Sunday evening. Watching Gossip Girl. Trying to figure out how I feel right now. Mainly… a strong sense of relief.

It’s out there. It’s done. That’s the whole outline of the book. In order of every terrible thing that happened, one right after the other. Now I just have to make the book, I guess. Ugh. I kinda wish someone would tell me it’s okay if I don’t write a book. Writing this book is hurting me so much, but it’s the only way I know how to deal with everything that happened to me.

I don’t know. How much longer do I have to engage with it? Long enough to finish telling the story. I’m doing this for me, sure, but my goal in writing this was always to put my story out there so others who have endured the same thing don’t feel alone. It’s about me, but it’s not really about me. It’s for an audience. So… I guess I just haven’t found that audience… yet.

The naming of the teachers is hard. I still feel safer from a legal standpoint using fake names. It seems like some of the other girls involved need to be the ones who come forward. But when it comes to the TTI stuff… hell yeah, I will use all the names. Most of them are in the TTI database anyway.

Not gonna lie, I feel pretty shitty right now. To look at this nightmare and have to accept the fact that this is my life story is so difficult. This isn’t the person I wanted to be. Before it all happened, I was a person with dreams.

I wanted to be a writer, an actress, a dancer, a signer, a director. I wanted to design clothes and interiors. I wanted to join the Peace Corps and teach English to kids in a tiny village somewhere in Africa. I wanted to travel the world, live in Paris, learn all the languages.

I guess I’m doing some of it now. That’s my one saving grace. After all the bullshit, I woke up one day and decided to go to India. It changed my life. Now I feel like I can do the things I’ve always wanted to do. I can finally close this book and start a brand new story. It begins with a job in Hong Kong. Who knows where it will go from there?

In the story of Pandora’s Box, she opens it up and releases all the horrible nightmares upon the world. But after all the ugliness flew out of the box, there was a butterfly. And the butterfly represented Hope. And for me right now, I feel just like that Butterfly. I am full of hope.

I’m going to live my life. I’m going to achieve my dreams. And this lifetime of trauma… it’s finally all in the past. I’m free of that prison now. I don’t have to stay trapped inside my own mind anymore. I am free.

I am free…