To the daughter I do not have:

I’ve spent my whole adult life kicking around the idea of even having you.

I tuck your name away in notes and test it out loud when I’m alone.

It’s my grandma’s mother’s name, the grandma whose words are inked into my arm.

You’d fall in line behind bold, unapologetic matriarchs who have all been stronger than me.

And if generational trauma is real, I’m sorry.

I make checklists of things I would teach you:

The many ways to say thank you

The many instances to say fuck you

How to be heard in the loudest rooms

How to be soft in the safest ones

How to build boundaries before they're needed

How to fall in love with a hundred hobbies at once

(I wouldn’t know how to teach you to stick to one)

(You’d learn diligence from your father)

We’ve never met, you’ve never existed, and you may never will,

but I constantly look for reasons you should.

I find them in my mother and the women who came before her.

I was raised by a strong woman who was raised by a strong woman who was raised by a strong woman who was raised by a strong woman...

This world is filled with people who would try to dull you, men who wouldn’t know how to treat you, spaces that aren’t meant for you, circumstances that would hurt you. For a long time I thought it'd be best to spare you from it all — one less little girl unpeeling ugly pieces of reality inside of her family's stories, one less woman who has to be strong.

But I keep writing so that by chance someday you do exist, you'll know strength isn't all that hard, and it isn't all that bad. It's in your blood.

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For Empaths