How Fragile this Was

“...I would have spiraled, hidden myself away, and done anything to unhear those words. I had worked my entire life to try to shape your opinion of me, and to avoid - at any and all costs - criticism and judgment...Why? Because I was ashamed.

Ashamed of my body.
Ashamed of my feelings.
Ashamed of my desire to be loved.
Ashamed of my attempts to "get it."
I was ashamed long before I had any reason to be.
And then, eventually, I had reasons to be...
...I was ashamed of who I'd become in my marriage,
I was ashamed of who I was as a mother.
I was ashamed of who I was as a friend.
I was ashamed.”
― Laura McKowen

“I wanted one version of me in the world, instead of the dozens there were.”
― Laura McKowen

“I hadn't noticed the totality of the distance I'd created between us until it was so big that I could physically feel it...

...something within me began to shift. I started to turn away from him, and though I hated myself for it, I didn't know how to stop.

Siting there, with just a few physical feet between us, I thought, I have an entire world inside me that you know nothing about.

With just a few words, I could change that. I could create one reality again, instead of two. But I didn't. I couldn't.

How fragile this was. How powerful. They were just words: sounds I could make with my mouth. But if I never made them, he would never know, And strangely I believed I wouldn't have to know either. I believed if I could only hang on for long enough, eventually it would all disappear inside me, like salt dissolving into water.”
― Laura McKowen