Dear Fighter,

I've been there. Someone who was once important to you walked away without warning. It could have been a close friend, a significant other, or a family member. Maybe they weren’t strong enough to stay, or maybe they were just jerks. Maybe it’s impossible to say. Regardless, it hurt. It burned down to your core, shaking your sense of worth.

You started posting more photos of you having fun to show them what they were missing. Perhaps you studied extra, so they’d see your name on the Dean’s List and wish they could claim the victory with you.

But that wasn’t enough for you.

Your wish to prove to them just how much of a mistake they made began to consume you. It wasn’t enough to successfully carry on; you wanted to conquer the entire rest of the world. You sought out any and every opportunity to do something, to be someone noteworthy.

You’re staying up late, retracing your every step in an impossible effort to figure out if you did something to push them away (spoiler alert: it wasn’t you) and losing sleep you can’t afford to lose. You never take time to relax and do something that brings you peace.

You certainly don’t allow yourself any downtime. You’re too busy being productive and trying to accomplish something that will satisfy you. But nothing you do anymore brings you any satisfaction. You’re drowning under the desire to rub your accomplishment in their face.

I hope you can see the box you’ve caged yourself into.

It’s hurting everyone.

I promise you, even if they never contact you again, they know. They know how much you’re accomplishing. Word has a way of always getting back. But they just know in their soul. They once knew you well enough to know how much you’d accomplish, with or without them. For the rest of their life, they’ll carry that knowledge with them and a small part of them will always wonder what could have happened if they had stayed.

I hope you look around to see the family and friends who have cheered you on through it all. They’re worried about you. Even if they don’t know why you’re doing it, if they can’t see the broken pieces of your soul that scrape you every time you breathe, they’re concerned that you’re trying to do too much. They can see it isn’t making you happy.

I hope you see these people who want only the best for you, who have stood the test of time and told you, “I’m not going anywhere.”

I hope you step off this dead-end path you’re racing down. Even if those broken pieces of your soul cut you in a different way every time you breathe, it’s that process of allowing yourself to breathe that will eventually heal those jagged pieces. Soak up the support of the people who are there for you, and when it’s all said and done, I hope if you ever see anyone else fighting this terrible demon, you can turn to them and say, “This is not ok. But we’ll get through this together.”