Letting Go

It’s hard to let go of the memories of the person I once was.

For years, I stagnated in the belief that if I just held on tightly enough, I could somehow return to her. That if I refused to let go, I could be her again. I thought about her constantly – the happy, vivacious, full-of-life woman I once was, before illness changed everything.

If you have suffered, you may understand this feeling. It’s a deep, unshakable wound, a permanent scar that alters you forever. I mourned for her, grieved for the death of who I used to be. I would catch glimpses of her in the reflection of my friends’ eyes, but they could not see what I saw. They didn’t know that behind my tired gaze was the understanding that she was gone. They didn’t realise I had changed, that I was now someone different.

I resisted this truth for so long. But eventually, I had to accept that there was no going back. Time does not move backward, and my perspective had shifted too much to ever see life through her again. I had to move forward. The time for mourning was over.

I had to let go.

When you hit bottom, when pain and disease consume your life to the point where you feel like everything has been taken from you – it hasn’t. That is a lie that illness whispers in your ear, but it is not the truth. You are still here. And you are still you.

When I hit my lowest point, when I felt stripped of everything, I realised I had to let go of the old me. Because I was still here. I was a new version of myself – reborn, changed, but still whole in a different way. Yes, I had scars, both inside and out. Yes, I had lost things I once took for granted. But I had also gained something – wisdom, resilience, and a perspective that would guide me forward.

I came to understand that my body, though broken and tired, was still worthy of love – not rejection. I had to shift my focus from loss to gratitude. I had to stop clinging to a dream that only brought pain and disappointment. What good would it do to keep mourning a past that could never return? Was I not already suffering enough? I made a choice – to be kind to myself, to stop looking back, to embrace gratitude for what I still had and what I could still do. I chose to look ahead, to start truly living again.

Wishing to be the person I was before illness is like waiting for a day that will never come. So why waste the days I have now?

By letting go, I found a new kind of freedom. I found peace. I found myself again – not in the past, but in the present. And that is where I choose to live.