While carrying Annie’s toys up the stairs today, I tripped.

I managed to regain my balance, and then I tripped again, landing flat on my face, nose first into the carpet. I lay face down on the stairs, toys bouncing back down to the bottom, and I laughed. I laughed until the pain in my sides hurt more than the ache in my heart.

Almost two months have passed since life kicked me when I was on the way up, and a month since it delivered a devastating blow for good measure, but today, after I fell, I realised something.

This is life. 

Sometimes I’ll trip, sometimes I’ll stumble, sometimes I’ll fall. 

I can’t go through life the way I have been; I have to learn from my fall.  At times I’ll get hurt doing so, but eventually, I have to learn to laugh again. So for today at least, I’ve won the battle. I may not have won the war yet, but I’ll go on to fight another day.

The one thing I’m not going to do anymore is give in to my fears about Tom and Annie. He’s not going to do that to me; I’m not going to let him do that. Not now. Not ever.

I am not going to allow him to control me in that way, not anymore.