A note before you begin

If you’re here, you’re probably tired. Maybe a little raw. Maybe wondering if you’re the problem, or if you’re asking for too much, or if it’s too late to start again. I want you to know, before anything else: you are not crazy, you are not broken, and you are absolutely not alone.

This little corner of the internet is for people who have carried more than their share, said “I’m fine” when they weren’t, and stayed far longer than was safe or fair because they loved deeply and hoped things would change. If that’s you, I’m so glad you found your way here.

My story, and why I write about choosing yourself

My name is Anu, and I started blogging back in 2015. At the time, I was still in my first marriage. I didn’t have a big plan. I was just practising writing, putting a few quiet thoughts into the world and hoping maybe someone out there might relate.

On the outside, my life looked steady. I had been married for many years, I did what I was “supposed” to do, and I tried very hard to keep the peace. On the inside, I lived with a constant knot in my stomach. That marriage, which lasted 27 years, was unhealthy, toxic and emotionally abusive.

For most of those 27 years, I believed it was my fault. If I could just be calmer. Kinder. Quieter. Less sensitive. Less “difficult.” I twisted myself into shapes to make things work, and when it still wasn’t enough, the blame always seemed to land on me. I carried that blame like a second skin.

In July 2016, my first marriage ended. After 27 years, everything I had built my life around was suddenly gone. I left with absolutely nothing and had to rebuild my life from the ground up. It was terrifying. It was also the beginning of me realising something I had never allowed myself to believe: it wasn’t my fault.

That realisation didn’t arrive neatly, with a bow on it. It came slowly, in waves. In therapy appointments. In long walks. In late-night crying and early-morning courage. It came as I started to learn what emotional abuse actually looks like, and how hard it is to see it clearly when you are the one living inside it.

I kept writing through all of this. At first, I wrote to bring awareness to others in toxic or emotionally abusive relationships. I wanted to give words to the things I had felt but couldn’t explain for so long. I wanted to help people gain clarity, because when you are in the middle of it, you often can’t see what’s really happening to you.

Over time, my blog began to change, just as I did. I realised that leaving an abusive relationship isn’t the end of the story. It’s the beginning of a very different one: learning to choose yourself, sometimes for the first time in your life. Not just in love, but in work, friendships, family, boundaries, self-worth, and the quiet, everyday ways you either abandon yourself or stand beside yourself.

Now I write about choosing yourself in all areas of life — in your work, in your relationships, in how you speak to yourself, in how you stand up for yourself even when your voice shakes. I don’t write from a place of having it all figured out, but from the middle of it, as someone walking this path with you.

Today, my life looks very different. This December, my current husband and I will have been together 10 years. We married in February 2022, and this marriage is healthy and loving in ways I didn’t know were possible. We talk. We listen. We repair. There is respect and safety here.

I want you to know this part of my story because it matters: there is life after leaving. There is love after leaving. Not perfect, not without its own hard days, but real, kind, steady love. If you can’t see that for yourself yet, hold onto the possibility that it exists. Borrow my hope until you find your own.

Who this blog is for

If any of this feels familiar, you are in the right place. This blog is for you if you:

• Have ever blamed yourself for someone else’s behaviour
• Are in, or recovering from, a toxic or emotionally abusive relationship
• Are learning to put yourself first without drowning in guilt
• Want gentle encouragement to keep going through hard seasons
• Need to know, deep down, that you are not the only one going through this

You don’t have to call what you went through “abuse” if that word doesn’t sit right with you yet. You don’t have to have left. You don’t have to have it all sorted out. You are welcome here exactly as you are, even if all you can manage today is to read quietly and breathe.

Start with these posts

If you’re not sure where to begin, these pieces will give you a gentle introduction to what I write about here:

• Yes, it hurts… — for the days when the pain feels like too much and you need someone to sit in it with you.
• It’s not you, it’s them… — to help you untangle your worth from someone else’s behaviour.
• When words are not enough… — for when apologies keep coming but nothing really changes.
• A sneak peek over the fence — a little glimpse of what life can look like on the other side.

Wherever you are today — still inside a hard situation, freshly out, or years into rebuilding — I am cheering you on. You have already survived so much. You are allowed to choose yourself now.

With love,
Anu