destinylaharris

Tag: healing

  • If you had a time machine and could send just one message to your past self, what would it say?

    If I had a time machine and could send one message to my past self, I think I’d tell her:

    You make it.

    I know you don’t believe me.

    Actually, I know you’re probably rolling your eyes at me right now because you’ve already decided you won’t.

    You’ve spent so much of your life fighting with yourself. With food. With your body. With your own reflection. You’ve hurt yourself because sometimes physical pain felt easier to understand than whatever was happening inside your head.

    And there will come a point when you don’t just think about dying.

    You’ll make a plan.

    You’ll decide you’re not going to make it to 30.

    But you do.

    You’re 33 now.

    And, because apparently we like to overachieve, you’re about to spend the next several months in medically induced menopause. 😂☠️

    I know. I KNOW.

    Thirty-three and menopause was definitely not on the bingo card.

    But here’s the part I really wish you could see:

    You’re doing it because you’re trying to give yourself a better chance at having a baby.

    You.

    The girl who couldn’t picture herself making it to 30 is 33 years old and planning for a child.

    You’re planning a future.

    And there’s something else you’re definitely not going to believe.

    Remember that 18-year-old who walked out in the middle of his shift on a busy night?

    The one who, for some reason, you just knew was going to leave an impression on your life?

    Yeah.

    Him. 😂

    You’re both living completely different lives right now. You’re married. He’s engaged. And no, before your brain goes there, absolutely nothing is happening between the two of you.

    But you were right about one thing.

    He does leave an impression on your life.

    You just have absolutely no idea how big of one yet.

    Years from now, he’ll come back into your life permanently.

    He’ll become your best friend.

    And somewhere along the way, without either of you really realizing when it happened, that friendship will turn into something neither of you saw coming.

    And this is the part you’re really going to have trouble believing:

    You’re going to fall completely in love with him.

    Yes.

    A man. 😂

    I know.

    You’re still bisexual. You’re still ridiculously attracted to women. Apparently men, on the other hand, are going to have exactly one exception.

    Him.

    Turns out, you don’t fall in love with him because he’s a man.

    You fall in love with him because he’s him.

    And one day, that 18-year-old who walked out in the middle of his shift on a busy night—the one you somehow knew you weren’t going to forget—is going to be sitting beside you while you plan a life together.

    A home.

    A family.

    Even a child.

    And the craziest part?

    He’ll change your life without ever setting out to.

    He won’t rescue you.

    I need you to understand that part.

    Nobody swoops in and magically fixes everything that happened to you. The things you’ve survived don’t disappear. Some of them will follow you longer than you think they should.

    Even years later, you’ll occasionally see a woman in public who looks just enough like someone from your past that your body reacts before your brain can remind it that you’re safe.

    Healing doesn’t erase the past.

    But your life gets bigger than it.

    And that boy won’t save you.

    He’ll just be there.

    He’ll become your best friend. Your safe place. The person you laugh with, annoy, cuddle, build ridiculous little memories with, and eventually start imagining an entire future beside.

    And somewhere along the way, without either of you realizing it was happening, you’ll stop counting down the years you have left.

    You’ll start thinking about all the years you still want.

    You’ll start thinking about a baby.

    You’ll start thinking about growing older.

    You’ll start making plans that stretch years into the future.

    And someday you’re going to realize something that would probably make you cry if I told you right now:

    You didn’t just make it past 30.

    You built a life you actually want to stay for.

    So if I could tell you only one thing, I guess it wouldn’t actually be some profound piece of advice.

    I’d just tell you to stick around.

    Because I know you can’t see her yet—

    but 33-year-old you is waiting.

    And she has plans.

  • Sunday Things #4

    It’s strange how quickly your definition of a good day can change.

    A couple of weeks ago, a good day probably wouldn’t have been defined by taking a shower without immediately needing to lie down afterward.

    Or being able to leave the house for a few hours.

    Or waking up and realizing the cramps that had been trying to kill me for three straight days were finally gone.

    But apparently, this is where we are now. 😂

    This week was my first full week of recovery, and I am learning that healing has absolutely no interest in being consistent.

    One day, I feel almost normal.

    The next, standing in the shower for a little too long makes me feel like I’ve run a marathon.

    And somewhere in the middle of all of that, my period decided this was the perfect time to show up and make everything approximately 700 times worse.

    My body has been through enough.

    She could’ve sat this month out. 😒

    Still, by the end of the week, things started feeling a little more normal.

    I left the house.

    I saw family.

    My nephews stayed the night.

    I went to a baby shower.

    I picked up my camera again.

    And for a few hours today, I wasn’t sitting around thinking about recovering from surgery.

    I was just…out.

    Doing something.

    Being around people.

    Feeling a little bit like myself again.

    Turns out, I missed her.

    ☕ This Week’s Comfort

    Movies in bed.

    My boyfriend renting the new Backrooms movie so we could watch it at home.

    Cuddling in the recliner while watching him play video games.

    My heating pad, even though it completely betrayed me when I actually needed it.

    Naps.

    Clean clothes.

    A long shower.

    And finally reaching the point where getting comfortable doesn’t require rearranging seventeen pillows and negotiating with my abdomen first.

    There is something deeply underrated about the first few days after surgery when ordinary things start feeling ordinary again.

    📷 Through My Lens

    I picked up my camera again this week.

    Not for long.

    Not for some planned photography adventure.

    I took it with me to my friend’s baby shower, and I ended up getting some really good pictures of her.

    And I think I needed that more than I realized.

    After spending so much time in bed or in the recliner, watching the world happen from one spot, it felt really good to look through my camera again.

    To notice light.

    Expressions.

    Little moments worth keeping.

    I’m still healing.

    I’m still limited.

    But apparently my creativity didn’t go anywhere.

    It was just waiting for me to get off the couch. 😂

    💭 A Thought I’ve Been Carrying

    There’s a weird point in recovery where you start feeling better before you’re actually better.

    And I think I’ve reached it.

    Friday, I had very little pain. After the week I’d had, I felt damn near fully recovered.

    Then I move around too much and my body very quickly reminds me:

    Ma’am.

    You literally just had surgery.

    I’m ready to do things again.

    I’m ready to go places.

    I’m ready to stop thinking about whether something is too heavy for me to lift.

    More than anything, I’m ready to be able to pick up my nephews again. 😭

    But feeling better and being healed aren’t the same thing.

    Unfortunately, my body seems to understand that better than my brain does.

    So, for now, I’m trying to listen when it tells me I’ve done enough.

    Even when I really, really don’t want to.

    ❤️ This Week’s Gratitude

    My sister.

    Without question.

    This period hit me like a fucking freight train.

    Norco didn’t touch the cramps.

    Ibuprofen didn’t touch them.

    My heating pad basically looked at me and said, good luck though.

    Then my sister showed up with Midol and more disposable period panties because she knew I was miserable.

    I could have cried. 🥹

    There are grand gestures of love, and then there is somebody showing up with exactly what you need when you feel like absolute shit.

    I’ll take the second one every time.

    I’m also grateful for my boyfriend, who has spent another week taking care of me, keeping me company, watching movies with me, and generally making being stuck at home suck a little less.

    For my nephews coming over.

    For getting to see friends today.

    For being able to go to my friend’s baby shower, even if I did have to leave a little early when I started getting sore.

    And for my body.

    Even though I have complained about her approximately 4,762 times this week, she’s healing.

    I should probably give her a little credit for that.

    😂 This Week’s “Well…That Happened.”

    Where do I even begin?

    First:

    Today’s poop was easier.

    Listen.

    Post-surgery, you celebrate different milestones. 😂

    Second, I got my period immediately after abdominal surgery because apparently my uterus saw everything else happening down there and said,

    You know what this situation needs? More blood.

    And because I can’t use tampons right now, I have been introduced to the wonderful world of disposable period panties.

    I support free bleeding.

    I really do.

    But I prefer my free bleeding to happen while I am sitting on the toilet like God and plumbing intended.

    Feeling blood slowly leave your body while you’re wearing what is essentially a socially acceptable diaper?

    Absolutely fucking not.

    0/10.

    Hated the experience.

    And finally…

    Today at my friend’s baby shower, we played the game where you guess how big around the pregnant belly is.

    I won.

    I was only off by two inches.

    How did I estimate the measurement so accurately?

    Did I carefully study her belly?

    Use some sort of spatial reasoning?

    Possess an unexplained talent for estimating circumference?

    No.

    I measured my boobs. ☠️☠️☠️

    And apparently my boobs are an excellent unit of measurement.

    I don’t know what I’m supposed to do with this information now that I have it.

    But I won.

    So.

    Science. 😂

    Until next time.

    -Destiny

    P.s.- What’s one little thing that made you feel like yourself again this week?

  • Between the Lines #3

    Dinner With My Fears

    Tonight,

    I sat at a table
    with all of my fears.

    There wasn’t enough room.

    Failure arrived first,
    still wearing my face.

    She smiled politely,
    asked if I’d finally accepted
    that I’ll never become
    everything I dreamed of.

    Before I could answer,

    Grief pulled out a chair.

    She didn’t say much.

    She never does.

    She just looked at me
    like we’d known each other
    for years.

    We have.

    Self-doubt
    wouldn’t stop talking.

    Every sentence
    ended with a question mark.

    Are you sure?

    What if you’re wrong?

    What if they leave
when they finally know you?

    Loneliness laughed.

    Not because anything was funny.

    Because she’d already heard
    this conversation before.

    Fear of failure
    ordered another drink.

    Fear of being forgotten
    kept checking the door
    to see if anyone else
    was coming.

    No one did.

    Then…

    Abandonment arrived.

    The room changed.

    Every fear went quiet.

    Even Grief
    looked away.

    She sat across from me
    like she’d always owned
    that chair.

    She didn’t have to introduce herself.

    I’ve known her
    since I was little.

    She folded her hands
    and asked,

    “How much of yourself
did you give away today
just to make someone stay?”

    I didn’t answer.

    She smiled.

    She already knew.

    She reminded me
    of every apology
    I never owed.

    Every boundary
    I called selfish.

    Every version of myself
    I buried alive
    so someone else
    wouldn’t feel uncomfortable.

    She spoke the longest.

    The others
    hardly interrupted.

    Because every fear
    at that table

    had learned its language
    from her.

    Failure said,

    “You’ll disappoint them.”

    Self-doubt whispered,

    “You’re too much.”

    Loneliness added,

    “No one stays forever.”

    Even Grief nodded.

    They were all saying
    the same thing.

    Just with different mouths.

    I sat there

    listening.

    Until something strange happened.

    A chair scraped the floor.

    Hope.

    Late as always.

    She looked exhausted.

    Like she’d fought traffic
    just to get here.

    She sat beside me,

    not across from me.

    She didn’t argue
    with my fears.

    She simply reached
    for my hand.

    And for the first time
    all evening—

    Abandonment

    stopped talking.

    Because maybe

    the loudest voice
    at the table

    was never the truest one.

    Maybe it was just

    the oldest.

    — Destiny

    A little between the lines…

    I think fear has a way of disguising itself.

    Sometimes it calls itself failure.

    Sometimes loneliness.

    Sometimes self-doubt.

    Sometimes it convinces us that making ourselves smaller is easier than risking someone walking away.

    But if you listen long enough, sometimes you realize all those voices learned how to speak from the same place.

    I wanted this poem to give those voices bodies.

    To sit them around a table.

    To let them talk.

    And then, eventually, to let Hope pull up a chair.

    Not because Hope magically makes fear disappear.

    She doesn’t even argue with it.

    She just sits beside you.

    Sometimes that’s enough to make the oldest voice in the room a little quieter.

    Until next time,
    — Destiny

    P.S. If your fears had a seat at the table, which one would talk the most? 🖤

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  • Sunday Things #3

    There’s something about Sundays that makes me look back at the week a little differently.

    The little moments start connecting.

    The uncomfortable ones.

    The funny ones.

    The ones that seemed insignificant at the time but somehow became the story.

    This week wasn’t productive.

    It wasn’t exciting.

    It was slow.

    And maybe that’s exactly what I needed.

    For the first time in a long time, I didn’t have the option to keep moving.

    My body made that decision for me.

    ☕ This Week’s Comfort

    A heating pad.

    King of the Hill playing in the background.

    Naps that happened whenever they happened.

    And finally being able to shower after surgery.

    Sometimes comfort isn’t exciting.

    Sometimes it’s simply finding one position that doesn’t hurt.

    📷 Through My Lens

    I didn’t pick up my camera this week.

    Instead, I spent a lot of time noticing things from the recliner.

    How quickly the days blurred together.

    How different every hour of recovery felt.

    And how healing can somehow feel painfully slow and surprisingly fast at the same time.

    💭 A Thought I’ve Been Carrying

    This week reminded me that healing isn’t passive.

    It feels like you’re doing nothing…

    but your body is doing everything.

    I’ve spent so much of my life feeling guilty whenever I slowed down.

    This week, I didn’t have a choice.

    And maybe that’s okay.

    Maybe resting is still moving forward.

    Just in a different direction.

    ❤️ This Week’s Gratitude

    I’m grateful the surgery went well.

    I’m grateful they finally found answers.

    I’m grateful for heating pads.

    For nurses who don’t wait for you to ask if you’re hurting.

    For pain medicine that worked faster than I thought was possible.

    For everyone who checked in on me.

    And especially for my boyfriend, who has spent the week making sure I haven’t had to worry about much of anything except getting better.

    😂 This Week’s “Well…That Happened.”

    I have become painfully aware of just how many things require your abdominal muscles.

    Shifting positions?

    Sore.

    Walking?

    Sore.

    Coughing?

    Absolutely not.

    Yawning?

    Apparently that’s an abdominal activity now, too.

    Even getting comfortable requires getting uncomfortable first.

    I knew I was going to be sore after surgery.

    I just didn’t realize my stomach was involved in approximately 97% of existing.

    And then, of course, there’s pooping after surgery.

    That’s an entire adventure of its own.

    I’ll leave it at that.

    🌱 This Week’s Small Joy

    My peanut butter pie finally arrived. 😅

    I knew it was coming.

    I’ve been waiting for it.

    And after spending several days snacking more than actually eating, I was VERY happy to finally see that pie.

    There were other little things, too.

    Video calls with my sister that kept me sane.

    My heating pad practically becoming another appendage.

    King of the Hill playing while I drifted in and out of naps.

    And noticing the bloating and gas finally starting to ease up.

    Nothing huge.

    But this wasn’t really a week for huge things.

    This was a week for finding something good in the small ones.

    Until next time.

    -Destiny

    P.S. What’s one small thing that made a hard day feel a little easier this week? I’d love to hear about it. 🖤

  • Day Two

    Recovery is strange.

    Everyone prepares you for the surgery.

    Not many people prepare you for the waiting afterward.

    Today has mostly been heating pads, naps, walking a little, trying to get comfortable, and discovering that the trapped gas from laparoscopic surgery is somehow more annoying than the incisions themselves.

    I’ve become very grateful for whoever invented heating pads.

    (Seriously.)

    My body feels like it’s reminding me every few minutes that it went through something yesterday.

    Not in a scary way.

    Just in an honest one.

    Recovery isn’t dramatic.

    It’s slow.

    It’s uncomfortable.

    It’s watching another episode because getting up sounds like too much work.

    It’s celebrating small victories that normally wouldn’t deserve mentioning.

    Like finally being able to use the bathroom.

    Or realizing you can laugh without it hurting quite as much as it did yesterday.

    I don’t have many answers yet.

    Those come in a couple of weeks.

    For now, my only job is to rest.

    And for someone who always likes to be doing something…

    That might be the hardest part.

    — Destiny

    P.S. Healing doesn’t always look productive. Sometimes it just looks like giving your body permission to catch up.

  • We Got Some Answers.

    Yesterday, I ended my journal entry by saying I’d let you know what today brought.

    So…

    Here’s the update.

    The surgery went well.

    The doctors found endometriosis.

    They also found fibroids on the back side of my uterus.

    As strange as it sounds, I actually felt relieved hearing that.

    Not because I’m happy to have either of those things, obviously. But because after wondering for so long, there’s finally an explanation for at least part of what I’ve been experiencing.

    I’ll know more in about two weeks when I go back for my follow-up appointment, but for now, I’m just grateful to finally have some answers.

    When I woke up after surgery, I was cramping like I was on my period, and I was definitely uncomfortable.

    The nurse gave me some medication through my IV, and within seconds the cramps eased up.

    I looked at her and joked that I needed them to prescribe whatever that was for my periods because I’ve never had anything work that fast before.

    After that, I celebrated my successful surgery with the world’s most gourmet meal:

    Saltine crackers and a Sprite.

    Honestly?

    Not bad.

    One thing I wasn’t expecting was the heated gown.

    Why has nobody told me those things exist?

    That may have been one of my favorite discoveries of the day.

    I’ve been home since around noon, sleeping on and off in the recliner, wrapped up in my blanket with Bailey Sarian playing in the background.

    My boyfriend stayed with me through everything today, waited while I was in surgery, and has been taking such good care of me since we got home.

    He’s definitely earned a few extra brownie points. 🖤

    Thankfully, I’m not in the kind of pain I was preparing myself for.

    Mostly, I’m just uncomfortable, crampy, and unbelievably sleepy.

    I have a feeling tonight will end the same way most of today has gone…

    With another nap.

    Yesterday I wrote that maybe today would bring answers.

    It did.

    Not all of them.

    But enough to finally feel like we’re moving in the right direction.

    For now, I think that’s enough.

    I’ll keep you updated after my follow-up appointment in a couple of weeks.

    Until next time,

    -Destiny

    P.S. For now, my only plans involve naps, blankets, and letting my body do the hard work of healing. 🖤

  • Between the Lines #1

    I wrote this before this blog ever existed.

    It was tucked away in one of my notebooks, waiting for the right place to live.

    I think it found that place here.

    Scars

    The gods always asked

    for sacrifices.

    Some were given lambs.

    Some were given daughters.

    I was given myself.

    No temple stood above me,

    no choir sang my name,

    yet something holy

    was taken all the same.

    Every pale line

    is another language

    my body learned

    instead of peace.

    The ones across my legs

    look like rivers

    on an old map—

    proof that even broken things

    search for somewhere

    to belong.

    People ask

    if I regret them.

    As if regret

    could erase history.

    As if skin

    ever forgets

    the knife,

    the fingernails,

    the hands that held too tightly,

    the nights that stole

    more than sleep.

    My skin is carved with scars

    that someone else earned.

    Not mine.

    Mine was only the body

    left behind

    after their hands,

    their words,

    their silence

    had already decided

    what would become of it.

    My skin was never sacred.

    It was only the altar.

    They called it survival.

    The gods

    would have called it

    an offering.

    Maybe that’s why

    I no longer pray

    for smooth skin.

    I pray instead

    for gentler hands,

    for quieter nights,

    for a body

    that no longer mistakes

    silence

    for safety.

    If the gods ever come looking

    for the pieces

    they abandoned,

    they’ll find them here—

    written beneath my skin,

    where every scar

    became a sentence,

    every sentence

    became a story,

    and somewhere along the way,

    I stopped being

    the sacrifice.

    I became

    the monument.

    Until next time,

    — Destiny

    P.S. Which line stayed with you the longest?