Why is it that when the story ends, we begin to feel all of it? Beautiful words from The Sun and Her Flowers by Rupi Kaur. I have found them to be true. It is only now, upon the beginning of a new story, that I feel the entirety of everything that has gone before. Each night I battle monsters from my past showing up in my dreams, trying to reclaim the land that they have lost. “You are not welcome here,” I yell to them over and over again, “I want you to get out of my life!” What should be the easiest thing to accept, a love that is healthy and nourishing, quickly becomes overrun with fear and anxieties. My angst tells me that I should look for the nearest exit-sign, before the unicorn gets a change to change his colours. Like my own Lernaean Hydra, it grows two heads for every one that I chop off. I get so tired sometimes that I just want to lie down and give up. But I refuse to be trapped by the past, so I reach for my sword again and again and hope to God that one day to find a piece of firebrand.