So, this isn’t the life I planned.
Ask any typical millennial: our 90s dreams included a four-bedroom house, two kids, and a perfect marriage. That even inspired my first, unpublished novel back in the late 90s.
If you had asked me not that long ago what my story looked like, I would have told you something pretty simple: a family of three, a shared life, a certain kind of future that felt…steady. Expected, even.
But life has a way of editing things without asking.
And now, here I am, turning the next page.
I’m in the middle of a separation and eventual divorce.
Wow! It doesn’t get any easier acknowledging that. Thinking it, saying it out loud, believing it: it means something different each time.
At first, the thought of leaving, of breaking something that, to be honest, was only being held together by threads at one point, raised a certain level of fear within me. How will I raise my child as a single parent? How will we survive on what little income I will eventually earn when I get an entry-level job after being out of the workforce for nearly 15 years? Will my daughter get through life coming from a ‘broken home’ without being damaged? How do I face my own family?
Can I tell you something? Answers didn’t come. What did come was once I started saying it out loud, I started to feel that little bit of confidence that I still had deep inside me wake up. Those close to me, those I confided in, they used their words to embolden me. Give me the strength to dig deep within me and find that superpower called being a badass. Because there was a time long ago when she existed. That feisty, independent, strong, confident woman who left home at sixteen because she wasn’t going to stand for bullying in her home. The woman who moved thirteen thousand kilometres to live the dream in one of the most cosmopolitan cities in the world with one suitcase and a heart of ambition. The woman who travelled solo for years because she wanted to do and see what she wanted, without needing explanation. That woman was a confident, strong person — and my friends reminded me that I will get through this and be that woman again.
That woman who slowly gave more of herself than she should have. The same woman who lost her voice so those around her could be heard, became small so those around her could feel big, and became a shell of herself so those around her could shine. That woman whose eyes hardly shine, who has no laugh lines, and who hardly believes her own worth…
That woman has slowly pulled herself out of the rubble that once was her safe space. And she is rebuilding that space. Day by day. Hour by hour. Slowly curating a life she had once thought she was building with someone who had promised for better or worse. But now building for her and her daughter.
And she is me.
I don’t have a roadmap for this journey I’m on. A journey many, many women before me have travelled.
There’s no five-step plan. No “lessons learned.”
Honestly, most days I’m just figuring it out as I go — one decision, one moment, one small win at a time.
That’s part of why I’m here.
I didn’t start this blog because I have all the answers. I started it because I don’t.
This is a space for the in-between moments.
For the messy middle.
For the days that feel hopeful and the ones that don’t.
For the little, quiet progress that doesn’t always look like progress at all.
This won’t be a place for advice or perfectly wrapped-up stories.
It’s just going to be real life, as it’s happening.
Some days might look like growth.
Some days might look like exhaustion.
Most days will probably be a mixture of both.
But underneath all of it, there’s something steady I’m holding onto:
That this isn’t the end of my story.
It’s just a different chapter.
And I’m still writing it.
Thank you for coming along for the ride.
G
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