“But why don’t you just leave?” It’s a question we ask people all of the time when they’re in a toxic relationship or friendship or family dynamic or job. As a relationship abuse survivor and a developmental editor who worked with authors who spent decades with partners who had hair-trigger tempers and who beat the shit out of them on the regular, it’s a question I have pondered often.
When I finally did leave my near half-decade relationship with an abusive partner who exhibited predatory qualities associated with sociopathy and covert narcissism, I was surprised at how easy it finally was to walk through the door, and it made me wonder—what the hell took me so long?
In reality, I know what took me so long—I had my own trauma and conditioning and attachment issues to heal. I’ve done extensive research in the arenas of behavioral psychology, spirituality, quantum energy, and many things in between, and what I learned was that we human beings operate at energetic vibrations that attract based on the frequency we are putting out. The Heart Math Institute has a chart that shows us the different vibrational frequencies we operate at. Many of us are unknowingly operating in stages of burnout. The lower vibrations are areas like shame, guilt, apathy, grief, fear, desire, anger, and pride. Once you hit the vibration of courage, then you have the ability to take action, and that’s when people do leave.
My inability to take action was what kept me stuck there, and the conditioning that affects most women in our society—to prioritize the needs of others ahead of my own to the point that I ignored my gut instincts—kept me from seriously looking at what I needed to in order to change my reality. Further, from an early stage, the relationship was governed on his party by fear-mongering and control. There was also always the threat that he’d leave. Ugh constantly tried to make me feel insecure by saying “I’ve got one foot in and one foot out the door”. He would shut down if not walk out and leave during conversations he didn’t want to have, which would ultimately turn to fights, which were somehow always blamed on me.
Here are a few examples of what that looks like quoted from my journals.
On January 24, 2020, barely two months into dating ugh (for legal purposes, we will call my abusive partner ugh because that’s the sound I make internally when I think of him. Ugh.), I decided to create an alternative Instagram profile, Widows Wake, to give me space to connect with other widows and to write about my grief and emotions without saturating my regular profile with sadness. So many people were befuddled that I was still “not okay”, but I wasn’t okay, and I needed to talk about it. Also, because I was dating ugh (ugh), I was sensitive to the fact that he might not want to read that kind of content. But I desperately needed room to breathe and grieve, which, though he said he wasn’t bothered at all by my working through my grief for Sean, he admitted after we broke up that he was jealous of him. You’re jealous of a man who died, yet you continue to breathe. More lies. Just like it was a lie from the get-go that you ever wanted to get married…even though you let people believe we were. No truths detected. But I digress—that lie revealed the truth that set me free once I hit the vibration of courage, but we’ll get to that later.
On that date in 2020, I was going to go to the cemetery where Marie Laveau is buried and photograph the tombs and mausoleums, and I’d post them artistically with poetry and words of reflection as I worked through my grief in a creative way. I told ugh I had a new project, but he didn’t ask about it—yet another red flag is when someone shows no interest or concern with your thoughts or feelings. Thus, I endeavored off to New Orleans on my own without telling the person I’d barely been dating for two months my plans.
Today I thought I could and would, but apparently I can’t, and now I am gray. I want to cry. I am mired in doubt about ugh. He called and I ended up not going to New Orleans to take pictures. He said it was stupid. He made me feel stupid. He berated me for not telling him where I was going even though I said it hurt my feelings about (him) not asking what my project was. My gut says something is off. Is it better to trust my gut even if it’s wrong and to lose him to be independent right now? I value my freedom. I perhaps need to be alone. More than that, I need to not be victimized. Every cell in my body is screaming. I am tingling and agitated. Everything is closing in. I just want to sleep. Sleep until this nightmare ends.
Was I not already forming a trauma bond with this person, were I not codependent and increasingly anxiously attached to a dismissive avoidant narcissist, I would have been able to easily do what I should have done in that situation, which was tell him, “It’s over,” because a non-negotiable should be someone yelling at you, berating you, and trying to fear monger you. In the conversation, he would tell me that I’d be raped and murdered if I went to New Orleans alone, which I dismissed as bullshit. And while it was fear-mongering bullshit, the fact that was his go-to every time I endeavored to do something on my own—even after the relationship ended, he told me I would be “raped and murdered” if I went to Roatan alone (I was fine). He further told me that I was a “terrible mother” for going somewhere I might not come back from. The irony was that relationship and the subsequent group stalking that transpired after it was over was the only thing I almost didn’t come back from.
If you are in a situation like that and someone speaks to you like that—let them go. Tell them it’s over and do not give them a second chance. Do not let them explain. I should have said, “You’re not allowed to speak to me that way. I’m going to New Orleans. It’s over.” Or I should have said, “I’m going to New Orleans,” and let himself take himself out. The reality is that when you stay when someone insults you or tries to manipulate you with fear and verbal and emotional abusive, you are telling them what you’ll tolerate, and not safe or mature adult speaks to you that way.
Here’s another example—on February 15, I mentioned that during the upcoming Mardi Gras break I wanted to take my daughters to the mountains. On July 31 at the hospital at USA, one of Sean’s last coherent conversations was about looking forward to taking the girls to Gatlinburg, one of his favorite childhood trips, during the Mardi Gras break.
When I mentioned it to ugh who liked to work during Mardi Gras because it made him feel special and “he had fun”—something he’d not discussed with me at all, this was how it won’t down.
On a whim, I decided a way it is possible to take the girls on a trip to the mountains for Mardi Gras break. I decided this yesterday, Valentine’s Day. I mentioned it to ugh. The conversation didn’t take. He came lat that’s night after sleeping a lot. He came late last night after sleeping a lot. I know he’s not feeling well, but yeesh. He slept in until 10:30 and then, when I told him I planned to take the girls to the mountains. He mock-boxed at me in the kitchen. He suggested that I’m spontaneous in a betraying fashion and suggested that he, too, would be spontaneous on his off days with “proving a point” and “trying to hurt you” as subtext. As if by me taking my girls on a trip during Mardi Gras Break is spiteful toward him or even about him.
I don’t even know what to say. I don’t like the burden of being shamed when I have done nothing wrong. Does he not see this trip is fulfillment of something we’d have done with Sean? That it’s therapeutic wish fulfillment?
He didn’t ask to book the Mardi Gras shifts with me even though it’s fun for him. It’s time away from us. Just as when he wanted to go watch football. Time. Away. From. If. But when he wants time with us or I want to do something, I’m too absentee—I should stay home with the kids more, why can’t I just stay home, etc.
I am feeling concerned. I feel like I’m subtly being manipulated with respect to my time. He is either being manipulative or sulking when he either doesn’t feel informed or he feels he’s been blindsided even though logically, it has nothing to do with him.
This is an emerging pattern. I am deeply conflicted.
I still feel a strong need to make my own choices. Especially about my kids. Especially for healing.
I shouldn’t feel manipulated. I shouldn’t feel ashamed. I shouldn’t feel the need to consult someone who isn’t here for me on the day-to-day about life choices.
Would he agree? No. I think he might lack that level of insight.
I ask myself—is it worth it? I increasingly know I could do this alone. I am doing it alone.
Same day. It has been over four hours since ugh’s ver last terse text to me. He either is genuinely busy or he has turned his phone off or he’s giving me the silent treatment. Or all of the above.
I have no idea what I did to the deserve this, but I very well may be ending things as a result of this.
The same day, I would take myself to the newly-opened Braided River Brewery on St. Louis Street to watch my friend Simone perform. I sat at the bar, and despite ugh ignoring me all day, I wrote this—
Ugh came to see me at the bar. He finally texted back. Didn’t say he was coming. I think he was checking up on me.
On February 24, I have this entry—I digress. To stay topical, ugh went out with friends last night (Joe Cain Day) and came home a bit, well, drunk. But he was sweet. I had a feeling he’d reveal a lot when his filter was down. Mostly it was a guy who needs to belong. A guy who says he loves me and would never hurt us or me. Still, even as he said it, I couldn’t help but recall the previous Saturday morning where he mimed boxing my face in the kitchen and said he wanted to strangle me that night. All for planning a trip without him. Actually, no, all for disrespecting him in his mind. We still have yet to talk. Plus important for me to clearly establish what my non-negotiables are.
In reality, it all should have been a non-negotiable, however, as noted, while I brushed off his fear-mongering, I was trapped in a shame and guilt loop relative to my own behavior. I was struggling with alcohol use disorder because it was how I avoided really looking deeply into the parts of myself that I needed to heal, and even though I internally knew that I was not the cause of all of our conflicts as he wanted to suggest, I wasn’t blameless. I did abuse alcohol—champagne, specifically—apparently I grieve like a rockstar because I was using it to mask the trapped emotions, the trauma, that I couldn’t sit still with or look at yet.
I also wasn’t taking accountability, and I was unwittingly being a toxic empath, justifying his behaviors and bearing the burden of shame that wasn’t mine to carry. I was projecting positive qualities on ugh that he only had the potential of meeting but was not. There was also a marked lack of alignment between his actions and words that I was not seeing.
Because he refused to do any inner work, he remained at a low vibration and would engage manipulative behaviors to keep me at a lower vibration, which ensured that I would stay.
Becoming the change I needed to leave
I would start taking accountability—real accountability for my role in conflict come summer 2020. This practice involved getting curious about myself and journaling through situations without assigning all-or-nothing blame. A huge part of that was hitting a wall within myself and my drinking in the spring of 2020—I felt like I was looking down a well—I was on a very real path of becoming a legitimate alcoholic, and I knew I had two choices—keep going or hit brakes and U-turn out of that skid.
I was already reading an abundant amount of quit-lit, books on quitting alcohol. I read This Naked Mind by Annie Grace, Alcohol Explained by William Porter, Alcohol Lied to Me by Craig Beck, Quit Like a Woman by Holly Whittaker, Highlight Real by Emily Paulson, Love Yourself Sober by Kate Baily and Mandy Manners, Sober Curious by Ruby Warrington, Cold Turkey by Mishka Shubaly, Lit by Mary Katy, Drinking by Caroline Knapp, In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts by Gabor Mate, and others. Through these books, I understood the science of addiction.
I discovered the Glo app, Tara Brach, Gabrielle Bernstein—I did May Cause Miracles 40-day course two or three years in a row, writing in the book and growing each time. I read books on mediation, mindfulness, esteem, and everything in between. Healing myself and my own issues was my priority. Ugh was stuck on a version of me that was increasingly being left behind by my inner growth. I knew that I was the absolute worst version of myself with him. I learned to stop chasing when he’d walk out.
When I was able to let go of the shame around my struggles, I could confront them in earnest. I knew I had to heal the trauma to fully release the urge or desire to drink. I was able to manage it, though, his repeated emotional abuse constantly retriggered childhood wounds associated with being around an objectifying and emotionally avoidant male figure. But I persevered with self-love and self-compassion. I stopped beating myself up. Once I stopped working against myself and became the best friend I needed—because would I really tell my best friend she was a dumb fucking idiot who ruined everything if she overindulged while she was going through some shit? Absolutely not! I would offer forgiveness and compassion.
I had to go inward to save myself, and as a result, I absolutely did. By 2024, I was able to respond rather than react to ugh’s behavior, which never varied from the type of manipulation and fear-mongering and abandonment he leveraged to control me from early on. But I was no longer chasing a version of him that only briefly existed at the beginning of the relationship—the love-bombing part of him.
Though by 2023 I was no longer sure I ever wanted to get married again, I was still excited when he said he wanted to get me the ring—the first piece of jewelry he’d get in our then-four-year-long relationship for Christmas. Then it would be given around Valentine’s Day in Savannah—and I was still excited. At 40, I wanted certainty and stability in my life—I was over surprises like that.
In January 2024, we had an argument over my not getting Fubu for him to watch the Alabama bowl game, and he stormed out. When he came back, to shut down the argument, he said he’d “send the ring back”. Later, before I got the plane tickets to Savannah—his gift, I asked him if he definitely got a ring—he said he did, so I got the tickets. I felt it deep in my gut that I’d be devastated if we got to Savannah and he hadn’t gotten a ring. He told me that he hadn’t a week before the trip. I was devastated.
He promised he’d do it after we got back, but he didn’t, and what’s more, he shut down every attempt to converse about it that I attempted to engage. Here was the reality I saw—if he’d wanted to, he would have. The ongoing lies and attitude helped me see with clarity the disparity between ugh’s actions and words.
Thankfully—I wasn’t doing it to be chosen. Instead I started choosing me and my passion and dreams for writing. In Savannah, I focused on my writing and what made me happy, largely ignoring his twisted sour expression…and ignoring him in general. I was choosing me. I got How to Be the Love You Seek by Dr. Nicole LaPera because I’d gained so much from her book How to Do the Work in 2020. I also read Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents by Lindsay Gibson PsyD and Emotional Incest Syndrome by Dr. Patricia Love along with Gwyneth Flack’s Limitless: Transform Your Live with Intuition and Creativity.
I hit the brakes on toxic empathy at this point—up to this point I’d allowed ugh to not take accountability for his behavior because I knew it was the direct result of his upbringing, which was similar to mine. That was also how I’d grown up to be able to forgive my dad for his own emotional avoidance, but I realized—wait—that’s bullshit. If I can start taking accountability, then why the hell can’t he? I stopped making excuses for him, and I saw him clearly. The list of behaviors that are unhealthy in Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents helped me further improve myself. I recognized where I was erring and committed to continuing to improve.
I also knew from my marriage with Sean how I really deserved to be treated. By learning to genuinely love and value myself, I was able to elevate to the level of courage to leave. I also know that our children learn from modeling. I’d learned what to accept in terms of a man’s attention from my own dad, and I learned how to put everyone else’s needs ahead of my own from my mom, and out of love for my daughters and a refusal to model that to them, I steeled myself to leave. I had already told myself I would not have a revolving door of men in my life because my friends who grew up with that were traumatized.
What’s more, I know now that predators target single moms and women—that’s why ugh and his flying monkeys create pseudo circumstances to terrorize a woman into going back to or staying with or choosing a low-vibrational troglodyte like ugh. All throughout the summer of 2024—I still have a litany of screenshots—ugh kept trying to shame me into staying home. He made baseless accusations that I was an alcoholic—I was not, but I still had things I was healing and working through along the way—much of it was the C-PTSD of being in an abusive relationship.
Essentially, though, he no longer had access to me and knew nothing about my life but was projecting a version of me that no longer existed and that honestly never existed other than in his manipulative mind.
I wouldn’t see ugh for who he truly was until I set a boundary by refusing to answer my phone on the last day of September in 2024. The narcissistic collapse was undeniable. Suddenly, the man who’d hang up or not answer his phone if he didn’t want to was blowing mine up. I kept hitting “decline” with each repeated attempt to reach me. He finally left a screaming voicemail that he was going to tell my parents I was crazy and “do everything in his power to get my kids taken away from me”.
I snorted and thought, “Oh thank God—you have no power.” Because he didn’t. I was finally free-free because that was the point that I blocked him. I took the good advice I’d gotten earlier in the summer and blocked him.
It took that long to see ugh for who he truly was. I finally learned to stop projecting qualities that don’t exist onto others. I still would have a lot to learn, which is why I’m writing this.
The best way to get out of an abusive relationship, friendship, work environment—whatever, is to never get into one if it can be avoided.
I plan to go into more detail with these behaviors, but here are some red flags that I blazed past like it was NASCAR—
1. They are attention-seeking and expect you to respond to messages or calls even if they refuse to uphold the same expectation. (I have finally shattered the conditioning that makes me feel like I need to or should respond to every message.)
2. They don’t respect your time. Ugh would call me while I was working and blather on about absolute nonsense. He’d ignore my need to get off the phone, but then he’d hang up abruptly if he wanted to get off of a call.
3. They have double-standards for everything—they can do it, but you can’t.
4. They guilt trip you. Guilt-tripping looks like projection. So phrases like, “Well, you don’t care about me,” or “I don’t have many friends,” or “If you cared you would…” are designed to manipulate you into complying with what they want.
5. They are downright insulting about your intelligence or try to make you doubt yourself. Ugh frequently told me that I didn’t have street smarts, which clearly I do. Just because I didn’t deal cocaine in the streets doesn’t mean I’m not socially savvy.
6. They are rigid and refuse to evolve or change. They adhere to an unevolved “well it’s always been done this way” mindset.
7. They disregard your feelings when you articulate them—such as when I told ugh it hurt my feelings that he didn’t show an interest in my project in January of 2020—he not only ignored that expression, but he also turned it around and blamed me.
8. They suggest violence. Ugh said he wanted to strangle me in 2020, and in 2023, nearly three years to the day later, he would strangle me.
9. They project onto you and refuse to believe your version of who you say you are. If you catch yourself trying to explain to be understood to someone who is refusing to accept your version of yourself, stop talking and walk away.
10. They avoid accountability at all costs—they have excuses for everything.
11. They have a victim mindset.
12. They whine and complain without taking action to fix anything in their lives.
13. They sulk or lose their shit when you set a boundary.
14. They don’t respect your boundaries such as with the flying monkey predator who would sexually assault me after I was roofied in 2025. He called me “sexy” even though I said I had a stalker, suggested I get together with the stalker (this was before I suspected ugh), and was handsy if I let him around me. When I said to stop, he said that’s how he was with all of his friends, totally disregarding my boundary. I blocked him, and I have since reported the SA from February 2025 to a detective.
15. They insult you and pretend it’s a joke—never allow someone to insult you at your expense…even if it’s funny. Never allow someone to speak negatively about you or to you.
16. They make critical “jokes” at your expense.
17. They disregard your feelings and tell you that you’re too sensitive. We all have different levels of sensitivity—if I feel it’s in appropriate or hurtful, it is.
18. They believe everything is transactional. They will also show up with an offer in an area where they believe you have a deficiency but with the condition of an exchange on the end of it.
19. They fail to perform tasks that they say they will do—they lack consistency and follow-through but will have the expectation that you always show up and follow-through.
20. They are only concerned with their feelings or needs—how they feel in any given moment is all that matters, and how you make them feel is the only priority.
21. They don’t ask you about you or show any curiosity about you.
22. They blame you for everything and refuse to take accountability.
23. They give you the silent treatment.
24. They walk out during conversation or conflict.
25. They are withholding in terms of information or things that you may need.
26. They use shame, guilt, or fear to control your actions.
27. They try to rush you into commitment, friendship, decisions, etc.
28. They refuse to accept your ‘no’ and continue begging, cajoling, or negotiating even after you’ve said ‘enough’.
29. They withhold emotions, kindness, or compassion if they are displeased with you.
30. They have double standards—he could go to the bar alone, but I couldn’t go anywhere on my own.
31. They don’t let you sleep or rest. If you are sick or have surgery, they suddenly can’t take time off work or be there to help you.
32. They make excuses for everything and shift blame if they’re ever called out.
33. They are financially abusive. Ugh always complained about how little money he had even though he’d lived with his mother for the first two years of our relationship and seemed to spend very little. He contributed the bare minimum to house finances and complained incessantly over having to buy Christmas gifts for his own family. He treated gift-giving like an afterthought.
34. They expect you to help them with the chaos of their own making.
35. They want help but then refuse to change unhealthy behaviors that are creating conflict in their lives. They want to be bailed out of a bad situation or given a little bit of money for something, but then they continue to repeat the behavior that is creating conflict in their lives.
36. They want to put things on your plate that aren’t yours to bear.
37. They take everything personally and make everything about them.
38. They disregard your boundaries around contact or communication such as with ugh’s flying monkeys invading my digital and physical space. I’m so not sorry they didn’t like for me to write about how to get out of a toxic relationship and not go back into one, but I want to help people—ugh would’ve killed me if I’d stayed, and he tried to get me to kill myself after I left, so get over it.
39. They act jealous even when there’s nothing to be jealous of.
40. They apologize without specifics—a bland “sorry” or they apologize with gifts.
41. They apologize or say they’ll change but never do. If a person is genuinely sorry, they will make a change within themselves and with regard to their behavior.
42. They’re self-pitying and create or describe circumstances to get you to take action that you normally wouldn’t take out of guilt or sympathy rather than being straight forward.
43. They try to use your past mistakes against you such as when ugh tried to manipulate me with shame and guilt around my drinking or make threats that he’d have my children taken away. He also did this to his previous partner who he made jealous by waxing poetic about the athletic achievements of his partner before then. When she became jealous, he’d get angry at her and leave. If she brought it up when they were trying to reconcile, he’d threaten to have her son taken away from her. I feel very sorry for her, but the fact that he told me that let me know that he was all hot air.
44. They’re invalidating. They invalidate your experiences and your reality, only accepting the version of reality that exists in their mind.
45. They peaked long ago. They talk about their past achievements but not current activities. This signals a lack of evolution or willingness to evolve.
46. They are contradictory—actions and words do not align.
47. They lack introspection—they will be critical of behaviors that they themselves in fact do or of people who they are actually like
48. They’re possessive and selfish.
49. They can’t articulate how they really feel about something.
50. They refuse to talk about their feelings or open up or share about anything.
I know there are other behaviors. Some of these are just immature qualities that we all have and have to work through. I have definitely been reactive in my life. I also used to engage making jokes that were veiled insults, but I realize now that was part of the conditioning of conservative culture. I realize now that’s what caused me to have a negative inner dialogue where I was way too hard on myself, which was the first biggest barrier to healing—I couldn’t look inward if I was self-loathing, and that’s a huge reason people we identify as being emotionally immature or narcissistic or hurtful continue their behavior without endeavoring to enact change.
We want to create space for healing. A person who embodies emotionally immature qualities and who externalizes getting their needs met isn’t necessarily dangerous—it’s life’s a sign you need boundaries around them. Danger enters the chat when people are entitled. When someone acts like they have the right to mistreat you and continues to do so without regard for your feelings, that’s when an unhealed person becomes a threat to society. Sociopathy is characterized by a blatant disregard for other people’s feelings wherein the perpetrator does not feel any guilt or remorse for hurtful actions. This can be coupled with sadism—enjoyment in hurting others or seeing others suffer. In a book about the dark triad of psychological disorders, it was noted that people who have perfectly normal lives but who get online and insult others are indeed sadists.
Essentially—anyone who isn’t integrated—who isn’t who they say they are and pretend to be on the outside as they are on the inside, is dangerous, and they will hurt you to the extent that you allow them access to you.
So…that’s why people don’t leave. They lack the courage and the healing to take action. They may have internalized that they deserve less, and they may have also been conditioned to accept hurtful behaviors as normal. Even if you watched your parent stay while being abused, know that is not normal. Healthy people respect boundaries and understand that nothing is personal—that not everything (or anything, really) is “about them”.
How to avoid toxic, manipulative, and potentially dangerous people
For one—heal. Do the work to heal your own BS. But do it with grace, forgiveness, love, compassion, and kindness—like you would with your dearest and best friend.
Learn to read the signs of potentially hurtful people.
Learn to pause. Learn to say “let me think about it” and take your time. Take all the time that you need. If they can’t wait, then whatever it is they’re pushing you into is not for you.
Learn to say ‘no’ when you mean no. This is one of the biggest tells it me—how someone handles ‘no’.
Learn to recognize when someone is trying to manipulate you with fear and lack. This is also true if you’re looking to level up in life. I can’t tell you how many things I didn’t pursue because of ugh’s negativity. Insecure low-vibe people will say they want to see you rise and thrive, but then they will sabotage you by putting doubts in your head when you do start to achieve anything. In spring of 2020, I was doing some socially-distanced modeling work with local photographers. It was esteem-boosting and a new experience. Ugh had the sense that one of the photographers—who I had no interest in whatsoever—had a crush, so he started to call it all stupid and tell me I wasn’t being a responsible mom by occasionally going and doing the photography work. So, I stopped. This also reveals that ugh didn’t have any regard of my opinion in the matter. He only felt threatened if he felt another man was interested in me, and my interest was totally irrelevant to the equation.
I know now I was just a trophy to him and how women feel in general is not something he takes into account (we had the “women do not get dressed up for men” conversation many times, and equally, we had the conversation that women don’t go out or to bars just to get hit on or picked up by men—like, literally never have I gone out to find a man, not once).
Here’s the final thing I want to impress—you cannot change them. You can only change yourself. Change their access. Change you from the inside out. Because here’s the thing—if you stay, they have no reason to change. If they don’t really care about you enough to evolve on their own volition, they’re not going to do it regardless of how loving of a letter you write, how long you explain, or how much you beg because you’re there—they have their comfort, and thus they have no motivation to change.
Why YOU have to be the one to change
And that’s why you become the change agent. You leave. Yes—they might try to retaliate such as with the 2023 smear campaign and the subsequent flying monkeys and cyber-abuse, but with all due respect, who gives a flying f—k? Because at the end of the day I came to realize that if I keep my power to myself, if I keep my attention, my energy, focused on things that are meaningful to me—ahem, writing, kids, travel, etc., and I keep access to me limited, there’s not a damn thing anyone can do about it other than watch me make this world my runway while I take off in pursuit of my dreams.
And that’s how you leave and stay gone.
You let them go f—k themselves while you wave bye from the vantage point of experience, personal growth, and perspective.