Some words aren’t meant to reach their destination, but still, they need to be written. This is one of them. You may never see this, may never know the way your presence shifted something inside me, but silence feels heavier than gratitude left unspoken. So here I am, writing a thank you note to someone who will probably never read it.

Thank You for Helping Me Heal

When I was at my lowest, when the world felt like a blur of aches and disappointments, you reminded me what it felt like to be alive again. Not through grand gestures, but through the little things, the laughter, the listening, the quiet ways you made me believe I was worthy of joy. Worthy of your love.

And then you were gone.

Ripped away, like a page torn out mid-sentence. The one who promised to stand beside me “always and forever” wasn’t there when the silence came crashing in. I had to finish the healing without you, and some days it felt impossible, like trying to sew a wound with nothing but shaking hands and broken thread.

But I did it.

Not because you stayed, but because you left. And still, even in that ache, I find myself thanking you. Because I would not have known the depth of my own strength without the memory of your love to remind me I was worth saving.

Thank You for Helping Me Grow

Being around you reminded me that growth isn’t always gentle. Sometimes it’s uncomfortable, sometimes it means letting go of the very things you want to hold on to forever.

You once told me you’d be there to hold my hand through the storms.

I believed you.

I leaned on that promise like it was a lifeline.

But when the storm came, you weren’t there, and I had to learn to stand alone, drenched and shaking, until I found my footing again.

That absence broke me.

But it also forced me to grow in ways I never would have if you had stayed. I had to dig inside myself for roots I didn’t know existed, for wings I wasn’t ready to use.

You promised me growth together, yet what I got was growth apart. Painful, jagged, unwilling. Even in leaving, even in the cruel silence of your absence, you gave me a gift: the knowing that I am capable of becoming whole without you.

Thank You for Reigniting My Passion

Before you, my dreams felt like faint sketches, things I had once cared about but tucked away for “someday.” But you reminded me of the fire I had inside me, the one I thought had burned out. Do you remember how you used to look at me when I spoke about my dreams? The way your eyes lit up, as though you could already see the life I wanted unfolding right there in front of us? For the first time in years, I felt believed in. I felt like my fire wasn’t foolish, that maybe it was something sacred.

But when you left, chasing those dreams meant carrying the weight of your absence with me. Every step forward hurt, because it felt like a betrayal of the life we once envisioned side by side. My passion became a battlefield, me, chasing what I love, and the echo of you reminding me that I was supposed to be chasing it with you.

And yet, even through the grief, I can’t erase the truth: you reminded me of who I am. You gave me back my hunger for life, even if I had to feed it alone. I wouldn’t be chasing this fiercely if not for you. That’s why, even through the tears, even through the hollow space you left behind, I thank you.

Letting Go, with Gratitude

The hardest part was realizing that I couldn’t keep you and keep myself at the same time. Letting you go was not a choice, it was survival. Holding onto you would have destroyed me, because I couldn’t keep loving someone who was no longer there. And yet, releasing you felt like carving out the very heart I’d built around us.

“Always and forever” turned out to mean “once and no more.” I had to rewrite every story I thought I knew about love, about promises, about trust. And though I still ache, though I still sometimes reach for the ghost of you, I know now that letting go was the only way forward.

I carry gratitude laced with grief. Gratitude for the way you touched my life, gratitude for the healing and the growth, gratitude for the fire you sparked, even though you weren’t there to see me rise from the ashes.

This is my thank you note to you—though you will probably never read it.

-🦩