The Fucking Portal

The unfiltered journey through trauma, truth, and transformation.

This is probably going to be the most raw, real, and messy post I’ve ever written.

Because it’s my story.

One I don’t tell often. It’s dark. It’s messy. And for the longest time, I had shame around it.

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My twenties were what I call my dark years. I got married very young to what turned out to be an abusive man. He didn’t hit me, just threatened to the point I believed him….evil in his eyes as he described how he wanted to hurt me. I was terrified.

By 24, I was divorced and back in the world. I did no healing, no inward work. I just pushed forward. Explored life, moved through other things (best left for another post).

At 26, I went on a date. A simple…seemingly harmless date that turned into a nightmare very quickly. The act resulted in me leaving my body due to the trauma…and as I drove away, I told myself, “That was just a bad date,” because the truth was too painful to name. A hollowness grew in me that day.

I began spiraling. Drinking…sleeping with anyone to regain a sense of control. I had no idea how to process anything….so I pushed it down and ignored it..just drifting, not caring about anything really.

Then, at 29, I met my second husband. He had his own unhealed traumas and eventually took them out on me physically. I became isolated from my friends, and my mind became a dark void.

Eventually, I escaped that marriage as well. I was so raw…so lost in darkness in my mind that the only voices I heard were those of my ex’s yelling their harsh words at me. My heart had become a piece of raw, bloody meat that had been pulverized and picked at by wild birds. I had no interest in anything, life was practically meaningless, and I had no idea how I would ever feel anything but numb again.

I knew things were bad. I knew I needed help. I knew I didn’t want to live that way. There was a tiny flicker inside of me that kept me going, though I had no energy to give it much attention. But it was all I had left.

At the time, I was an atheist, so I did the secular thing to do…I got a therapist. I made sure they were not religious, and it worked out. That little flame inside of me that kept me from losing myself to abusive people still flickered…and the flame grew.

To be quite honest, I don’t remember the change. It was gradual. I realized I could tell the voices of my ex’s to shut the fuck up, that they were not speaking truth to me. I slowly rebuilt my life, still shy, still healing, but I was able to pick my heart up and stuff it back in…even if it was covered in gravel.

And at some point…things shifted in my mind. I finished college at 33, moved to a city I loved, and began a whole new life.

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I’m not sharing my dark years to gain sympathy. I’m sharing them to show that I’ve been through hell and made it out.

My story isn’t unique. It’s valid, yes, but not unique.

We all have dark shit. Every single one of us. It takes all sorts of shapes, and it is all valid.

The second truth is that we all have that small flame inside of us that doesn’t want to be put out. It cries for us to listen to it and not ignore it, even if it’s asking us to do the seemingly impossible.

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I am in the middle of my sixth...yes sixth…tower moment in life. It’s not really a moment either, it's more a phase. Can last months to a year or more, even I’m sure.

To put it simply…it’s a death.

Not of the body, but of the self.

And collectively…we are all going through this. How it shows up in your life is unique to you, but this is the great transmutation.

The dark void in us, the hidden, is rising up. Showing itself. It is crying out to be witnessed. This is the ache, the pain, the unbearable we don’t wish to look at…our shadow.

The risk here is getting swallowed up in it. Lost in the darkness and feeling untethered to reality or life or anything really.

When my shadow presents itself to me now, I don’t shy away. I look. I tell someone.

It can feel embarrassing, messy, raw, vulnerable, painful, gross, dark, ugly, bitter, and just a general dumpster fire.

But now I would say it’s the most beautiful thing.

A lot of us in this community have had visions of the future, and we are remembering profound ideas…we know we are meant to build and co-create and work together….

But we cannot do that until this part is done. This great transmutation. This ugly yet beautiful part of the process.

It’s the fucking portal. It’s the fucking portal you guys.

This stuff can’t come with us. Be it emotions, relationships, etc. It can’t come. It has to ‘die.’

So let yourself be witnessed. We are not trauma bonding; we are meeting each other with grace and love, honoring the process each of us is going through.

I can tell you…as someone who’s lived through events like this…it does get better. Doesn’t mean “bad” things won’t happen again, but it does mean how you deal with them will change.

And this time in life…I’m not facing this tower moment alone. I’m being witnessed. I’m being met. I’m being seen. And fuck me does this change things!!

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So if you know what I’m talking about, if it feels like your life has gone to shit and you have nothing to cling to anymore…

You’re not alone.

You’re right where you’re meant to be.

You truly are strong enough to get through this.

You are in the fire.

The fire is not here to destroy you, but to reforge you.

So let the tears come. Let the numbness sit beside you. Let the rage breathe. Let the ache be seen.

Because what rises on the other side of this?
It isn’t the old you with a new mask.

It’s the real you. The remembered you.
The you that never forgot the flame.

This is the portal.
And we’re walking through it together.