There are two days every girl who has been in a bad relationship knows will come. The day she thinks she is ready to love someone again and the day she has to confront the boy who broke her. I won’t call him a man because men do not break women. Men do not take someone beautiful and strong and chip away at them until they become a shell of doubt.

When she found the strength to tell you it was enough, it was one of the best days of her life. She cried not because she was going to miss you but because everything had dragged on far too long. The yelling, crying, and the belief that there was a relationship to save was all a twisted nightmare that she escaped. Waking up in a cold sweat only to find the world had continued on and she would have to move on as well.

The next long months were spent searching for the pieces of the woman she was. You left them scattered all over town and perhaps some she will never get back. So that when someone would come along who wanted to take her out she retreated. Being alone was easier than telling anyone how broken she felt. How, even though the pieces were put back together, they didn’t fit the same anymore. People will tell you they’re proud. They’re happy to see you back to yourself again. What they don’t know is you’ll never be you again. That girl is gone. It would make her mad some nights, because she thought this gave him power still. Power he claimed each time he called her stupid, a bitch, a slut. Power he felt when he punched the walls or kicked a door, or slammed her head into a the car dashboard.

You start to wear your scars like a crown. Proud you left. Proud you were strong enough to withstand the storm. Some nights you drink and some nights you just sit alone. Life feels like it’s moving in a haze but you have your crown. It could make you bitter, unless you choose not to be. When you finally meet someone and he tells you he wants to take you out, to treat you right, you get caught up in the butterflies. Then you’re driving home from your first date and you wonder how long it will take for him to change. When will he show you who he really is? The memories you worked so hard to forget are back. Do you fight the urge to run this time and trust a stranger. This would mean telling him all the secrets you buried when you left.

For the first time in months you think you could be happy. These women do not find happiness with others easily anymore. They do not need to saved because they have saved ourselves so many nights before. It’s taken this long but the places where the pieces could not be recovered left room for the light to shine through. You never broke her. Instead she got to put the pieces back together any way she wanted.

As for the men she encounters next, tread carefully. She will never need you the way she thought she needed him. It would be the height of hubris for you to believe that you’re the prince come to sla all her demons. This woman commands those demons as her friends and she is not a helpless damsel but a queen looking for her equal; if such a man exists. Do not try to fix her or take away the independence she has gained. Nurture her need to be alone some moments and with you others. Let her continue to find her way for she learned to love storms and now only laughs when it rains.