the past.

    Replay every choice

    like I could somehow

    change the ending.

    But grief

    doesn’t negotiate.

    And regret

    has never listened to reason.

    So eventually

    I stopped asking why.

    Stopped demanding answers

    from things

    that were already over.

    And something strange happened.

    The pain didn’t disappear.

    It just lost its voice.

    It stopped being

    the loudest thing

    in the room.

    Now it feels more like

    an old scar.

    Something I notice

    when the weather changes.

    Something that reminds me

    where I’ve been

    without deciding

    where I’m going.

    Maybe that’s healing.

    Not forgetting.

    Not moving on.

    Just reaching a point

    where the things

    that almost broke you

    no longer get to decide

    who you are.

    Because I am more

    than my worst days.

    More than my failures.

    More than every chapter

    I thought would be

    the end of the story.

    And maybe that’s what survival is—

    looking at everything

    that tried to destroy you

    and realizing

    it didn’t.

  • Burning Bridges of My Memory

    I’ve been burning bridges

    inside my own mind—

    not the ones that lead to people,

    but the ones that lead back

    to who I was with them.

    Setting fire to moments

    I used to walk across

    like they meant something.

    Laughter goes first—

    it’s the easiest to doubt.

    Then the soft parts,

    the almosts,

    the things I held onto

    because they felt real enough

    to keep.

    I tell myself

    it’s necessary.

    That if I leave those paths standing,

    I’ll keep wandering back,

    keep looking for something

    that isn’t there anymore.

    So I light the match.

    Watch memories catch

    quicker than I expect.

    Turns out

    it doesn’t take much

    to turn a past into smoke.

    But the strange thing is—

    even when the bridge is gone,

    even when the fire settles

    and everything falls quiet—

    I still remember

    what it felt like

    to cross it.

    The shape of it.

    The way it held my weight.

    The way it led somewhere

    I thought I’d stay.

    And maybe that’s the truth

    no one tells you—

    you can burn every path

    that leads backward,

    but you can’t erase

    the fact

    that you were once there,

    standing in the middle

    of something

    you believed in.