As a woman,
I carry both the softness I was never taught
and the strength I had to build alone.
As a girl growing up,
I searched for a mirror
in faces that never quite reflected me.
I needed a mentor,
someone steady,
someone sure,
someone to say, this is how you hold yourself together
when life tries to pull you apart.
There were questions I swallowed whole,
lessons I learned too late,
and wounds that might have healed cleaner
if guided hands had been there first.
So much could have been avoided—
the silence,
the second-guessing,
the way I mistook survival for direction.
I often sit with the thought
of who I might have been—
how differently I might have moved,
loved,
chosen,
if I had someone to connect with,
to confide in,
to remind me I wasn’t too much
or not enough,
just becoming.
But life does not rewind itself
for the sake of what-ifs.
So now,
as a woman,
I gather every lesson, every ache, every truth
I had to learn the hard way—
and I soften it.
I become the voice I needed.
The presence I searched for.
The guidance I went without.
Now I need to be that
for someone.
Not perfect,
not whole in every place,
but willing—
and that is enough to begin.
