These past few weeks have been a plethora of revelations.

The first and most striking continues to be the ever-changing nature of human beings. Partially, because it still astounds me that when things are going well, when they’ve plateaued and you’ve been in a good space for a while (ikyk), you somehow forget that getting to that seemingly transcendent zone, required an absolute confrontation of your own fallibility and the immediate need for adaptation and growth to overcome whatever challenges you faced at the time. So, even when you think you’ve finished growing, when you think you’ve reached your peak, when you think “surely no more trials could come my way and crush me making me feel unable to carry on” – you are wrong. There’s always new challenges, there’s always room for more learning, and there’ll always be new things you identify in yourself and adaptations you take up as a result. We are constantly evolving creatures, and honestly, whilst I love realising that I am growing, it’s also fucking annoying too – can I please stop? I am TI RED and I have learnt enough.

Laughable I know.

The second, and one specifically relevant here, is the revelation that I have not been living for myself as much as I thought it was

Well fuck.

I thought I was doing it really well or at least had it mostly figured out, so that one was a slap in the face.

It would also be an easy guess as to where the trigger lies for these revelations, and you would be correct if your guess involved the absolute bane and potentially obsolete aspect of human existence; the man .

As a disclaimer, I’m somewhat on the come-up after feeling like I was thrown to the wolves, so there’s still things to work out and I think part of that is admitting that I don’t think I’ll ever truly have this figured out. But the aim is to keep trying and to do so, requires an acknowledgement of where I may possibly have made some missteps. So this is where I feel a little bit exposed because for context and relatability, I want to be a little bit open about what occurred behind some of these missteps.

The reality is, that instead of choosing myself like I thought I was, my choosing of myself was dependent on having a man (in whatever context) that was choosing me too. Knowing me, knowing my little obsessive, overthinking, dramatic, Pisces self, I thought that if I had a man on the side meeting my sexual and intimacy needs, well, only THEN could I go out and bless the world with all other aspects of me. I was putting my feelings of security and safety on men who I was sharing the briefest of moments with, men who had not earned that right but who most of all, did not even ask for it – let me tell you, when it was good, it was good, but when it wasn’t good …. I cried over all of them at some point, days ruined/not experienced to their full potential due to thoughts and ruminations over the actions of every single one of them and I sure as hell was not living for myself at these times. I allowed these men to control my emotional state and the way I interacted with the world because of the expectations I put on them, which again they did not ask for.

Yes, I am in agreement, men as a whole are trash.

But, I do have to acknowledge, that I; a 28yo, unfortunately heterosexual (though still potentially to be revised) female, eight months out of a long-term relationship, almost nine years out of the last twelve years beholden to another person, three brief interludes/situationships/casual interactions/attempted orgasmic experiences later and I am still out here chugging down dumb bitch juice.

Someone take me to rehab because a sister has not been living for herself and her vagina/vulva/clitoris/erogenous zones has been leading the charge. In fairness, she has been seriously deprived up until recently so there was benefit, it’s definitely not all negative and I would absolutely love to dive deeper into that particular discussion. But for now, let’s stay focussed, we’re acknowledging and identifying missteps because only then can we be in a position to address them and do our best to live fully and whole-heartedly for ourselves.

Stay tuned.