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I Wasn't Always This Quiet

 I used to be the life of the party.


I was loud. Carefree. Always laughing. I could walk into a room and actually be in the room.

Sometimes I miss her more than I know how to explain.


Because grief changed something in me.


Not one loss. Not one hard season.

Years of it.


Grief stacked on top of grief. Trauma I didn't have time to process before something else came along. 

Losing people. Losing pieces of myself. 

Being hurt, betrayed, blindsided, and somehow still waking up the next morning because life didn't stop just because my heart was tired. 


After enough of that, your body starts living like something bad is always around the corner. 


You learn how to survive.


And, eventually, surviving becomes so normal that you forget what it felt like to just... live.


That's what I miss.


I miss laughing without something heavy sitting underneath it. 

I miss walking into a room without part of me being somewhere else.

I miss the version of me who didn't know how much life could hurt yet.


And that's a strange kind of grief too... grieving the person you were before you had so much to grieve. 


I'm still happy. I still laugh. I still love deeply. I have a life and people in it that I wouldn't trade for anything. 


But there's a part of me that has been standing guard for a very long time. 

A part of me that learned not to get too comfortable. 


Not because I don't love my life. 


Because I've learned quickly life can change. 


I'm not trying to become the person I was before all of it happened. 

But I do want some of her back.


Her lightness. 

The way she could be completely present without waiting for something to hurt. 


Trauma didn't take away my ability to enjoy my life. 


It took away the part of me that believed I could always let my guard down while I was enjoying it. 


And little by little... 


I'm learning how to give that part of myself back.


- Brandi

Writing from the broken porch

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