Category Archives: Becoming Anew

Then.

This summary statement came from the appellate attorney I consulted (the one I couldn’t move forward with because I couldn’t place the $15,000 retainer) –

“The father’s sworn statements established that the children were never endangered and that he trusted their mother. The record shows the iCloud issue (which occurred almost a year earlier) originated from the father’s device and that the mother complied with every court order. Despite these facts, the emergency process was prolonged well beyond legal limits, causing emotional and procedural harm. This case highlights the need for reform in how family courts handle digital misunderstandings, false emergencies, and post-separation coercion.”

Now.

This is hard to read 18 months after the incident.

But it’s still the truth.

Part of my healing now is returning to the places where I froze:
the thousands of documents,
the screenshots,
the police reports,
the motions,
the clerical errors,
the emails I never wanted to write or respond to,
the evidence no one reviewed,
the panic responses I didn’t understand at the time,
and the months of living in shutdown mode simply because my body couldn’t hold any more.

Until now, I couldn’t even open these files without shaking. Wait! I’m still shaking. And it still makes me nauseous. But silence becomes its own burden of a different kind. I have to stop avoiding and start clearing the chaos that has been claiming my life.

So I am slowly, carefully, intentionally going through all of it.

Not to relive it, but to release it.

To organize what happened.
To tell the truth clearly.
To give my nervous system a roadmap back to safety.
And to make sure that what happened to me,
What happened to my kids…
never happens to another parent who is already doing their best in impossible circumstances.

This is not a revenge story.
It’s a recovery story.

It’s a “begin again” story.
An anew story.

This is part of my healing.
This is part of finding my way back home to myself.

And this is why I write…
because stories need a place to land.