To The Woman in The Red Dress…

To The Woman in The Red Dress…

You have no idea how much I needed that moment...

That smile… that reminder.

See, yesterday was hard…. Really hard.

Probably one of the hardest days I’ve had in a long time....

I was on my way home….eyes swollen from crying, face blotchy, exhausted… in pain… and completely heartbroken.

I felt defeated.

Not like it was the end but like the journey ahead has already beaten me…

And I still have miles to go.

But yesterday… I travelled to Manchester…a 12 and a half hour round trip, door to door. Ouch.

All for a medical examination.

I sat there listening to the doctor read out his report…

My truth coming from his mouth.

Word after word falling like bricks…each one breaking me a little more.

There was nothing he said I didn’t already know.

But hearing it out loud, from someone else’s lips, did something to me.

We all want so badly to be seen.... to be understood, to be heard.

But we forget how hard it can be when all of us is seen.

The broken parts.

The parts that feel like failure.

He finished.

There was a pause....

He looked down, took a deep breath…

And then, with a softness in his voice, he said:

“This is a mess.”

And my heart broke.

Not because I didn’t know… but because I finally felt it.

The grief.

It tore through my chest like it had been waiting to be acknowledged. Stepping into its moment...

I think I’d been so focused on pushing through, on surviving, on being grateful…

That I hadn’t allowed myself to truly feel the loss.

Not fully.

The loss of who I was.

Of who I thought I’d be.

Of what I could ever be again...

If you know my story, you’ll know I’ve been through more than my fair share of adversity.

And I worked through it… Understood, healed…

Then I turned it around and reached back to help others who had not quite got through it yet themselves...

And now… this is no different.

That same pull is there….to use the pain, to turn it around and give it purpose.

But I’m still here, in the middle of it…

Still trying to accept.

Still learning to carry the weight of this new version of me.

Grieving.

Trying to navigate life through a different lens.

With too many unknowns pressing down on my shoulders.

Yesterday, I felt completely and utterly finished.

And then you stepped onto the tube.

You were stunning.

Like something out of a 1950s movie.

Not a single hair out of place.

Red vintage dress that just screamed elegance.

You lit up the entire carriage.

You smiled at me… just a small smile.

And that was it. An almost nothing moment...

The doors opened, we all got off and walked on…

I forgot it happened…

And then a few minutes later, I saw you again… running up the escalator, the red soles of your shoes flashing as you climbed…

And in that moment… That flash of red, that movement, that energy…

Reminded me of one of the first blogs I ever wrote….

About a painting of a girl in a red dress… dancing in the rain.

Taking back her power.

And something in me shifted.

Something in me remembered….

It’s going to be okay.

 ______________________________________________________

And if you want to read it... here is the blog about the painting of the lady in the red dress