🌿 I Can't Save Anyone — And That is Freedom 🌿

Two nights ago, I had a nightmare that shook me to my core.

Nightmares are not new to me.
I have PTSD and insomnia from a traumatic childhood and young adult life.
I have a story — a painful story, a story that inspires, a story I have been revealing for what feels like a lifetime.

The nightmare was many things, but also a foreshadowing — as they always are.
I want to retell this plainly, especially the parts that I saw repeating through cycles.

My dream opened with me in a house, watching my mother sing and cook.
She loved to dance and sing while she moved through the kitchen.
She was so beautiful — her long blonde hair pinned up with combs, radiant with life.

We were happy.

Then a car pulled up outside, and fear took over me.
I saw my stepfather, and my heart sank.
Drug addicts poured out of the car, and there was a woman among them.
My mother ran outside, and the fighting began — as it always had.

In my dreams, I was reliving the fear that I could not escape.
The dream continued painfully, repeating what I lived — and what I had long locked away.

I ultimately woke trying to scream, but my voice could not make a sound.
I was trapped — suspended inside a crystal, veiled by curtains of gold.
Inside, I was screaming:

"I want out."

Another night. Another nightmare.
But this morning — I woke up with something different: clarity and peace.
Something had been released within me.

I began writing about it, preparing to share, when I opened Facebook —
and there it was: a message from a family member.
My stepfather’s mugshot.
An old man now, blind, feeble, arrested for domestic battery.

My heart fell — not with hatred, but with pity.
I do not carry animosity.
I wish no one harm.

And yet more realization came:
I have always been the one everyone called for help.
I tried to save them all — even those who hurt me the most.
But I see now:

I can't save anyone.

The nightmare was not just a foreshadowing of events — it was a message to my soul.
I have lived my whole life trying to hold others' brokenness inside my own hands.
I have carried blame for things I did not cause.
I have clung to hope for those who chose blindness.

But now, I know the truth:
I am not responsible for anyone else's salvation.

Here is my truth:

I can't save anyone.
I especially can't save anyone from themselves.

All I have to offer are my words — scattered like seeds,
my art — glimpses of a heart that survived,
and pieces of myself — revealed tenderly, imperfectly, honestly.

It isn't up to me to save anyone.
It never was.

If you choose not to see,
if you choose blindness,
that is your sacred right — your free will in motion.

I know the ache of wishing it could be different.
I know the sorrow of carrying the blame for things I didn't cause.
I know the weight of trying to hold the brokenness of others inside my own hands.

But no more.

As much as there has been anger,
as much as there has been grief for not being allowed to simply be a hurting human being —
I hold no hatred.

It isn't in me.

Even now, I wish no one harm.
Even now, I send love.
Even now, I pray for peace, healing, and awakening.

But I also know now:

I am responsible only for walking my own path — with as much truth, as much grace, and as much light as I can carry.

For those who wish to walk beside me — welcome.
For those who turn away — go in peace.

Either way, I will keep walking.
Either way, I will keep loving.
Either way, I am free.

🌿

This is offered freely, with no strings and no selling.
Only light shared for those who seek it.

I am not looking for book deals or to profit from my pain. I seek healing and to bring peace to others and the world.