Peace is such a gentle thing. It did not arrive loudly, it did not force itself into my life… It settled quietly, like calm after a storm. And for a moment, everything felt okay… Manageable… Steady.
But now losing my peace of mind?
That does not feel gentle at all. That feels like I am drowning without water. Like my chest is tight, my thoughts are loud, and there is nowhere to run even though I am standing still.
And what hurts the most is knowing I opened the door myself…
I gave chances. Not because I was weak, but because my heart still believes in people, still hopes, still tries to see the best, it is a dangerous trait, but I guess that is what made my mom a good woman who was used and abused and I followed in her footsteps… I tell myself maybe this time things would be different. Maybe this time I would magically not end up feeling like this.
But here i am again… Drained.
Listening, absorbing, carrying… Whilst silently breaking.
It is a different kind of pain and that made me realise that my own well-being has never been apart of the equation. When everything revolves around someone else, their emotions, their struggles, their choices, and I am just expected to understand, to be there, to make space… Even when I have nothing left within myself.
And I sit here wondering…
How does one choose something, then cry about those very choices every day?
Cry wolf, when there is no wolf insight?
How am I supposed to keep pouring into a situation that is clearly hurting me… And then there is the expectation of having to hold a pity party project…
It is confusing. It is heavy. It is morally unfair.
Because while they are expressing everything…
I am suppressing everything.
And slowly, my peace is starting to slip through my fingers.
And just when i think i have shouldered enough… Life finds another way off knocking me down.
A voice from the past. A voice I reached out to many a time, but got no response.
An unfinished story that was never mine to complete.
I answer the call as the caller was familiar, Assalamu Alaikum Mumtaaz, I am calling regarding your moms outstanding debt, and suddenly I am standing in a space I did not choose, being told about something left behind, something unsettled. Something that now, somehow, feels like it belongs to me.
And I paused… Not because I did not understand, but because I understand too well.
I remember reaching out once before, trying to do the right thing, trying to close doors with dignity… And there was no time for me then. No space. No urgency.
But now? Now it matters.
And so I do what you always do.
I stand up.
I take responsibility.
I carry what was never mine to carry.
Not because it is easy.
But because my heart refuses to let someone I loved be questioned, even in their absence.
And still… A question lingers quietly inside me…
Why do I always have to circle back to people who never made space for me?
Why do they only return when it is convenient… when it costs me something?
It feels like I am being pulled backwards when I have been trying so hard to move forward. Like just when i began to rebuild my life, something reaches out from the past and tugs at me, unraveling the little peace i was holding onto.
It is honestly exhausting… Living a life like this.
Constantly recovering.
Constantly fixing.
Constantly having to be the one who steps up when no one else wants too.
I have started missing silence in a way that feels almost desperate. Missing being alone, not because it was perfect, not because it did not have its own struggles, but because at least there, I could hear myself think. At least there, my energy belonged to me.
Now, it feels like I am constantly “on.”
Constantly needed.
Constantly absorbing.
And even care… Even kindness… Is starting to feel overwhelming when my soul is desperately begging for space.
There is a quiet kind of exhaustion that comes from being emotionally available all the time. From having no room to just be. No room to fall apart. No room to breathe without someone else’s emotions keep filling the air around me…
And the truth is I almost afraid to admit is this…
I do not want more noise.
I do not want more conversations.
I do want to keep explaining myself.
I just want to be alone.
Not because I do not care.
Not because I am cold.
But because I am really tired… Deeply tired… In a way that sleep cannot fix. I am are trying to hold on to the last pieces of my peace before they disappear completely.
And that feeling? It is terrifying.
Because once my peace is gone, everything will become heavier. My thoughts, my emotions, my reactions… Even the smallest things begin to feel like too much.
So this is not me being distant.
This is not me being difficult.
This is me trying to protect what little calm I have left inside me.
I am allowed to step away.
I am allowed to choose silence.
I are allowed to reclaim my space without guilt sitting on my chest.
It is now beginning to eat at my peace… And this is a cost I am not going to pay, not again…
And I deserve a life where my mind is not at war with itself.
Where my heart is not constantly on edge.
Where my existence does not feel like survival every single day.
I deserve to feel like myself again.
And if being alone is what brings me back to that… Then maybe being alone is not something to fear.
Maybe it is not loneliness.
Maybe… It is the only place left where I can finally breathe.
