I am getting used to being the first one awake in the house. Not because I never slept, but because I enjoy the stillness of the morning.

I am getting used to waking up without tears in my eyes from a nightmare, with someone beautiful laying close beside me.

I am getting used to hearing the words, “I’m sorry”, “Please talk to me”, “Never too much”, “I’m proud of you” and I am starting to believe them.

I am getting used to planning my future, to thinking about growing older not as an impossible goal to reach but as something that’s exciting and inevitable.

I am getting used to not taking short cuts, embracing each of my emotions as they come because I know I can handle them.

I am getting used to the pages of a book, rather than the feeling of a screen beneath my fingers.

I am getting used to being honest, no matter what might happen as a result.

I am getting used to the smell of flowers that decorate my room, my car, my hair.

I am getting used to the way my body looks in the mirror. I am getting used to liking what I see.

I am getting used to things working out, to good things happening.

I am getting used to the ache in my cheeks from laughing and smiling for most of the day.

I am getting used to the satisfaction that comes with the end of the day, the eyes of someone I love, closed next to me.

I am getting used to opening my mail, checking my bank account, and thinking of appointments and promises I made to people without fear or guilt.

I am getting used to feeling secure, to talking to my loved one’s family and friends, knowing they’ve been told things that uplift who I am, and believing that they will love me because I am worthy of love.

I am getting used to my family trusting my choices, and my judgement.

I am getting used to hearing yes instead of no.

I am getting used to feeling protection instead of violence.

I am getting used to the empathy that comes with feeling peace within.

But acceptance does not come with a lack of gratitude.

It does not come with forgetting the way things were.

I will never forget the ways I have felt. I will never forget the times where I was scared of the light as much as the dark.

I am getting used to the tears in my eyes each morning as I sit in the stillness, as I remember. And as the memories flood my mind, the voice that haunted my thoughts for so long has something different to say.

“Finally, after all of this time,

I think it’s going to be okay”.