Ashes to Ink

Ashes to Ink For the ones who never feel heard...im screaming for you.

08/03/2025

“Now You Know”

You called me a burden
when the weight wasn’t yours to carry.
Rolled your eyes at my struggle,
sighed when I asked for a ride.
Like my existence was
an inconvenience
you barely tolerated.

You watched me drown
and handed me stones instead of a life raft.
Smirked behind the wheel,
pretending you were doing me a favor
while making sure I felt small.

But now look at you
stuck.
Stranded.
Asking for help with the same cracked voice
I once used.

Now you know what it’s like
to be humbled by circumstance,
to watch your pride crumble
on the side of the road.
To need, and be met with silence.
To realize help is not a weakness
but making someone feel weak for needing it is.

I won’t say a word.
Because silence
was what you taught me.

And now you wear my shoes.
They never did fit you right anyway.

08/02/2025

And Still, I Rise From It All”

They don’t know the weight I carry.
Not the ache in my chest when the house is too quiet,
or the storm that still echoes in my bones
from a man I called “husband”
who only saw me as something to break.

Years ago, I wore white.
But it wasn’t purity or joy.
it was surrender.
Even his mother warned me.
Told me I didn’t have to do it.
But trauma can look a lot like love
when you’ve been taught to beg for it.

He took everything.
Friends.
Family.
Freedom.
He tracked my steps like I was a fugitive
from my own life.
He blew up my phone if I breathed without permission,
and still managed to make me feel
like I wasn’t enough to keep.

He cheated.
with the girl next door.
Close enough to smell his betrayal
through our window.
And when I asked why,
he said I couldn’t give him children.
Like my infertility was a flaw
and not a wound he pressed his ego into.

He drank like the world was ending every night.
Three 30-packs deep and still standing.
But not to hold me
just to tower over me,
glass in one hand, blame in the other.
He hid pills,
hit me with hands and words,
and once
slammed my head through the wall.
My blood on the floor
His silence on repeat.

I left a year ago.
Not because I wasn’t afraid
but because I finally decided
I was worth saving.
But the pain didn’t end there.
There was her.
and all the chaos she dragged behind her.

A “friend” who turned healing into drama,
who twisted truth and painted herself the victim.
Who broke what she couldn’t control
and talked when I stayed silent
because my silence said more
than her mouth ever could.
I’ve been the villain in stories I never wrote,
the one blamed for boundaries,
for walking away,
for protecting my peace.

They never see the war it takes
to keep showing up
when no one shows up for you.

But then there’s him.
The one who found me
when I was still brushing the ash from my shoulders.
He didn’t ask for perfection
just honesty.
He didn’t demand healing
he held space for the mess.
He doesn’t flinch when I cry.
He doesn’t punish me for the ghosts in my closet.
He simply stays.
And that’s all I ever needed.

I have my animals.
My chaos.
My memories.
My scars.
My strength.
I’m still a little angry.
Still a little guarded.
But I’m here.
I’m whole.

And I’m done letting people take pieces of me
just because they smile when they ask.
I survived a husband who tried to destroy me.
I survived fake friends who tried to replace me.
I survived silence, shame, violence,
and the weight of being told I was too much
or not enough.
And now?
Now I rise
with every damn thing they said would break me.

08/02/2025

“If This Isn’t Borderline, Then What the Hell Is It?”

I haven’t been diagnosed,
but every symptom wears my face.
I read the list like it’s a diary I don’t remember writing
unstable moods,
abandonment issues,
black-and-white thinking,
rage that turns into guilt that turns into shame
that turns into silence
so loud I can’t sleep.

I haven’t been seen by a doctor,
but I’ve seen myself.
Late at night,
crying over things I shouldn’t feel this deeply,
screaming at walls inside my head
because no one can hear the chaos without calling it crazy.

I get attached too fast.
I push people away too soon.
I beg for closeness and then flinch when I get it.
I test people,
then break when they fail.
And they always fail.

If this isn’t borderline,
then what is this thing that makes me hate myself
even in moments of joy?
I can be laughing
and still planning an escape in my mind.
I can be in love
and still convinced they’ll leave the second I let my guard down.
I can look fine
beautiful, even
and still be a walking apology.

I’m sorry for being too much.
I’m sorry for needing too much.
I’m sorry for being sorry
and still not stopping the patterns
that ruin everything I touch.
People say,
“You’re self-aware, that’s good.”
But being aware of the monster inside you
doesn’t mean you can stop it from breaking the furniture.
It just means you hate yourself
while it happens.

And still… I hesitate to get help.
Because what if I’m wrong?
What if they say,
“It’s not BPD. You’re just dramatic.”
What if they dismiss me like everyone else has?
What if they look at me
the way I already look at myself?
Like a burden.
Like a mess.
Like a storm that doesn’t deserve to be survived.

I don’t want to be labeled,
but I’m tired of guessing.
Tired of managing a disorder
I’m not allowed to claim
because I don’t have the paperwork to prove
what I live with every. single. day.
I am sick of second-guessing my pain.
Sick of apologizing for being built out of broken glass and gasoline.

I want help.
I want answers.
But most of all
I want to believe I’m not this disorder.
That somewhere beneath the wreckage,
there’s still a version of me
that’s more than survival.
More than diagnosis.
More than the worst parts of her brain.

And maybe,
someday,
she’ll be seen
and still be loved.

08/02/2025

The Woman Beneath the Weight"

I am the body that moves
so no one else has to.
I am the hands that clean,
the feet that ache,
the spine that bends
so this house doesn’t break.
I work ten hours a day.
Six days a week.

And still,
I come home
to a battlefield of undone things
that all wait for me
like it’s my duty
to hold the world together
with bleeding fingers
and no applause.
You sit.
I serve.
You rest.
I unravel.
And no one notices.

You think because you pay the bills
I am paid in comfort.
But I am not.
There is no paycheck
for the woman who feeds the animals,
folds the shirts,
scrubs the same spot on the floor
three times a week
while her spirit rots beneath the routine.

You say you’re tired.
I believe you.
But my tired
has fangs.
It bites through bone.
It creeps into joy
and chews it to pulp
until I forget what peace even feels like.
This isn’t balance.
This is survival.
And I’m barely making it.

I need more than money.
More than “thank you.”
I need your hands next to mine
when the kitchen is chaos.
I need your eyes to see
that I’m not okay.
Because I’m not.

I am breaking in quiet ways.
You don’t hear the screaming
because it isn’t loud.
It’s the silence after I clean the whole house
and no one notices.
It’s the moment I sit down
only to remember
something else needs me.

It’s the empty bed I lie in
next to someone
who doesn’t see the version of me
that is slowly dying
under the weight of being everything.

If I vanished tomorrow,
the trash would pile.
The animals would wait.
The house would ache.
And maybe then
you’d understand what I was carrying
with a smile
that stopped being real a long time ago.

08/02/2025

I Want to Believe This Time"

Last night,
you looked at me differently.
You reached for me
not with expectation,
but softness.
You tried to love me
with your hands,
with your voice,
with little gestures
that said,
I see you now.

And I wanted to believe it.
God, I wanted to.
Because your touch felt warm.
Your eyes held something gentler.
And for a moment,
the ache I’ve been carrying
settled into something softer.

This morning,
you got up before me.
Cooked.
Cleaned.
Moved through the house
like someone trying
to lift the weight off my shoulders.
And I saw it.
Every bit of it.
The way you tried.
The way you looked at me
like maybe you understood now.

And I want to hold onto that.
But there’s a voice inside me
whispering,
Don’t get too comfortable.
Because I’ve seen this before.
The surge of care
that lasts just long enough
to calm the storm,
before everything slips
back into silence
and I go back to cleaning
while you rest.

So I am caught in the in-between.
Grateful,
and guarded.
Hopeful,
and hurt.
I don’t want to doubt you.
But doubt has built a home inside me
after so many nights
where I cried in silence
while you looked for things
that mattered more than my voice.

And now that you’re listening,
now that you’re here
I want to believe it’s real.
I want to believe
that this isn’t a moment.
That it’s a beginning.
But I’m tired of rebuilding myself
in the quiet spaces
you forget to fill.

So please
don’t let this be temporary.
Don’t show me what it could feel like
and then take it away.
I’ve been holding this house together
for so long.
I just want to know
you’re staying
to hold some of it with me.

08/02/2025

She Watched, and I Remember"

I remember being small
and scared
and screamed at
by hands that hit me
And left bruises.
I remember the quiet that followed.
How it wrapped around the house
like a fog.
Thick.
Still.
And full of things no one dared name.

She watched from across the room.
My mother.
Eyes wet,
but body still.
Like if she didn’t move,
the damage might pass over.
She looked sorry.
So sorry.
But her silence was a choice
she made every time
he slammed the door
or made my heart shrink into itself.

I know now
she was breaking, too.
That her voice was stolen
long before mine ever tried to rise.
That her strength
wasn’t gone—
it was buried
under years of being told
she didn’t matter either.

Still…
I was a child.
And children don’t understand
that survival can look like betrayal
when your mother doesn’t save you.
Years passed.
The pain grew up with me.
So did the distance.

But something shifted
slowly,
quietly,
like light creeping in
under a locked door.
I got older.
He softened.
Maybe age took the sharp out of his words,
or maybe he finally saw
what he’d carved into the walls of our silence.

He started asking questions
he once would’ve mocked.
He started listening
without the weight of control in his voice.
We sat across from each other
with years between us
some full of hurt,
some full of hope.

And we began again.
Not in the way children dream of,
but in the way survivors do
cautious,
slow,
but willing.

There are still parts of me
he’ll never fully understand.
Still moments I carry
that he can’t name.
But there’s a version of him now
that reaches out,
and a version of me
that doesn’t pull away.
That has to count for something.

08/02/2025

"What I Learned in the Silence Between Screams"

My childhood was loud
in all the wrong ways.
Shouts echoing through walls
too thin to protect me.
Doors slamming like gunshots.
Glass breaking in rooms
I wasn’t allowed to leave.

They fought like they were enemies.
Two people in love
with the idea of being right
more than being gentle.
Fists, words, things
it all got thrown.
And I watched.

Too young to know
if this was normal.
Too scared to ask.
They hit each other
like it meant something.
Like it would end the war.
But it only ever started new ones.
Always louder,
always uglier.

They threatened to die.
Over and over.
“I’ll kill myself.”
“I’ll drive off this road.”
“I’ll put a bullet in my head
and you’ll be sorry.”
They said those things
with me in the room.
Like I wasn’t there.
Like I wasn’t a child
with ears that never forgot
and a heart that broke
too early to heal properly.

And I thought
maybe love is pain.
Maybe love is loud.
Maybe love always leaves bruises,
even if you can't see them.
I grew up thinking
love had a temper.
That screaming meant passion
and silence meant danger.

I didn’t learn peace.
I learned how to stay quiet.
How to freeze.
How to disappear
into corners of my mind
where no one was bleeding
and no one said they wanted to die
just to win a fight.

And now,
as an adult,
I still flinch at loud voices.
I still brace for impact
when someone says "we need to talk."
I still carry the echo of
“You made me want to end it all.”
like it was a lullaby I was raised on.

My parents didn’t just fight.
They broke things
I’m still trying to fix.

08/02/2025

"The Child They Couldn’t Control"

I was the wild one.
The loud one.
The one who talked too much,
laughed too loud,
forgot her homework,
and got punished
like I’d broken the world.
They didn’t know what to do with me.
So they tried to break me.

I remember the paddle.
How he made it himself.
Crafted wood into weapon
and called it discipline.
Said it was my fault
for being difficult.
For being a kid
with a voice he didn’t want to hear.

He beat me
until my legs were a map
of every bruise he thought I deserved.
Back and thighs painted
black and blue
like some kind of lesson.

But all I learned
was that love in our house
came with fear.
I got kicked out once
for not waking up at 7am
to clean a house
I didn’t mess up.
As if being tired
was rebellion.
As if not being perfect
made me disposable.

I was always in trouble
for small things
the way I breathed,
the way I questioned,
the way I couldn’t sit still
in a home built on control.
I was never the golden child.
Never the quiet one.
Never the one they could mold.

So they labeled me broken
instead of asking
what broke me.
I wasn’t wild.
I was wounded.
I wasn’t defiant.
I was desperate
to be seen
without being hit for it.
They didn’t raise me
they survived me.
And I survived them.

But there’s a version of me
still stuck in that room,
trying to figure out
why being herself
was enough to deserve
bruises,
shame,
and silence.

She still cries sometimes.
But I hold her now.
And I tell her..
you weren’t the problem my dove
You were just a child
who needed gentleness.
And they failed you.

08/02/2025

I Married a "man"

Years ago today,
I walked down the aisle
with hands that shook
and a voice in my head whispering,
“ you dont have to do this.”
Even your mother knew.
She told me I could still walk away.
But I didn’t.
And I’ve hated myself for that.

I married a "man"
who wore a mask so well,
even I began to forget what the truth looked like.
A man who didn’t love me
he owned me.
He took everything from me.
Piece by piece.
Friend by friend.
Family by family member
I married a "man" who pulled the world away from me
until I was standing on a ledge of loneliness,
and the only voice I could hear
was his.
I married a "man"
Who didn't need chains because
his love was the prison.
If I left the house, he followed with rage.
If I stayed, I suffocated.

I married a "man"
who told me he could find someone better.
Said it often,
like a lullaby meant to kill me slowly.
He made sure I knew I wasn’t enough
especially because I couldn’t give him a child.
My infertility was his favorite knife.
He twisted it in silence, in arguments,
in drunken rants where he slurred “barren”
like it was my name.

I married a "man"
Who found someone else..
the girl next door.
So close, I could see her porch from our window.
While I begged him to come home sober,
he gave her the version of him I begged for.
when words didn’t satisfy his cruelty,
he gave it form.
Hands.
Fists.
blood on my clothes,
shame in my lungs that choked the scream
I didn’t have the strength to let out.
He drank until there was nothing left of him
but slurred insults and shaking hands.

I married a "man"
Who drinks Three 30-packs a night.
Every night.
And he’d still be standing.
Still blaming me for his downfall.
Still hiding pills in places I didn’t find
until after the papers were signed.

I married a "man" whom I divorced
Not because I stopped loving him
but because I started loving myself
just enough
to crawl away from the wreckage.
I left with nothing but a heartbeat and a name.
And somehow… that was enough.

Because now.
Now I know what real love feels like.
Now I have a MAN
who holds me like I’m made of something soft.
A man who never raises his voice,
except to laugh beside me.

A man who never weaponizes my past,
but kisses the scars and calls them strength.
He doesn’t drink to forget
he remembers everything I tell him.
He doesn’t cheat,
because he knows loyalty isn’t hard
when you’re finally where you belong
He tells me I’m enough,
even when I’m quiet.
Even when I’m crying.
Even when I still flinch from the ghost of hands
that haven’t touched me in a year.
He reminds me every day:
I didn’t deserve what happened to me.

But I deserve every bit of what I have now.
Two years ago today, I married a "man".
I made the worst decision of my life.
But a year ago,
I made the bravest.
And today?
I am free.
I am loved.
And I am finally, finally, home.

Address

Las Vegas, NV

Website

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