27/12/25

Lately it has been unbearably hot.

I was in the living room with the fan on, the windows open, and I took a short nap.

Before I fell asleep, I read some of the words I wrote past months, and suddenly I wanted to hold that version of myself.

Just to pull her into my arms and tell her: you have tried so hard, you have progressed so much.

Half asleep, I opened every window in my place.

My new apartment sits halfway up the mountain. The wind moves through from different directions, like circles of arms wrapping around me.

I cried quietly.

No sound, just letting the tears come.

Wendy told me I am in a process of cleansing.

So much pain has been stored in my body and my heart, and now I am clearing it out.

Yesterday I went to the beach with my new roommate and met his friends.

Sometimes I joined their conversations, sometimes I stayed quiet and wrote.

At night we went to a hip hop party.

I am not sure if hip hop is my kind of music, but it does not matter.

I went to have fun, to live.

What feels important is not whether I like it or not, but that I am still willing to bring myself into the crowd, still willing to let life keep happening, and to enjoy the present moment.

I suddenly had an insight about Beans.

I had so much love to give him, and I believe he once had the same for me.

We were able to generate so much love because we kept pouring into our own “well of love”, and during that time, our well kept producing love, endlessly.

I have always believed our love was like our first child.

We both loved this child.

We both hurt this child.

But while I was still holding this child, thinking about how to love it and care for it together with Beans, Beans left.

And this child could not survive alone, because it needed both of our love to breathe.

So when he started withdrawing, this child began to die, little by little.

Back when I was in Belize, he pulled his feelings away, pulled his love away, pulled away the part of him that was willing to give. He stopped pouring water into that well. Love cannot stay alive when only one person is holding it. A child that belongs to two people cannot be fed by the mothering of one person alone. That might have been when this child began to die. Maybe it was earlier. But I do not want to keep digging for the exact moment it started. Some questions do not give me more answers. They only make me more tired.

On Christmas Eve, he sent me a message.

When I received it, my emotions still rose and fell, because it was the first time he reached out after we separated. He said that not talking to me did not mean he had not been thinking about me. He said he cooked something I used to make for him, for his family. He said he had so many memories with me. He wished me beautiful days ahead, told me he was happy I am here in Brazil, and that he wants me to enjoy my surroundings.

Then he added: P.S. This is not goodbye.

The wishes felt sweet and gentle to me, but I do not understand this “this is not goodbye”.

Was goodbye not already happening the moment he withdrew?

Why does he talk about it like it is something that has not happened yet, as if it is still in his hands, as if he can still decide when it begins and when it ends.

And these two months of heartbreak were almost entirely me trying to cope with his goodbye, and rebuilding myself afterward.

Thinking about that, I almost want to laugh.

It feels so bleak and hollow.

The lessons I fought through might not have even started for him.

Even so, I hope he is well.

He really did try.

He is a beautiful, kind, gentle person.

There is something pure in his essence.

I hope he is happy, less lost, and more capable of loving and being loved.

But I am also slowly understanding that wishing him well, and continuing to carry responsibility for him, are two different things.

At the end of the day, what I need to keep learning is how to love myself.

This experience has also taught me something else: I cannot keep loving in the same way. Especially when I sense that Beans is hurting, my instinct is still to scoop him up, like lifting an injured child into my arms, wanting him to be loved, wanting him to hurt less.

And is that not one of the roots of the problem?

I can feel my heart recovering, little by little, rebuilding itself.

But I am also afraid.

After two months like this, how many times can I survive something so devastating?

Will my heart break again?

Will my heart break beyond repair?

I am so tired.

I want to rest for a while.