Trauma-Informed, Unpolished and Unapolgetic

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No More Margins

I'm still getting used to her — this version of me who feels like a quiet evolution, the one who's half chaos, half clarity, and somehow still intentional. She's new, but she's also… not. More like a reawakening. The next phase in becoming. I didn’t realize that choosing to be unpolished would eventually feel like becoming. And now that she’s here, she doesn’t tiptoe. She doesn’t ask if she’s too much. She just arrives — raw, steady, unbothered — like she’s been waiting for me to stop folding myself into shapes that made everyone else comfortable. And when she steps forward, she doesn’t just take the stage — she fills it, like she finally remembered she was never meant to live in the margins of her own life. She stands there with this quiet certainty, the kind that doesn’t need to prove anything, the kind that makes you realize she was never the problem — the room was just too small. And maybe that’s the part I’m still learning: that I’m allowed to step into a life that fits. That I don’t have to fold myself down to be understood. That I can want more space without feeling like I’m asking for too much. This isn’t about becoming someone new — it’s about finally letting myself be who I was always trying to protect. And that’s what I’m learning now: I’m allowed to grow past the edges of who I used to be. I don’t have to fold myself down to be understood. I can want a life that fits without apologizing for it. This isn’t about becoming someone new — it’s about finally letting myself be someone true. And the more I let myself grow, the more I realize how much I used to hold back without even noticing. How often I tried to make myself easier to carry, easier to understand, easier to love. But I’m not doing that anymore. I’m learning to take myself as I am — not as a project, not as a problem, but as a person who deserves the space she’s finally claiming. There’s a steadiness in that. A kind of quiet confidence I didn’t know I was allowed to have. And that’s what I’m holding onto now — the understanding that I don’t have to shrink to stay familiar. I can grow without losing myself. I can take up space without feeling like I’m taking something from someone else. This version of me isn’t a departure; she’s a return. A widening. A settling into the life I’ve been quietly building. For the first time, it feels less like stepping out of who I was and more like finally stepping into who I’ve always been.

Source: No More Margins

[rowanhaletiuuwrites]

Picking Up The Peices

I started therapy again, and with it came this slow, hesitant return to journaling. Not the kind we did in grade school, where our biggest crisis was who sat woth who at lunch. This time its different. This time, its deliberate. This is me trying to meet myself where I’ve been avoiding myself. Journaling is still foreign. Therapy still feels like learning a language that I should have grown…

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The Clues I Left for Myself

What’s a mystery from your own life that you’ve never solved?

The mystery I’ve never solved is myself — all the versions of me I keep meeting along the way. All of the parts I worked so hard to cover for so long, I’m finally learning how to let breathe. I’m learning how to be me, whoever that is. The parts I’m still unlearning, the softness I’m still learning to trust, the instincts I’m finally listening to instead of running from.

I keep stumbling across little clues I didn’t know I left for myself — a feeling I finally have the language for, a boundary I didn’t know I was allowed to have, and the quiet, almost tender recognition of the ones that were crossed when I didn’t yet know how to protect myself. It’s like each puzzle piece is finally sliding into place, not with urgency or haste, but in its own time.

And I still wonder sometimes — what if. Not in a clear or directional way, more in that drifting, existential spiral that can be positive or negative depending on the day. Somehow I’m still floating forward, even when I don’t know where I’m going.

And honestly? Maybe we’re not meant to solve the mystery we find within ourselves. Maybe we’re just meant to live it — to keep unfolding, keep surprising ourselves, keep becoming the person we didn’t know we were allowed to be.

[catchymemes]

[rowanhaletiuuwrites]

The Clues I Left for Myself

What’s a mystery from your own life that you’ve never solved? The mystery I’ve never solved is myself — all the versions of me I keep meeting along the way. All of the parts I worked so hard to cover for so long, I’m finally learning how to let breathe. I’m learning how to be me, whoever that is. The parts I’m still unlearning, the softness I’m still learning to trust, the instincts I’m finally…

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Breaking What Tried to Break Me

The deeper I get into this work, the more I feel the tension between the mother I’m becoming and the mother I had. It’s strange — loving her, understanding her, seeing her wounds so clearly now… while also refusing to let those wounds shape my children. It’s a kind of love that has boundaries built into it, not out of punishment, but out of protection.

I can hold compassion for the version of her who was doing her best, and still hold firm to the truth that her best wasn’t always safe for me. Both things can be true. Both things are true. And learning to live in that “both” is its own kind of growing up — the kind I’m doing decades later than I should have had to.

And part of what makes all of this so complicated is how present she still is in our lives. She’s our main source of childcare, in and out of the house almost every day, woven into the rhythms we depend on. And I love her, and I’m grateful for the ways she shows up — but it also means the boundaries I’m trying to build aren’t abstract. They’re happening in real time, in shared spaces, with someone who is still finding her own footing. It’s a strange thing, trying to heal from someone while also needing them, loving them, and still protecting your kids from the patterns you’re working so hard to break.

Because the more I heal, the more I see how much she never healed. The more I soften with my kids, the more I notice the places where she hardened. The more I choose presence, the more I recognize the ways she disappeared into her own pain. And none of that is about blame — it’s about clarity. It’s about finally seeing the landscape I grew up in without the fog of survival distorting it.

And with that clarity comes a kind of grief I never expected — grieving the childhood I didn’t get, grieving the mother she couldn’t be, grieving the version of myself that had to grow up too fast. But grief isn’t the enemy here. It’s the doorway. It’s the place where I finally get to tell the truth without fear of what it will break.

And even as I say all of this — even as I name the weight I carried and the things I shouldn’t have had to learn so young — I can also say this: I wouldn’t change who I became because of it. I wouldn’t rewrite the parts of me that were forged in those circumstances. I’m here, doing this work, because I survived things that could have broken me in a hundred different ways.

I know I could have gone down a much darker path than my mother ever did. I know the statistics. I know the patterns. I know the roads that were laid out in front of me. And somehow, I still found my way to this version of myself — the one who refuses to repeat what hurt me, the one who chooses softness even when it feels foreign, the one who is building something better from the scraps of what I was given.

So no, I don’t sit here wishing my life had been different. I sit here acknowledging that it shaped me — and that I’m strong enough to shape something new from it.

And the more I look at the path I’ve taken — the one I’m still taking — the more I realize I’ve been breaking cycles long before I ever had the language for it. Leaving situations that were shrinking me. Questioning patterns that didn’t feel right in my body. Choosing softness even when hardness was all I’d ever known. Every one of those choices was a quiet rebellion, a small act of self‑preservation that led me here.

Motherhood didn’t start my healing — it accelerated it. It held up a mirror I couldn’t look away from. It made me confront the parts of myself I had ignored, avoided, or simply never had the chance to develop. And as uncomfortable as that mirror can be, it’s also the thing that keeps me growing. It’s the thing that keeps me honest. It’s the thing that keeps me choosing the kind of parent I want to be, not the one I was taught to be.

Because every time I choose presence over panic, connection over control, reflection over reaction — I’m not just changing the moment. I’m changing the story. I’m changing the inheritance. I’m changing the future my children will carry in their bones.

And maybe that’s the quiet miracle of all of this: that I get to build something I never had, and in doing so, I get to become someone I never got to be. Not a perfect mother. Not a healed woman. Just a human being who is trying — really trying — to give her children a life that doesn’t require them to recover from it.

And on the nights when we’re all tangled together in one bed — someone upside down, someone insisting they’re “not tired,” someone’s elbow inevitably in my throat — I feel it. The shift. The softness. The safety I’m building in real time. It’s messy and loud and nothing like the bedtime routines I imagined, but it’s ours. And somehow, in the middle of all that chaos, I can feel the cycle breaking.

And in that shift, I can feel the space I’ve carved — the one that didn’t exist for me, but will exist for them

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Unpolished on Purpose

Today’s society loves to showcase perfection and constant success, even though most of us know that’s not the whole story — most of us are just trying to make it through the day. Even though my own pursuit of perfection gets in my way at times, I know that I don’t come here as a polished gem ready to shine; I come from the middle of the work, ready to unpack with honesty rather than pretending I’ve got it all together. As I’ve grown through the social work program, I’ve been able to come to terms with imperfection not as failure or wrongdoing, but as part of the learning process.

I’ve spent so much of my life trying to sand and polish the rough edges until no one could see them; the harder I tried, the harder everything became. After all, an over‑polished stone eventually turns to dust. So I turned toward embracing and advocating for myself instead. I’m here to be honest, not perform — to be vulnerable without coming apart, and to share without over‑sharing. I don’t have the answers; I have questions and a drive to explore them here with you. Along the way things may get messy, but that’s only because the truth is rarely clean. That’s the version of me you’ll meet here.

And since I’m done pretending I’ve got it all together, it only makes sense to explain how I’m actually doing this — especially now that I’m learning to set boundaries instead of sanding myself down. That’s where Rowan comes in. Rowan is the part of me that writes without apology — the version of myself that’s uncensored and raw while still holding a boundary that keeps my humanity intact. And honestly, boundaries are pretty new territory for me, which is part of why I’m here in the first place. This space lets me practice showing up without shrinking, without performing, and without worrying about who’s watching. It lets me write from the middle without the pressure of approval or the risk of pity from people who know me in real life.

So that’s where I’m starting — in the middle, with the rough edges showing and the boundaries still new. I’m unpolished, boundary‑learning, and officially done pretending I’ve got it all together. If you’re here for the real stuff — the honest, messy, middle‑of‑the‑work truth — then welcome. Thanks for meeting me where I’m at. That’s something I hope my future self can offer her clients too: the ability to meet people exactly where they are, without judgment, without performance, and without expecting them to be anything other than human.

Source: Unpolished on Purpose

[rowanhaletiuuwrites]

No More Margins

I’m still getting used to her — this version of me who feels like a quiet evolution, the one who’s half chaos, half clarity, and somehow still intentional. She’s new, but she’s also… not. More like a reawakening. The next phase in becoming. I didn’t realize that choosing to be unpolished would eventually feel like becoming. And now that she’s here, she doesn’t tiptoe. She doesn’t ask if she’s too much. She just arrives — raw, steady, unbothered — like she’s been waiting for me to stop folding myself into shapes that made everyone else comfortable. And when she steps forward, she doesn’t just take the stage — she fills it, like she finally remembered she was never meant to live in the margins of her own life. She stands there with this quiet certainty, the kind that doesn’t need to prove anything, the kind that makes you realize she was never the problem — the room was just too small. And maybe that’s the part I’m still learning: that I’m allowed to step into a life that fits. That I don’t have to fold myself down to be understood. That I can want more space without feeling like I’m asking for too much. This isn’t about becoming someone new — it’s about finally letting myself be who I was always trying to protect. And that’s what I’m learning now: I’m allowed to grow past the edges of who I used to be. I don’t have to fold myself down to be understood. I can want a life that fits without apologizing for it. This isn’t about becoming someone new — it’s about finally letting myself be someone true. And the more I let myself grow, the more I realize how much I used to hold back without even noticing. How often I tried to make myself easier to carry, easier to understand, easier to love. But I’m not doing that anymore. I’m learning to take myself as I am — not as a project, not as a problem, but as a person who deserves the space she’s finally claiming. There’s a steadiness in that. A kind of quiet confidence I didn’t know I was allowed to have. And that’s what I’m holding onto now — the understanding that I don’t have to shrink to stay familiar. I can grow without losing myself. I can take up space without feeling like I’m taking something from someone else. This version of me isn’t a departure; she’s a return. A widening. A settling into the life I’ve been quietly building. For the first time, it feels less like stepping out of who I was and more like finally stepping into who I’ve always been.

[rowanhaletiuuwrites]

My Becoming

On the private becoming I’m not ready to confess–and the guilt of keeping something to myself for once.

There’s a strange kind of guilt that creeps in when you’re finally learning that it’s okay to keep something for yourself. Not the dramatic, world‑ending kind — just that persistent tap on the shoulder reminding you that most of your life has been spent locking the wrong things away while remaining transparent in every other direction, almost to a fault.

So when I sit down to write — at home, in the car, between classes, wherever the words decide to show up — that guilt sometimes flares. Not because I’m hiding anything, but because I’m not used to having a part of myself that isn’t immediately available for public consumption. It’s an old feeling, one that doesn’t belong to the present moment but still knows how to find me. A leftover echo from a time when privacy and secrecy were indistinguishable, and wanting something of my own felt like a crime. And yes, sometimes that shows up when my partner notices I’m preoccupied and I haven’t prefaced it with “I’m doing schoolwork.” But it’s not about him. It’s about me learning how to have something that’s mine before it belongs to anyone else.

I’m not lying. I’m not scheming. There is no secret life.

I’m just… becoming.

And becoming just so happens to be a private process — especially when you’ve spent most of your life believing that privacy and secrecy were the same thing.

Sometimes I forget how automatic the guilt truly is — how it rises out of habit, not truth. It’s muscle memory from a past life that forbade me from giving myself space. So even now, when nothing is wrong and no one is asking anything of me, that old reflex still kicks in. The echo still taps. It still asks who I think I am to claim space, to hold something quietly for myself, to grow without announcing it. And I have to remind myself, incessantly, that this is not secrecy. This is sovereignty. This is me learning to hear the difference.

Sometimes I wonder how many of my reactions actualy belong to the present moment and how many are just old patterns stretching their legs. Guilt is one of the loudest ones, even when it shows ip in a whisper. It doesn’t need a reason; it just arrives, familiar as ever, slipping into the room life it never left. I’m learning to notice without assuming it means something is wrong. I’m learning to let it pass without handing it the whole story. There are echos I’m till unlearning, but this part–this queit becoming–belongs to me.

There is something strangely liberating about the realization that I don’t need to explain every corner of myself as it forms. That I can let something grow in the dark for while without dragging it into the light for inspection. I’m learning that I’m allowed to have a private interior, a place that isn’t up for debate or interpretation. A place that doesn’t have to be justified. And the more I practice holding that space–here, in my writing and out there in the real world– the more I feel the ground shift beneath me. Not in a dramatic way, but in the queit, steady way that becoming always begins.

Maybe what I’m learning isn’t some grand revelation so much as a quiet shift–the kind you only notice when you stop long enough to hear youself think. Theres a strange relief in letting something grow without offering a running commentary, in letting the work spin without anouncing every internal weather pattern. I’m starting to understand that not everything needs to be shared, justified, or held up to the light for inspection. Some things can stay soft and unspoken while they find their shape.

And honestly? Theres a certain thrill in that. A tiney rebellion. A whispered ‘actually, this part is mine’ to no one in particular. It’s not secrecy. It’s not defiance. It’s just me learning to hold my own hand a little tighter, to let the echoes fade without inviting them to narrate the moment, to trust that becoming doesn’t need witnesses to be real.

Some things are allowed to stay tucked close for a while.

Somethings are meant to be mine first.

And if that unsettles the old rules echoing in my ribs–well, then they’ll survive.

[rowanhaletiuuwrites]

Learning Myself Out Loud

There’s a particular intimacy in letting people see you while you’re still in motion.  Not the finished version.  Not the rehearsed one.  Just the version that’s learning herself as she goes.Posting regularly has made me confront that in ways I didn’t expect. Every time I hit publish, I’m choosing to be witnessed mid‑shift — in the middle of understanding my own patterns, my own needs, my own…

[rowanhaletiuuwrites]

Finding Rowan

Nobody gets a handbook for life. We all just show up, look around, and start collecting the unspoken rules of whatever world we land in. Mine came with a very specific set: stay composed, stay useful, don’t need too much, and if you want something done right, you’d better do it yourself. Independence wasn’t a personality trait — it was survival strategy dressed up as competence.

And when you grow up inside rules like that, you don’t just follow them. You build around them. You build walls before you even know what boundaries are. You build defenses that feel like instincts. You build a version of yourself that can handle anything, because the alternative never felt like an option. Softness wasn’t forbidden, but it wasn’t exactly safe either.

The funny thing about walls is that they work… until they don’t. They keep the bad out, sure, but they also keep you in. And eventually you start noticing the echoes — the way old trauma responses show up in new situations, the way hyper‑independence masquerades as strength, the way your body reacts to things your mind insists are “no big deal.” It’s disorienting, realizing how much of your life is shaped by patterns you didn’t consciously choose.

Finding myself hasn’t been some dramatic quest. It’s been quieter than that — more like peeling back layers I didn’t know I was wearing, questioning rules I never agreed to, and trying to figure out who I am underneath all the reflexes. It’s been learning the difference between who I am and who I had to be. It’s been giving myself permission to be soft in places that used to feel dangerous. It’s been letting myself be human in ways I didn’t know were allowed.

And once you start noticing those old echoes, you can’t un-notice them. You start catching yourself bracing for things that aren’t happening. You realize you apologize for needs you don’t even have. You see how quickly you jump into fixing mode, how naturally you take responsibility for things that were never yours. It’s strange, watching your own reflexes like they belong to someone else — someone younger, someone who didn’t have many choices.

That’s the part of the journey no one talks about. Not the dramatic breakthroughs, but the tiny, uncomfortable moments where you realize your body is still living by rules your mind has outgrown. The moments where you catch yourself choosing silence out of habit, or independence out of fear, or strength out of muscle memory. The moments where you think, oh… I don’t actually want to live like this anymore.

I’m still figuring out what it means to live without the old script. Some days it feels like freedom; other days it feels like standing in a room with the lights on after years of navigating in the dark. There’s no neat list of new rules to replace the old ones — just small, stubborn truths I’m trying to practice. Things like letting myself need people without apologizing. Letting myself rest without earning it. Letting myself be seen without shrinking first.

I’m learning that strength doesn’t have to look like silence, and softness doesn’t have to feel like danger. I’m learning that boundaries aren’t walls, and asking for help isn’t a failure. I’m learning that I don’t have to brace for impact every time something good happens. I’m learning that I’m allowed to take up space in my own life.

None of this comes naturally yet. Most of it feels like trying to write with my non‑dominant hand — clumsy, slow, a little embarrassing. But it’s mine. It’s honest. And it’s the closest I’ve ever been to living from a place that isn’t shaped by fear or reflex.

That’s what Rowan is for me. Not a persona. Not a mask. More like a place to practice being a person without the old rules running the show. A place to tell the truth without apologizing for it. A place to explore the parts of myself that were quiet for too long. A place to unlearn, to soften, to question, to breathe.

This isn’t a guidebook or a manifesto. It’s a record of becoming — the slow, imperfect, deeply human process of finding myself underneath everything I built to survive. It’s the philosophy I’m learning to live by, one small shift at a time. And if you’re here, reading this, maybe you’re somewhere in your own becoming too.

Rowan is the voice that walks me out of the walls I built and into a life that finally feels like mine.

[rowanhaletiuuwrites]

The Reflection that Opened the Door

Vulnerability is one of those deceptively simple words that looks harmless until someone asks you to define it. It sounds straightforward, but answering it means peeling back layers I don’t always let people see. Still, this is what I know so far.

Being vulnerable, for me, means letting myself be seen in ways that don’t come naturally. It’s choosing honesty over the instinct to stay guarded, even in situations that are supposed to feel “normal” or safe — at home, with people I love, or in everyday moments where others might not think twice. Vulnerability shows up when I admit I’m overwhelmed, when I ask for help instead of powering through, or when I let myself feel something fully instead of shutting it down. These are things I’m still actively working on, because my default has always been to stay strong, stay composed, and handle everything myself. “If you want something done right, do it yourself” was something I heard a lot growing up, and unlearning that mindset takes time.

In my life, vulnerability isn’t about dramatic confessions anymore — it’s the small, everyday choices that feel surprisingly difficult. Letting someone in. Saying “I don’t know” without apologizing. Setting a boundary. Allowing myself to rest without guilt. These might seem simple to others, but for me they require time, intention, and courage. I’ve learned that finding my words takes a moment of reflection, and I’m learning that vulnerability isn’t a weakness; it’s a practice. One I’m building, bit by bit, in real time.

A lot of what holds me back comes from the way I learned to survive. Growing up, it didn’t feel safe for me — or for the people raising me — to show uncertainty or need anything from anyone. When emotional expression feels unsafe, you learn quickly to stay composed, stay quiet, and stay in control. Those patterns sink deep, and even now, they show up in moments where I logically know I’m safe but my body hasn’t caught up.

There’s also the fear — fear of rejection, fear of being misunderstood, fear of being “too much,” fear of letting someone see the parts of me I’ve spent years managing quietly. My trauma shaped a version of me that equates vulnerability with risk, and even in supportive environments, I sometimes react like I’m still bracing for impact. It’s not logical, but it’s real.

And honestly? Sometimes it feels like everything holds me back. My history. My instincts. The habits I built to protect myself — including the ones tiny‑me picked up long before she had the language for any of this — don’t disappear just because I’ve decided to grow. Even the simple fact that vulnerability requires slowing down long enough to feel things I’d rather power through. I’m working against patterns that once kept me safe, and shifting them takes patience and compassion for myself.

But here’s the part that matters: I’m working on it. I’m practicing. I’m choosing small moments of openness even when they feel uncomfortable. I’m learning that vulnerability doesn’t mean losing control — it means letting myself be human.

And maybe that’s the real work for me now, while I’m earning my degree — letting the woman I’m becoming offer the steadiness that girl never had, so I can move forward with more intention, and so the clients I’ll sit with someday feel the same grounded honesty I’m learning to give myself.

[rowanhaletiuuwrites]

Wondering & Wandering

What topics do you like to discuss

A brief map of the things my mind likes to explore.

Honestly, it’s easier to list what I don’t. My curiosity tends to drift — not in a chaotic way, but in that soft, wandering way where one thought opens a door to another.Sometimes it’s space — the sheer scale of it, the way it makes everything else feel both tiny and strangely comforting. I like thinking about…

[rowanhaletiuuwrites]

Unpolished on Purpose

Today’s society loves to showcase perfection and constant success, even though most of us know that’s not the whole story — most of us are just trying to make it through the day. Even though my own pursuit of perfection gets in my way at times, I know that I don’t come here as a polished gem ready to shine; I come from the middle of the work, ready to unpack with honesty rather than pretending I’ve got it all together. As I’ve grown through the social work program, I’ve been able to come to terms with imperfection not as failure or wrongdoing, but as part of the learning process.

I’ve spent so much of my life trying to sand and polish the rough edges until no one could see them; the harder I tried, the harder everything became. After all, an over‑polished stone eventually turns to dust. So I turned toward embracing and advocating for myself instead. I’m here to be honest, not perform — to be vulnerable without coming apart, and to share without over‑sharing. I don’t have the answers; I have questions and a drive to explore them here with you. Along the way things may get messy, but that’s only because the truth is rarely clean. That’s the version of me you’ll meet here.

And since I’m done pretending I’ve got it all together, it only makes sense to explain how I’m actually doing this — especially now that I’m learning to set boundaries instead of sanding myself down. That’s where Rowan comes in. Rowan is the part of me that writes without apology — the version of myself that’s uncensored and raw while still holding a boundary that keeps my humanity intact. And honestly, boundaries are pretty new territory for me, which is part of why I’m here in the first place. This space lets me practice showing up without shrinking, without performing, and without worrying about who’s watching. It lets me write from the middle without the pressure of approval or the risk of pity from people who know me in real life.

So that’s where I’m starting — in the middle, with the rough edges showing and the boundaries still new. I’m unpolished, boundary‑learning, and officially done pretending I’ve got it all together. If you’re here for the real stuff — the honest, messy, middle‑of‑the‑work truth — then welcome. Thanks for meeting me where I’m at. That’s something I hope my future self can offer her clients too: the ability to meet people exactly where they are, without judgment, without performance, and without expecting them to be anything other than human.