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Leaving an 8-year relationship did not just mean walking away from a person. It meant slowly finding my way back to myself. Since the split, I have learned so much about who I really am, and in many ways, it has been both painful and beautiful. When you spend years being criticised, blamed, and made to question yourself, you start to lose sight of the parts of you that once came naturally. You become smaller without even realising it. But once the noise fades, the truth start

Lately, I’ve been going through reassessment, and it’s brought up a lot for me. For a long time, I was told I had BPD, and I accepted that because I thought the professionals knew best. I tried to make sense of myself through that diagnosis. I tried to carry it, understand it, and live with what came with it. But now there are real questions being asked about whether that diagnosis was ever right in the first place. What if I didn’t have BPD at all? What if I was reacting to

I was listening to Taylor Swift the other day and that line, “why you gotta be so mean?”, hit me harder than I expected. It sounds simple, almost childish really, but sometimes that’s exactly why it works. Because when you’ve been through something draining, toxic, and hurtful with someone you loved, all the complicated words disappear and what you’re left with is that exact feeling. Why? Why did you have to be so cruel? Why did everything have to be turned into an argument?

Hi, I’m Everleigh. I’ve sat and rewritten this more times than I can count, because when you’re someone who is always the strong one, always the organiser, always the one sorting everyone else out, it can feel strange trying to stop and explain who you actually are. The truth is, I’m a lot of things. I’m a care manager with years of experience behind me, and caring for people has never just been a job to me. It’s who I am. I’ve worked in health and social care for a long time

Music always finds you at the right time. Not just songs you like — songs that mean something. Songs that match where your head’s at, what you’ve been through, what you’re still trying to process. This isn’t just a playlist. It’s a timeline. No.1 – Bottoms Up This one isn’t about drinking. It’s about wanting your brain to just stop for five minutes. When life feels loud, when you’re overthinking everything, carrying everything, feeling everything… sometimes you just want a br

There was a time in my life when Stupid Girls by Pink felt less like a song and more like a personal attack with a beat. Not because I’m stupid. Far from it. I’m actually very intelligent in person. I read people well, I notice everything, and I can usually tell within about seven seconds whether someone is genuine, strange, or about to waste my time. And yet, somehow, give me a man with nice teeth, a sob story, and just enough attention to keep me interested, and suddenly al

I swear online dating is one of the most humbling things a woman can put herself through. You go on there in a decent mood, maybe even feeling nice about yourself for once. You upload a few good pictures, tell yourself to keep an open mind, and think maybe, just maybe, there might be one normal man left in the world. There isn’t. What there is, though, is an endless supply of pretty boys, man whores, emotionally unavailable men, desperate weirdos, and those ones who act like

Today I started private therapy. I’ve touched on this journey in a few blog posts before, the need to become emotionally stronger, wiser, and more aware of the red flags I have missed for what feels like my entire life. Not just to heal, but to understand. To finally make sense of the patterns, the pain, and the parts of me that have been shaped by surviving things I should never have had to survive. Today, I told Nick the secret. The secret I have been carrying like a rottin

“Do you feel like a man when you push her around?” That lyric used to just be a song to me. Now it feels like my story. Domestic abuse doesn’t start with someone’s hands around your throat. It starts slowly. Control disguised as concern. Arguments that somehow always become your fault. Being told you’re too emotional, too dramatic, too much. And before you realise it, you’re walking on eggshells in your own home. I lived like that. Behind closed doors there were moments where

Today, I met my new therapist, Nick. It was supposed to be an initial consultation, just a first meeting to see how things felt. Instead, it turned into me signing up for 10 weeks of sessions. And honestly, I think that says everything about how much I needed this. For seven years, I was made to feel like I was the problem. I was told I was crazy. Told I imagined things. Told I was overreacting. Told that the abuse I was experiencing was somehow my fault because of how I resp

I’ve been sitting with a thought I don’t like admitting out loud. Maybe I’m the problem. Because when you line my life up like evidence, it looks bad. Not wanted by my mum. Sent into foster care at nine. Abused by someone who shared my blood. Passed between homes until sixteen. Then relationship after relationship with men who controlled me, hurt me, or slowly erased parts of me. At some point, it stops feeling like bad luck and starts feeling like a pattern. And when you’re

I’ve been feeling more like me  again… and I didn’t realise how much I’d missed her until she started showing up in little moments. Because when you’ve spent so long feeling drained, numb, overwhelmed — when you’ve been surviving more than living — you don’t always notice how far you’ve drifted from yourself. You just adapt. You function. You get through the day. You do what you have to do, and you tell yourself you’re fine because you don’t have time to be anything else. But

There’s a strange moment that happens after you finally step out of the fog. It’s not dramatic. There’s no thunder, no grand speech, no perfect closing scene. It’s quieter than that. It’s the moment you realise you’re no longer confused — you’re clear. I see you now. For a long time, I thought clarity meant understanding you better. Understanding your moods. Your reactions. Your silences. Your stories. I thought if I just listened harder, loved deeper, stayed calmer, stayed s

I’ve learned this the hard way: having years in care, a folder full of certificates, and all the right qualifications doesn’t automatically make someone a good carer. I’ve met people with decades of experience who could recite policies word for word — yet somehow missed the most important part of the job: the person in front of them. And I’ve met people new to care, still finding their feet, who brought more compassion, common sense, and heart into a room than anyone else. Be

Separation is often talked about like it’s a single moment: a decision, a conversation, a door closing. But for me, it hasn’t been a neat event. It’s been a process — messy, layered, and honestly, deeply revealing. When my nine-year relationship ended — a relationship marked by emotional betrayal and relational harm — I didn’t just lose a partner. I lost a version of myself I’d built around endurance . Around holding things together . Around believing that love meant staying,

Today, a carer made a mistake. And I didn’t shout. Today, one of our carers made an error. Nothing that caused harm, but enough to matter. Enough to pause, assess, and put right. What surprised them most wasn’t the mistake. It was that I didn’t shout. And that got me thinking. In complex care, mistakes will happen. We work in high-pressure environments, with long shifts, detailed protocols, and real human lives depending on us. The goal is not perfection — the goal is safety.

People talk about teamwork like it’s a personality trait. Like you either “have it” or you don’t. In complex care, I don’t see it that way. Teamwork is not a vibe. It’s not matching uniforms and a group photo. It’s the operational system that protects a vulnerable person day after day, shift after shift, no matter who is on duty. When care is delivered in someone’s home, you don’t have the same buffers you have in a hospital or a large service. There isn’t a big team down the