When Shadows Return

This afternoon, I noticed a name I hadn’t seen in years, silently viewing my business’ Instagram story.

It belonged to someone who once held a haunting place in my life. Just seeing the name again sent a quiet, unmistakable shiver through my nervous system. He was uninvited, unwelcome, and unsettling — but also a painfully familiar energetic signature

He wasn’t the first to break my trust, but he was the first to cross a boundary that fractured something sacred. That moment was the beginning of a longer thread, one I wouldn’t begin to untangle until years later, a pattern far too common, especially among young women who were left unprotected in the early 2000s. Back then, language was vague, accountability was rare, and the burden of blame fell, almost always, on the woman.

I couldn’t name what had happened, I rationalized and I minimized. I tried to justify the ache in my chest. I thought maybe if we stayed together, it would be romantic rather than painful, making it less real, or at least less wrong. Maybe this was just how things were, maybe I was overreacting, or maybe this was normal.

So I stayed too long. I forgave too easily. I confused trauma-bonding with true love.

He lingered for years — dropping in and out as it suited him, breadcrumbing enough false hope to keep me emotionally tiedup, while holding his heart just out of reach. When I finally walked away, it wasn’t because of one catastrophic betrayal — it was the slow erosion of repeated absences, emotional neglect, and a dishonesty so casual it bordered on cruelty.

When I finally left, it was because something within me refused to stay small any longer.

He had used my kindness and exploited the purity of my love for his own gratification. He never really saw me or chose me.

Now, years later, his quiet return through a screen — just watching — felt like an old echo trying to reenter a room that no longer exists.

I am not the innocent girl I once was.

I no longer shrink in the face of discomfort. I don't confuse attention for affection. I don’t require an apology or even accountability — I know what happened, he knows what happened, and the world has shifted since #MeToo.

Let this be said without venom, but with clarity: You may watch, but you will not find who you left behind. You may remember her, but you do not know the woman I’ve become.

The version of me you once knew has been alchemized. I now live in a space of sanctity you cannot enter. I carry gold forged in the fires of healing. I walk with God, rebuilt from the wreckage others tried to bury me in.

If you’ve ever felt that sting, that sudden recognition of someone who once trespassed your body, your mind, your soul — please know: your reaction is not a regression, your reaction is ancient protection. Honor that.

To every woman who has ever been watched by the past: You are not what happened to you, you are who you chose to become. This is a sacred path, the work of those brave enough to face their name and charge ahead. No shadow can follow where light has been sovereignly reclaimed.

Curious how I guide women through a ninety-day spiritual rebirth that changes everything?  Begin here.