“No, you don’t punch them,” I told her quickly. “You just keep saying no.”
“Fine.”
“And what do you do if someone offers you candy?” I asked.
“I tell them no, thank you, and then I ask you for candy when I get home because I missed out on candy because of my stupid allergy.”
“That’s fair.” I could give in to that compromise. “And do you touch other people’s food?”
“Nope.”
“Good.” Leaning down, I kissed the crown of her head. “I know it sucks—”
“It sucks so much!” She let out a dramatic sigh.
“I know, little love,” I said. “It’s not fun, but we have to go through it all to make sure you’re safe.”
We sat there for a while longer, going through our EpiPen plan—including where she’d store it, what to say to her classmates if they had questions, and how to handle random interactions with teachers. I walked her through the phone conversations I’d had with the school nurse and her teacher, reassuring her that everyone was on board.
While I knew she hated the inconvenience, I also knew that having all the information made her feel a little safer, and that was all that mattered.
After Aria was asleep, I retired to my office. It was the only room in the house that wasn’t done. The bookshelves were up, but my books were still in their boxes on the ground. Some of my art was hanging, and some were leaning against the wall. My client binders were out and organized, and my desk was neatly put together.
It was progress. I just struggled to put the final pieces together. When it came to taking care of anything related toAria, I was on top of it. Unfortunately, I wasn’t nearly as good at putting that same effort in for myself.
Healing was a messy thing. No one really told you that when you started your journey. Everyone talked about growth, breakthroughs, and what it would mean to become a better version of yourself. What they didn’t talk about was the in-between… that part where you were painfully aware of every flaw and every scar, but you hadn’t quite figured out how to live with them yet.
Therapy helped, and so did my daily medication. Most days, I could feel the difference. The constant hum of anxiety was gone, leaving me calmer than I’d ever been in my life, and I caught myself before my old habits could get the better of me now.
But nothing could prepare me for how raising my daughter would bring me face to face with all the truly awful things about my childhood—the ones I’d softened in my head because I had to in order to survive.Like how love was conditional.The list of conditions had twisted and changed depending on my mother’s needs or desires. I carried that weight without realizing it and applied it to every relationship in my life. I let it shape how I interacted with people, turning me into a people-pleaser, putting my personality on the line.
From the moment Aria was born, I knew I didn’t want that for her. I wanted my daughter to be loved for exactly who she was, but moreover, I wanted her tofeelit. To give her that, I had to change. I had to be better.
I knew how to be better for her. I knew how to let her be herself, how to make her feel seen and heard, how to build her up, and how to help her feel safe. But I was still figuring out how to show up like that for myself.
It was messy, but I was trying.
Exhaling slowly, I opened my laptop and logged into my telehealth account. My therapist, Olivia, was a godsend with howshe worked with my schedule. I was down to therapy every other week or as needed, but I hated doing my appointments when Aria was awake. I wanted to give her as much of my attention as I could, which often meant after-hours appointments.
“Hello, Harley,” Olivia greeted when the link opened up the appointment we had scheduled.
“Hi,” I replied. “Thank you for pushing our appointment back a little bit on such short notice. We had a little bit… Aria wasn’t happy going through all her allergy information before bed, and we had an incident today that we had to talk through.”
“Do you want to talk about what happened?” she asked. She was no-nonsense about our appointments, and I appreciated that.
“It’s the pixie dust thing again,” I replied. “Same shit, different day, new town. It’s fine.”
“How did the move go?”
“She’s excited, which is good,” I told her. “She starts school tomorrow. I think she’s ready, so that’s good.”
“That’s good, but how are you feeling about the move today?” Olivia redirected it right back to me, which was a thing we needed. I wasn’t good at focusing on myself. “I know Wilde Bay has a lot of difficult memories for you. I know that we’ve been working through everything, and that you’ve felt confident about this move, but I’m wondering how you’re feeling now that you’re officially moved in.”
“We walked down Main Street today,” I said quietly. “It was… weird. Not bad, just… weird. So much has changed, but it hasn’t, you know? It’s still Wilde Bay. It was nice.”
And it was. That part surprised me. I wasn’t sure how I’d feel once I got here. I knew this was the right place to raise Aria. I just hadn’t been one-hundred-percent on whether or not it was right for me.
“That’s good.” She smiled. “Now, the last time we talked about Wilde Bay, we were talking about Maverick.”
