strongerthanmystorm

You broke me down in more ways than I can count.
And still, somehow, I rose.
Not because of you—but in spite of you.

You say you want me to see my worth, my strength, my beauty.
But you never taught me how.
You only ever taught me how to question myself, how to shrink, how to hurt.
You gave me shame when I needed love.
Silence when I needed protection.
Judgment when I needed grace.

And now, when I’ve fought like hell to find the pieces of myself you tried to erase,
you want to stand at a safe distance and pretend you had a hand in it?

No.
You don’t get to claim the woman I became.
The credit for her healing belongs to her—and only her.

You said I was strong,
but only after watching me break—
after you subconsciously broke and battered every ounce of me.
You didn’t build my resilience;
you forced it into existence.
And then you had the nerve to admire the strength you never nurtured,
as if you had any part in creating it.

You forced your choices to become my reality—
not because they were right,
but because you lacked even a drop of faith in me,
in who I could’ve been,
in the greatness I was born to rise into.

If I’ve made it this far—without being nurtured,
without being encouraged,
without being seen or believed in—
just imagine the reckoning I was meant to be
if I’d ever had consistent parenting.
If I’d ever been lifted instead of dismissed.
If love had been a language I learned, not a wound I had to heal from.

But I am that reckoning anyway.
Because today, I am my own consistency.
Not because I wanted to be—
but because I had no other choice.

When the world went quiet,
when your voice was the only one I had and it told me I was too much or not enough,
I still found a way to survive.
In the darkest of my days,
I scraped and clawed through the wreckage,
just to let in the tiniest slivers of light.

And from those scraps—I built a life.

You said one thing true, months ago:
God gave me the answer.
Even if it wasn’t the one I was praying for.
Even if it came wrapped in grief instead of grace.
But you missed the deeper truth.

You want to dismiss him as just another man in my life,
like all the others you judged without knowing,
as if his presence somehow discredits my growth.
But that man—
even in his flaws,
even in the ways he hurt me—
saw me.

In the first few days we met,
he saw more goodness, more light, more possibility in me
than you’ve seen in 52 years.

And that will always be the difference.
He may have left.
But you were never really there to begin with.

I am forever changed by what his presence brought into my life.
Self-respect.
Slow-building confidence.
A quiet courage I didn’t even know I had.
He didn’t just see me—he accepted me, flaws and all.
He wiped away my fears by simply standing in my corner.
He never tried to fix me.
He was never ashamed or embarrassed of who I was.
And no, he was never my boyfriend—
but the love he gave me was pure, unconditional, and safe.
And I’ve never received anything like that from you.

You don’t get to guilt me.
You don’t get to dangle your love like a threat,
or remind me of what evil you’re capable of if I defy you.
Because the truth is—
even when I followed all your rules,
even when I did everything to earn your approval—
it was still never good enough.

You’ve always looked for what’s wrong with me.
You’ve inherently believed the worst.

So I’m done.
I’m freeing myself from seeking your validation going forward.
Because now, for the first time,
I see the woman I am.

And I know exactly who got her here:
Me.

Not you.
Not your words.
Not your love withheld.

Me.

The woman I’ve become—she was born from truth,
raised in resilience,
and shaped by grace you never offered.

And every day now, I strive to be the best version of myself—
the exact opposite of you.

You have rewritten the past,
leaving out crucial details to paint yourself as the victim—
never taking a damn ounce of accountability for your choices.
But this undoing?
This is your reckoning.
This is the reminder that eventually,
your actions will catch up with you.

I have cut you too much slack as it is.
You've burned the last remaining pieces
of the bridges I rebuilt for the sake of keeping the peace.

You no longer have access to the basics of my life.
You are now simply someone I tolerate on holidays—
and even that is a fragile mercy.
Because you destroyed my peace for so long.

Now, it’s my turn
to do whatever is necessary to protect it.

You want me to believe your card was love?
That your words hold weight?
But words on paper mean nothing
when they don’t come from the heart. #MightyTogether #SpravatoSavedMe
#MentalHealth
#BipolarDepression
#ThisPainHasPurpose
#strongerthanmystorm #EndTheStigma
#recoveryfrominconsistentparenting
#breakinggenerationaltrauma
#imnotafraidanymore
#finallyfoundmyvoice

I never liked having my picture taken growing up. I was bullied a lot—my overbite, the braces, my awkwardness. It all made me want to disappear when someone pulled out a camera. I didn’t feel beautiful, not even close. My mom didn’t help either. She wasn’t the type to hype me up, and she sure as hell wasn’t going to pay for senior pictures. So I just… faded. Into the background. Into the shadows. Into invisibility.

But the strangest thing happened on a hospital bed in Wilmington, Delaware, on May 8th, 1993, sometime between 2 and 4 in the afternoon.

It was the first time I ever felt beautiful.

Not because I looked a certain way. Hell, I had just undergone an emergency C-section. I’d been put under because I could feel them prepping my stomach—pressure and all—and I started to panic. I was scared out of my mind. I was nineteen years old, about to be twenty, and here I was, having surgery for the first time in my life, alone, high on fear and anesthesia, and preparing to say goodbye to a baby I had carried through chaos.

There had been no baby shower. No nursery. No baby book with little milestones. None of the cute, expected moments of joy that mark a first pregnancy.

Only guilt. Only shame. Only secrets. Because I had messed up—I had done drugs while pregnant. And I carried that weight every minute of every day leading up to his birth. I didn’t know if he’d be okay.

When I came to, my mom was sitting beside me. I could barely open my eyes, and the anesthesia had me foggy, but I managed to croak out, “Is he okay?” I needed to know. I needed to hear it. I needed some form of redemption.

Her eyes watered when she said it.
“He’s perfect.”

She told me his APGAR scores were 7.5 or something like that—I didn’t know what it meant. Nobody had explained it to me. Nobody had prepared me for any of this. But her eyes… they told me everything. He was here. And he was safe.

And then they brought him to me.

God. I will never forget what I saw.
This perfect, red-faced, wide-eyed baby.
A round little head with soft brown hair.
And eyes—those deep, searching blue eyes—that locked onto mine like he already knew me. Like he had been waiting just to see my face.

I had never seen anything so beautiful in my entire life.

And in that moment, I remember thinking:
There has to be something beautiful inside of me… because I made that.

He was proof. Living, breathing, perfect proof that I couldn’t be as worthless as I had been led to believe. I couldn’t be all the bad things I had internalized. I had to have something sacred within me to have created something so miraculous. He was the first reflection of beauty I ever truly believed in.

That baby saved me in a way I wouldn’t even understand for decades.

I gave him up for adoption. That was the hardest, most agonizing decision of my life. But before that chapter began—before the grief, the loss, the empty arms—I had this single, eternal moment of clarity:

I was capable of beauty.
I was capable of creation.
I was capable of love so deep it cracked my ribs open and reshaped me.

And for the first time, I saw it.
I saw me.

#amotherslove #whatsyouradoptionstory #anotherbetrayal #SurvivorStory #FromDarknessToLight #mentalhealthmatters #writingtoheal #strongerthanmystorm #ThisPainHasPurpose

The Switch Flipped
by Jenn Dacey

Intro:
This is the exact moment I stopped shrinking myself to fit into places I had outgrown.

Don’t push a good person to the point where they no longer give a fuck.
Because once the switch flips, it’s over.
The softness doesn’t disappear—
it just stops being available to people who took it for granted.
The love doesn’t die—
it just stops being handed out like a goddamn reward for bad behavior.

I was the good person.
The one who stayed too long.
Loved too hard.
Apologized too quickly.
Forgave too easily.

I gave benefit of the doubt like it was oxygen.
I extended grace even when I was gasping.
I showed up for people who forgot me the moment their storms passed.
And every time, I told myself, “That’s just who I am.”

But now?

The switch flipped.

I don’t chase.
I don’t beg.
I don’t overexplain.
If you fumble me, you lose me.
No second act. No soft return. No “maybe they’ll change.”

I’ve changed.

That’s what no one expected.
That I would rise—not bitter, but brutal.
Not angry, but awake.
Not heartless, but healed.

You can’t guilt me into going back.
You can’t charm me into forgetting.
I’m not waiting for closure anymore—I am the closure.

The girl who used to cry for love is gone.
She’s resting now.
She did her job.
She kept me alive.

But I’m driving now.
And I don’t take passengers who can’t handle the weight of my worth.

If you wanted me,
you should’ve shown up for me.
When I cried,
when I begged,
when I whispered “I need you” with every ounce of strength I had left—
that was your moment.

But you let it pass.
You watched me unravel,
and stayed silent.
You mistook my patience for weakness,
my forgiveness for permission.

You thought I’d always be there.
But now?

The door’s locked.
The key?
It was made of things you don’t carry:
accountability.
honesty.
effort.
respect.

I don’t owe anyone my undoing ever again.

You don’t get to miss me now that I’m unavailable.
You don’t get to regret what you lost
when you never fought to keep it.

I’m not ice cold.
I’m just done melting for people
who only liked me when I was easy to pour into a glass.

I loved you.
I wanted it to work.
I dreamed of being enough.

But now I realize—
you weren’t even enough for you.

And I’m not staying small to make you feel big.

I have finally, finally arrived
in the space where my peace matters more than your presence.

So if you’re wondering what happened,
if you’re scrolling through our old messages looking for cracks—
here’s your answer:

The switch flipped.

And I’ll never be that soft again
for someone who made me feel like I was hard to love.

#theswitchflipped #traumahealing
#MentalHealthAwareness #Selfworth #BipolarDepression #Suicide #Grief #FromDarknessToLight
#keepgoing
#WhenNothingElseWorked
#SpravatoHope
#strongerthanmystorm
#writingtoheal
#SpravatoSavedMe

🧺 The Basket of Markers: A Post-Spravato Revelation

Tonight, I got high.
Not just “I’m giggly and everything feels soft” high — I mean clarity high. The kind that creeps up when you’re just living your weird little life, surrounded by your weird little things, and suddenly boom — therapy-level insight smacks you in the face with a Sharpie.

You see, I’m kind of a hoarder. Not the kind they make TV shows about (yet), but close.
Especially when it comes to stuff that makes me happy. Craft supplies. Journaling pens. Markers. Planners. If it comes in all the colors, I want all the colors. And not just want — I obsess. I organize. I keep things forever because I swear to myself, I’m gonna get back into that someday.

I don’t just have one planner.
I have five.
Each has a purpose, a location, and they’re all synced up like the Pentagon of personal organization. That’s how I work. That’s how my brain has always tried to create control out of chaos.

And then there’s my marker collection. We’re talking gel tips, fine points, Sharpies, off-brand craft store specials, and yes — I recently bought a 262-color mega pack because apparently, I like to own coloring even though I do it maybe three times a year.

But here’s the thing.

Tonight, I bought a new basket.
A Longaberger — because yeah, I collect those too.

And instead of separating every marker by brand, as I’ve always done, I put them all together.

Still color-coded (duh — I’m not a monster).
But for the first time, not by brand.

All mixed up.
All in one basket.

And in that quiet little moment, I realized:

This basket is me now.

Before, everything in my life was separated:
🖤 Before trauma / after trauma
🖤 Before the pain / after the breakdown
🖤 Before Owen died / after the world collapsed

I kept it all compartmentalized — like trauma Tupperware. Neatly labeled. Sealed shut. Keep the mess contained.

But since starting Spravato, something shifted.
My thoughts are no longer all-or-nothing.
My identity isn’t black-and-white.
And my healing doesn’t need labels.

Just like those markers, I can exist in the same basket.

The grief.
The growth.
The obsession.
The creativity.
The sadness.
The sparkle.

It all goes together now.

So maybe I’m still a little OCD, and maybe I’ll still color-code by rainbow arc because I like pretty things. But I’m not organizing by trauma anymore.

I’m organizing by joy.
By who I am now.
By what makes sense in this moment.

And that’s not crazy.
That’s recovery.

So yeah, maybe it’s just a stoned night with a bunch of markers and a woven basket…
Or maybe it’s Sigmund Freud meets radical self-love, with a gel pen in hand and a giggle in my throat.

Either way, I’m keeping the damn basket.
And I’m keeping all of me in it.

⸻

By Jenn
🌈 Color-coder of chaos. Hoarder of hope. Marker-wielding warrior.
#postspravatolife #healingoutloud #ocdbutmakeitart

#postspravatolife
#Stillhere
#healingjourney
#EndTheStigma #youarenotalone #FromDarknessToLight
#WhenNothingElseWorked
#GriefIsLoveWithNowhereTo #GriefIsLoveWithNowhereToGo #mentalhealthmatters #SpravatoSavedMe #writingtoheal #strongerthanmystorm #SpravatoHope #healingjourney #EndTheStigma #keepgoing

The Reason I’m Still Here
By Jenn Dacey

For most of my life, I didn’t believe I had a future. I didn’t think I deserved one.
Since I was fifteen, I’ve struggled with severe mental illness — depression, bipolar disorder, and later, borderline personality disorder. The pain was overwhelming, and the darkness relentless. I survived nearly 50 suicide attempts, each one a desperate plea to end the suffering I carried deep inside. For decades, I couldn’t find a reason to stay.
But somehow, I’m still here. And I’ve finally stopped asking why. Now, I’m searching for what for.
Growing up, I never felt seen. I was bullied, silenced, and repeatedly invalidated. I experienced childhood trauma, including abuse by someone who was supposed to be a spiritual protector. No one acknowledged it. No one offered help. That betrayal shattered my sense of safety, trust, and self-worth. I was left to navigate a life I never felt equipped to live — constantly wondering what was wrong with me.
As an adult, I carried that pain into every area of my life. I struggled with addiction, broken relationships, estrangement from my children, and a total loss of identity. I couldn’t hold a job. I couldn’t maintain hope. I lived in survival mode, day after day, with no vision beyond simply enduring the next moment. I was lost.
On May 3 of this year, I made what I believed would be my final attempt to escape the weight of it all. But something happened. I woke up — still intubated — in an ICU bed. It was my 29th documented attempt. But this time was different. I didn’t feel numb or angry. I felt terrified. And then, I felt something I hadn’t felt in years: clarity.
That moment became my turning point. I realized I had to make a choice — not just to stay alive, but to finally take control of my healing. To stop waiting for someone else to fix what was broken and to start becoming the person I needed all along.
Seven weeks after that moment, I enrolled in community college. I chose Human Services as my major, with a focus on Drug and Alcohol Counseling. For the first time, I set goals — real ones. I met with my advisor. I planned my schedule. And I began to believe that maybe, just maybe, I could build a life rooted in purpose, not pain.
I also completed a Partial Hospitalization Program and finally started offering myself the grace I’ve always extended to others. For so long, I thought healing meant hiding my past. Now I know that true recovery means integrating it — using it as fuel, not a weight.
I’ve spent years in therapy, and while some tools helped, many didn’t go deep enough. I’m now exploring new, research-backed treatments like Spravato — an FDA-approved esketamine nasal spray for treatment-resistant depression. I’m no longer ashamed of needing help. In fact, it’s one of the bravest things I’ve ever done.
Today, I’m not just surviving. I’m rebuilding — piece by piece — a version of myself I never thought I’d get to meet. I’m learning to trust my instincts, speak my truth, and take up space in a world I used to believe didn’t want me in it.
This journey hasn’t been linear, and it’s far from over. I still grieve. I still long for reconciliation with my children. I still face hard days. But the difference now is that I don’t face them alone — and I don’t face them without hope.
If you’re reading this and you’ve ever felt invisible, voiceless, or too broken to begin again—please hear me when I say: it’s not too late.
You are not too far gone.
You are not beyond help or healing.
I’m living proof.
I used to believe I was born with a curse—to suffer.
Now I know: I was spared the curse, so I could serve.
To share.
To save—if only one person sees themselves in these words and chooses to stay one more day.
I don’t have all the answers.
But I have a reason now.
And every morning I wake up, I choose to live like I’ve been given one more chance to find out what that reason is—and to live it out loud.

#mentalhealthmatters #stillmatters #SurvivorStory #ThisPainHasPurpose
#healingjourney #Grief #ThisIsWhy #EndTheStigma #LiveAnotherDay #FromDarknessToLight #keepgoing #WhenNothingElseWorked #Spravato #strongerthanmystorm #SpravatoHope #writingtoheal