THAT GIRL

 

By Inioluwa Ige.

Don’t judge me. You’re not me. You haven’t walked my path, and won't probably walk in my shoes, haven’t felt the weight of my burdens, and likely never will. Therefore, you have no right to pass judgment or assign blame. You lack the wisdom, the scars, the lived experience to offer understanding or solace.  

So why do you presume to know me? Why etch new wounds on a soul already fractured?  

The girl who never knew the lightness of a carefree childhood.  

The fragile heart that learned to carry silence like a second skin.  

The child taught to see herself through a lens of doubt and inadequacy.  

The girl whose confidence was shattered by someone she trusted the most—Her blood.

The girl was shaped by abuse, weighed down by invisible scars.  

The girl whose body, mind, and spirit were relentless battlegrounds.  

The girl who searched for escape, only to find dead ends.  

The boring, reticent and unassuming shadow of a soul.  

That girl, that young, lost girl. She is me!

May she find peace in herself. May she no longer hide behind the walls she built to survive. The girl who once trembled at every echo of pain has learned to breathe again slowly, deeply, intentionally. She no longer seeks validation in the eyes that once looked down on her, for she has begun to see herself clearly through her own reflection. In the quiet of her healing, she learns that peace isn’t the absence of scars but the courage to live beautifully with them. Every wound, every scary, every night she thought she wouldn’t make it, they now form the soft rhythm of her becoming.

She finds her peace not in forgetting the past but in forgiving herself for surviving it the only way she knew how. She no longer hates her fragility, she honors it. Her silence, once born of fear, now hums with quiet strength. She understands that healing isn’t loud, instead it's steady, it’s gentle, and it’s hers alone.

When she looks into the mirror, she no longer sees “that girl” as broken. She sees a woman rising stronger, and braver than before. The shadows that once haunted her have become reminders of her endurance. She has found her peace not because life became easier, but because she learned to love herself in the midst of it all.

That girl has not vanished,she has blossomed, and in her calm eyes rests the light she was searching for all along. So be it.