I Think It’s Time I Get My Voice Back

This morning, I woke up to a group text with a TED Talk by Luvvie Ajayi Jones, author of Professional Troublemaker: The Fear-Fighter Manual.

The message was about speaking up.

Not softly.

Not politely.

Not in a way that makes everyone else comfortable.

It was about speaking your truth, standing in your values, and being willing to yell when whispering is no longer enough.

And if you know me, you know I love waking up to messages like that.

I love reminder texts. I love phone notes. I love podcasts, TED Talks, quotes, voice messages, and those little things that say, I thought of you.

That matters to me.

It makes me feel valued.

It makes me feel seen.

I love waking up and knowing I have a real connection with another human being.

Period.

But this morning, while I watched that TED Talk and brushed my teeth, smiling because I know I am almost exactly where I am supposed to be in life—minus a few health problems and some mental health shit I am still working through—I felt something crack open in me.

Because the truth is, at some point, I got tired of fighting.

I worked in an incredibly stressful environment before starting Wings of Change Therapy with Theresa, and every single day felt like a fight.

There were no love messages when I woke up.

There was no softness.

There was no, “How are you?”

It was:

Do this.

Handle that.

Fix it.

Figure it out.

Be stronger.

Keep going.

And I did.

I kept going until I was so fucking tired that I did not know whether I was strong anymore or just surviving.

I also fought for twelve years in a marriage that had an incredible amount of love and almost no respect.

And people do not talk enough about how confusing that is.

To be deeply loved and deeply hurt by the same person.

To have beautiful moments and still feel alone.

To keep showing up for someone who does not know how to show up for you.

To carry the weight of your mental health, your children, your home, your responsibilities, your hopes, your anger, and your heartbreak—and somehow still be expected to smile and act grateful.

I spent years trying to hold everything together.

I was raising children while navigating different values.

I was trying to take care of my mental health while being reminded that my mental health made me the problem.

I was expected to be honest, accountable, emotionally regulated, forgiving, patient, understanding, and self-aware.

But where was that same honesty for me?

Where was that same accountability?

Where was that same effort?

Where was the person showing up for me?

Eventually, I got tired.

Not weak.

Not defeated.

Tired.

There is a difference.

So this morning, while I watched that TED Talk, I asked myself:

Is this the moment I get my voice back?

Because fuck, I can yell.

I know how to be loud.

I know how to fight.

I know how to walk into a room and make my presence known.

I know how to protect people.

I know how to call out bullshit.

I know how to say the thing everyone else is too afraid to say.

But somewhere along the way, I stopped.

I made myself smaller.

I softened my words.

I swallowed my anger.

I stopped posting as much because I worried I was too loud, too bold, too emotional, too intense, too honest.

Too much.

And I started wondering whether peace meant silence.

Whether healing meant never getting angry.

Whether being emotionally balanced meant allowing people to hurt me without reacting.

Whether growth meant becoming easier for other people to deal with.

But maybe I have been asking the wrong questions.

Maybe the question is not, “How do I become quieter?”

Maybe the question is, “Why did I ever believe I needed to be?”

Do I stay in this life where everything looks good from the outside?

Do I let everybody be exactly who they want to be while I keep abandoning who I am?

Do I keep swallowing my truth because I am afraid of losing people?

Or do I start taking pieces of myself back?

Because I see memories pop up on Facebook, and I remember being happy.

Or at least I remember looking happy.

And now I have to ask myself something that feels dangerous to say out loud:

Am I happy now?

And is it okay if the answer is no?

Is it okay to say:

I am not happy.

I do not like this.

This does not feel good.

I need something different.

I am pissed off that you did not show up for me.

I am tired of pretending something does not hurt just because you do not want to hear about it.

Is it okay to love someone and still admit they are hurting you?

Is it okay to stop protecting people from the consequences of how they treat you?

Is it okay to lose people while making room for yourself?

I think it has to be.

Because what is the alternative?

Keep everyone else and lose yourself?

I have spent enough of my life doing that.

Now, I know my anger can hurt people.

I know that when I am wounded, my words can become weapons.

I know there have been moments when I have crossed lines.

I know I have yelled when I should have paused.

I know I have said things out of pain that landed like cruelty.

I own that.

But owning the damage I have caused does not mean I have to accept every story people tell about me.

It does not mean I am always the problem.

It does not mean my feelings are invalid because I have a diagnosis.

It does not mean everyone else gets to lie, withhold, manipulate, dismiss, or wound me while pointing at my mental health as proof that I am the unstable one.

You do not get to look at me with soft eyes and say, “You are bipolar,” as though those three words explain every emotion I have.

You do not get to use my diagnosis to erase your behavior.

You do not get to keep truths from me and then demand brutal honesty from me.

You do not get to betray trust and then tell me I am overreacting.

You do not get to decide that my anger is the entire problem while refusing to look at what caused it.

You do not get to label me sick so you never have to examine yourself.

Maybe I am sick.

Maybe you are too.

Maybe we all are.

Maybe we are all walking around with wounds we refuse to name, patterns we defend, lies we tell ourselves, and pain we keep passing from one person to the next.

Maybe emotional balance is not about deciding who is right and who is wrong.

Maybe it is not about winning.

Maybe it is about being honest enough to ask:

What did you experience?

What did I experience?

What did we do to each other?

What are we willing to change?

Because being right does not automatically make you loving.

Being calm does not automatically make you safe.

Speaking softly does not mean you are telling the truth.

And being angry does not mean you are wrong.

Sometimes anger is the body’s way of saying:

Enough.

Sometimes anger is grief that got tired of crying.

Sometimes anger is what happens when your boundaries have been crossed so many times that your soul finally starts screaming.

Emotional balance does not mean I never get angry.

It does not mean I never raise my voice.

It does not mean I sit quietly while someone disrespects me because I am trying to prove I am healed.

Healing is not silence.

Healing is not submission.

Healing is not becoming convenient.

Healing is learning the difference between using your voice and using it as a weapon.

It is knowing when to speak.

When to scream.

When to listen.

When to apologize.

When to forgive.

And when to walk the fuck away.

So if I am going to become a professional troublemaker, I am going to start with me.

I am going to trouble the part of me that thinks love means staying.

I am going to trouble the part of me that thinks understanding someone means tolerating everything.

I am going to trouble the part of me that keeps making excuses for people who do not show up.

I am going to trouble the belief that I have to be quiet to be loved.

I am going to be the one who says, “I love you,” even when love is complicated.

I am going to be the one who raises her voice when someone needs protection.

I am going to speak about the topics people avoid because they are messy, uncomfortable, embarrassing, painful, or real.

I am going to talk about anger.

Mental health.

Marriage.

Motherhood.

Respect.

Betrayal.

Accountability.

Love.

Loss.

And the brutal process of becoming yourself again after years of being told you were too much.

I am going to be humble.

Well, maybe not that fucking humble.

But I am going to be honest.

I am loud.

I am emotional.

I am intense.

I am bold.

I am imperfect.

I love hard.

I fight hard.

I hurt deeply.

I protect the people I love.

I make mistakes.

I apologize.

I learn.

I fall apart.

I rebuild.

And I am done acting like those things make me unworthy.

Getting my voice back does not mean becoming the woman who had to fight every day just to survive.

It means becoming the woman who no longer fights for a place she is not respected.

It means becoming the woman who does not beg to be heard.

It means becoming the woman who can say, “This hurts me,” without apologizing for having feelings.

It means becoming the woman who can love you and still leave you.

Maybe being a professional troublemaker is not about causing chaos.

Maybe it is about disturbing the silence that has been slowly killing you.

Maybe it is about refusing to abandon yourself just to keep everyone else comfortable.

Maybe it is about finally saying the truths you have swallowed for years.

So here is mine:

I am allowed to take up space.

I am allowed to be angry.

I am allowed to be unhappy.

I am allowed to say that something is not enough.

I am allowed to need more.

I am allowed to tell the truth about what hurt me.

I am allowed to stop explaining myself to people committed to misunderstanding me.

I am allowed to love people and still walk away.

I am allowed to protect my peace without losing my voice.

And I am allowed to heal without becoming quiet.

I think it is time I get my voice back.

And this time, I am not asking permission.