Saying Goodbye To The Year That Broke Me: My Mental Health In 2025

I lay in his bed for hours bawling. Squeezing the stuffed animal that he had for 17 years. After holding it together for weeks, I couldn't do it any longer.

I couldn't hold the pain in.

I couldn't hold the fear in.

That day broke me. Broke me in ways that I never imagined I would have to experience as a parent.

From that point on, 2025 became a year that broke me into a million different pieces. Pieces that are roughly glued back together. Pieces that, if any disruption occurs, may fall back out of place. In 2025, I had more days that broke me than any other year.

Days when I thought I couldn't continue.

Days when I thought I had lost myself in pain so deep that there was no returning.

Days where I don't remember the dates, but I remember the emotions, the feelings that had me trapped in the unknown.

My body living in a constant state of freeze as there was nowhere to move. Days I won't forget. Not because they are marked on a calendar but because they are seared into my soul. Black charr remains in a place that was once vibrant with life. New pieces of me emerge. Not because they feel safe but because they can no longer hide.

To heal, I must heal out loud. Silence keeps me trapped and frozen in time. My voice is the one thing that saves me. Even when the world around me or inside of me doesn't make sense, there are words that I can put down on paper that beautifully describe the inner turmoil.

And so, here I am.

MY MENTAL HEALTH IN 2025

Healing loudly in hopes that my voice echoes loud enough for others. To come together and remind each other that even though we are leaving 2025 tattered and broken, we are also weaving threads of hope and transformation into the year to come.

I don't know what 2026 has in store for me. BUT to rebuild myself gives others the strength to rebuild themselves. There is beauty in the pain. I can't see it quite yet, but I do know that someday, I will look back at 2025 and know that I was meant to survive it.

Even on the most hopeless of nights, the tears cleanse my soul and speak to me in ways that happiness cannot. Knowing that the turmoil inside serves a purpose brings me back. The tear-stained pillow, the blanket wrapped tight around my body, the cold sheets touching my skin are points of contact that keep me grounded.

To 2025...

I saw you.

I felt you.

I broke beneath the weight of you.

To 2026...

I see you.

I feel you.

I allow myself to expand in the power of you.