There’s a particular kind of surrender that doesn’t feel like giving up, but it also doesn’t feel like determination. It feels like… floatation. Like a leaf that finally falls into the water.

When I married into his family, I truly believed I was stepping into something beautiful. A big family. Loud, lively, connected. The kind of family I hoped would fill the spaces mine never could.

It always started with that question: What’s wrong with me? A question so familiar it carved a permanent groove through my nervous system. I asked it whenever I was misunderstood, mistreated, excluded, blamed, or expected to tolerate the intolerable.

A Step 5 reflection on the pattern of loving men who loved my silence. This piece explores self-abandonment, emotional clarity, and choosing relationships that honor your voice.

For most of my life, I thought reacting and responding were the same thing, just two words for “something happened, and now I’m having a feeling about it.”