Integrating Dysfunction

March 30, 2026

I wrote this back in early November 2025 during the time I had taken my website down while I was processing all the emotions and grief that I experienced after having attended a 90 minute training that my ex had co-led. That was the longest we had been in that close of proximity in months and it brought up so much inside of me.

I don't know why I didn't share it back then but recognizing and naming the dysfunction has been an integral part of my recovery, and so important in helping me not carry shame that never belonged to me.

Written November 9, 2025

Integrating Dysfunction

I have wrestled for months with the cognitive dissonance of what happened to me —

the whiplash between memory and reality,

between the love I believed in and the truth I finally saw,

between the man I thought I knew and the man he actually is.

I loved deeply — the life, the story, the illusion — all of it.

And still, my body sometimes longs for the familiar ache,

the rhythm of the cycle,

the comfort of what hurt me.

Even now, I catch myself missing the abusive love —

the kind that starved and soothed in the same breath.

Ninety minutes in close proximity to him

was all it took to reawaken the craving —

my nervous system remembering the pattern,

my heart remembering the hope.

It was nearly detrimental:

the collision of old longing with new truth.

So I am spending time with myself,

naming the dysfunction

until it becomes truth in my bones,

in my breath,

in the air I live inside.

I name the withholding —

emotional neglect disguised as busyness,

dressed up as importance and responsibility.

I name the stoicism and logic —

the kind that looked like strength

but was rooted in absence,

and was weaponized to make my emotions feel like flaws.

I name the victimhood —

the way he positioned himself as a man just wanting to be liked,

quietly carrying the story of a loveless marriage,

so that when I told him I was hurting,

or asked for reassurance after other women entered the picture,

it became something he had to defend against

instead of something he was responsible for.

I name the control —

the performance of goodness concealing the absence of empathy.

I name the lies —

the omissions, the half-truths, the shifting stories.

I name the triangulation —

how love became competition and connection became currency.

I name the emptiness —

the void that mimicked depth but could not sustain intimacy.

I name the mask —

polished, charming, and hollow.

I name the words —

the promises of safety,

the encouragement to speak when I was hurting,

the statements that we could work through anything —

words that made it feel safe to trust

but were not supported by how he actually showed up

or what he was doing when I wasn’t around.

And I name the selfishness —

the callous choices, the childlike cruelty,

the way he mistook power for love and manipulation for care.

I name the ignorance —

and how profoundly he underestimated me.

Each time I name it, I integrate a little more.

Each time I remember what it was — and what it was not —

the longing loses some of its power.

Because the truth is this:

I have been on a quest to be healthy enough for healthy love —

to be the kind of woman who attracts and sustains it.

I’ve broken patterns, changed my behavior,

defined my standards and non-negotiables,

and begun enforcing boundaries that honor me.

That quest is what led me to him —

and ultimately, what helped me escape.

I am not deviating from my path.

My worth is inherent, unshakable, divine.

I know that real love — safe, mutual, consistent — will find me in time.

And in the meantime,

I am learning to love my own company

the way I once loved the dream.

This is what healing looks like now:

not erasing the love,

but reclaiming the truth beneath it.

Not denying the bond,

but breaking the spell of dysfunction that kept it alive.

I am integrating dysfunction —

so I no longer crave what disempowers me,

so my nervous system learns safety

that doesn’t require self-abandonment,

so my body recognizes peace as peace,

not as boredom or loss.

And someday soon,

when I stand in the presence of someone truly healthy and worthy of me,

I’ll recognize it instantly —

not as a miracle,

but as my new normal.

And it will be exactly as it was divinely designed to be.