So much so that I can barely sit with my own thoughts. My mind feels too loud, my heart feels too heavy.

I have tried so hard to keep my mind occupied. I have tried to keep my days busy, to distract myself, to carry on as though my heart is not constantly being pulled back to her.

But I feel grief.

And I want to make this clear: my grief is not about me. It is not my pain that I am trying to centre here. I am simply trying to find somewhere to put all this hurt, because I don’t know what else to do with it.

I grieve for my friend.

I grieve for what she has lost. I grieve for what she has had to carry. And perhaps most painfully, I grieve because I did not know she was struggling.

K has always been the quiet one.

We grew up together, and even then, I sometimes struggled to know what was going on in her head. She is the kind of person who can go through the most difficult things and still show up as though everything is perfectly fine. She doesn’t complain. She doesn’t make a fuss. She simply carries things quietly.

She has always been that quiet child.

And I wish I had known.

I wish I had noticed the little things. I wish I had paid more attention. I wish I had been more present. I wish distance did not make it so easy to miss the things that matter.

I hate the distance between us so much.

I hate that I cannot see you. I hate that I cannot sit beside you or look into your eyes and ask you how you are. I hate that when my heart is begging me to be there, I am here.

A few weeks ago, my friend showered me with compliments. She kept telling me how beautiful I looked in my Thanksgiving dress. We laughed, we spoke, we carried on with our lives.

I couldn’t have known that something was wrong. And perhaps that is what hurts the most.

How do you miss the pain of someone you love when they have become so good at hiding it?

I wish I could hold my friend right now.

I am the kind of person who cannot bear to see the people I love hurt. When someone I love is hurting, some part of me hurts with them. And right now, there is so much I wish I could do.. Please I just want to hold my friend!

Someone told me; in the middle of my tears and grief, that I was making this about myself simply because I was hurting too.

But said person did not understand.

I am not grieving because I believe I have lost something. I am grieving because someone I love has been hurt.

But am I not allowed to grieve?

Is it okay if I grieve?!

Is it okay if sometimes the only thing I can do is cry?

I am grieving for my quiet friend, because even now, she still chooses silence.

I am grieving for the friend who has always found a way to put a smile on other people’s faces.

I am grieving for the girl who has nothing but sweet words for people.

For the person who is, in every way I know her, the epitome of goodness and kindness.

I am grieving because I love her.

And maybe that is all this is.

Love, with nowhere to go.

I am counting down the days until you come home.

My heart feels so unbearably heavy. I wish I was there. I wish I could sit beside you. I wish I could hold you and let you cry for as long as you need to.

I wish I could take even a little bit of this pain from you.

But I can’t.

And because I cannot scream, I choose to write.

Because these words are the only place I can put the things my heart does not know how to say out loud.

I cannot question Allah. He tests because He loves, and He alone knows what we do not know. He alone knows the full picture when all we can see is pain. So I will trust Him, even when I do not understand.

But my sweet friend… Aah, God.

They say people grieve what they have lost.

But I grieve for my friend.

And when you finally come home, I want you to know that I am waiting.

My heart is waiting. My arms are waiting.

And when I finally get to hold you, I won’t be letting go.

I love you so much, K.

For some reason, I have shied away from speaking about love.

I have been contemplating this write-up for about three days now, and somehow, today, I guess my hands finally decided they wanted to write about it.

It’s funny because I am someone who constantly preaches openness and the importance of being confident about your feelings. Yet somehow, I have not really taken my own advice. Hypocrite much?

It’s been almost three years since my last breakup and, somehow, I still haven’t found the love of my life.

Now, you see, I genuinely thought this was going to play out like one of the books I read.

You know the plot.

A girl has had enough of men. She chooses herself. She disappears into her little world, changes her life, creates a ridiculously organised routine, drinks more water, reads more books, develops standards and somehow becomes the most self-aware woman alive.

Then, after about two years of this beautiful personal rebranding, she meets the love of her life.

Fairytale ending. Roll credits. Everybody goes home happy.

Well.. I did my part.

These past few years have honestly been beautiful. I can’t lie. I have invested so much time into myself that I think I have genuinely birthed a whole new person.

I learnt that there were relationships that really mattered which I wasn’t showing up for as much as I should have.

I built something so beautiful for myself in the form of friendships that, somehow and quite unconsciously, I have reached the point where I refuse to be with anyone who cannot treat me better than my friends do.

Standards have changed. Perspectives have changed. My once silent voice is now so firm that I am actually trying to tone it down a bit.

I have become very unwilling to compromise.

I don’t even think twice before leaving, blocking, deleting or protecting my peace. And sometimes I wonder if I am being too strict.

But there is this very unshakeable resolve in me that I am going to get that fairytale ending.

I can feel it.

Like it is not even that far away.

BUT WHERE IS MY PRINCE CHARMING STILL?!

Sir, what route are you taking?

On one hand, I genuinely love being single. I love my life. I love my little routines, my friendships, my peace and the person I have become.

But on the other hand…

I am also a lover girllll.

I want to love somebody. I want to be loved. I want the embarrassing, ridiculous, giggly kind of love that makes you look at your phone and smile like you have suddenly forgotten how to behave.

Crazy thing is, now, I even take my time to listen. I try not to judge too quickly. I give people room to be themselves.

But these men? They just love putting on a show for me.

I am either laughing until I lose my breath or becoming deeply irritated.

There is apparently no middle ground.

But really, how far along is he now?

Do you guys reckon he is currently on a plane flying towards me?

Or is this man taking his sweet time and WALKING??

Because at this point, I would just like an update.

I have done the healing. I have done the self-discovery. I have built the friendships. I have established the standards. I have created the peaceful little life.

Surely, surely, the universe can process one man now?

And when I finally find the man on my very uncompromised list, I promise to deliver the official mail of my newly found love to you all.

With roses, of course.

But for now, I am going to keep that hope alive.

Where Is My Husband! by Raye plays softly in the background.

Please, if you see him, tell him I am here.

~ Hania♡

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It’s 11:44pm.

I don’t even know why I opened my laptop tonight.

It’s one of those situations where your feelings refuse to let you sleep. And thankfully, no matter how long I stop writing for, I always somehow find my way back to it.

Truthfully, I think I’m just a lazy writer.

There are so many times I feel the words bubbling inside me, but I ignore them. I tell myself I’ll write later. Then later becomes days, and days become months.

But tonight felt different.

There was this heavy feeling sitting in my chest. Not necessarily sadness. Not happiness either. Just… something. And whenever my emotions grow too loud in my head, writing is the only thing that helps me sit with them long enough to understand them.

The funny thing is, even now, I still don’t know what I’m feeling.

I’ve spent the last few minutes staring into space trying to name it. I always do that. I try to organize my feelings into simple groups; good or bad, happy or sad. As if every emotion is supposed to have a clear name.

But what about the feelings that don’t?

What about the ones that just float around inside you with no name attached to them?

The ones that sit quietly in your chest and make you feel full and empty at the same time.

I think I spend most of my life trying to figure myself out like this.

There are days I wake up happy and almost surprised by how good I feel. I laugh more, talk more, smile more. And sometimes, later in the day, my mood changes a little and I become quieter.

And sometimes I wonder: Should I stop getting excited about good days just because they don’t always last?

But I’m learning that not every shift in emotion means something bad is coming. Some days are just like that. Feelings come and go, and maybe that’s normal too. The happy moments still deserve to be enjoyed while they’re here.

There are days I have to remind myself to be gentle. Not with other people. With me.

Because I know how to pour into others so easily, yet somehow forget that I deserve the same softness too. I forget to slow down. Forget to rest. Forget that I deserve the same softness I give people.

And then there are the really hard days.

The days where my smile shines the brightest when I’m actually struggling the most. The days where people think I’m okay because I’ve gotten so good at hiding when I’m not.

I think a part of me is still learning how to receive love. How to believe people when they show up for me. How to accept care without feeling weird about it. How to stop feeling guilty for needing comfort too.

There are also days where I make my own achievements feel small. Days where I convince myself that my success happened by luck and not effort.

So when good things finally happen, I don’t even know how to celebrate them properly.

I almost expect disappointment before I allow myself to feel proud.

And then there are days where I feel everything too deeply.

Someone else’s sadness can sit with me for hours. Someone else’s happiness can bring tears to my eyes. My heart stretches itself so far for people that sometimes I wonder if there’s enough left for me too.

I care deeply. I feel deeply. And sometimes that feels lonely.

But maybe it shouldn’t.

Maybe having big feelings in a small body is not something to be ashamed of.

Maybe there are people like me lying awake at night trying to understand their own hearts too. People who cry easily. People who love hard. People who feel joy loudly. People who feel sad for reasons they can’t explain sometimes. People who carry silent battles behind bright smiles. People who are trying their best to handle emotions that feel bigger than them.. navigate emotions that don’t always make sense.

And maybe that’s okay.

Maybe it’s okay to sit with your feelings instead of rushing to fix them.

Maybe it’s okay if some emotions stay unnamed.

Maybe it’s okay to feel deeply in a world that constantly tells people to toughen up.

I have sworn never to shrink myself  just because my emotions are big.

I am learning that sensitivity is not weakness.

That softness is not something embarrassing.

That feeling everything so deeply does not make someone “too much.”

It just makes them human.

So if you are someone who feels things loudly. The joy, the grief, the fear, the hope, all of it..  you are not alone.

There is nothing wrong with you for feeling things deeply.

And no matter how confusing these emotions may become sometimes, I hope we never lose the beautiful parts of ourselves that allow us to feel them all.

 It’s currently 1:37am, and I am ending with my favourite outro.

 Somewhere, maybe in the next house, on the next street, maybe on a different continent, there’s another girl learning how to carry big feelings in a small body. She thinks her emotions are abnormal. She thinks she’s the only one who crashes after surviving.

She isn’t.

And neither are you.

~Hania♡

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LEAVE WOMEN ALONE!

Our bodies have become objects of objectification. Bodies to be sized and sampled. Prone to the criticism of unwanted commentators.

Dear Men!, Among you are scientists of both worldly and unworldly kinds, comedians who call themselves politicians, and self proclaimed aristocrats with only pennies to show for their pride. But let me make room for the decent ones — the true fathers, husbands, brothers, and men who genuinely believe in respect and equality for women.

Dear Men, How do I begin to explain the biology and chemistry behind the magic of a woman? The cells, molecules, and systems that come together to form something so magnificent. We shelter and grow full-sized human beings within our bodies. In the same bodies, we nourish, protect, soothe, and heal.

Menstrual cycles too. Days of twisting stomach pains, hormonal chaos, exhaustion, and emotions that feel impossible to control.

Should I talk about PCOS and PMDD?

About Polycystic Ovary Syndrome – a condition that throws hormones into disorder, increases androgen levels, disrupts ovulation, affects weight, skin, hair growth, fertility, and sometimes even a woman’s confidence.

Or Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder not just “mood swings” as people love to dismiss it, but a severe hormonal condition capable of dragging the mind into anxiety, irritability, emotional numbness, and waves of depression that feel impossible to explain to someone who has never lived through it?

A constant battle to remain while your brain chemistry shifts without permission. Estrogen rises. Progesterone falls. Cortisol spikes. Serotonin fluctuates. And suddenly the same woman who was laughing yesterday is fighting to survive her own emotions today.

We do not get a chance. We do not get a say in whether we consent to these resets or not. In the blink of an eye, let’s even get dramatic.. after a flash of thunder, our lives change. A girl once wearing an extra small is now wearing a medium. A size 8 becomes a size 10. And suddenly society has opinions.

Opinions about our arms.
Our bellies.
Our thighs.
Our faces.

Opinions about bodies they do not live in.

Let’s talk about the growth in parts of our bodies we never asked for. The bloating. The acne. The facial and body hair that just refuses to give up. The emotional exhaustion of constantly feeling like your body is changing without your permission.

There are days where I wish I could choose my mood. Choose whether I want to be on a high high or a low. Nobody wants to live with a constant feeling of sadness. Nobody wants to wake up every day feeling like they are fighting for their life emotionally.

Let’s talk about the plus sized baddiesss!

Some of you have this ignorant mentality that being fat is always intentional. As if every body is built from the same blueprint. As if genetics, hormones, illnesses, medications, stress, metabolism, thyroid disorders, PCOS and countless other conditions do not exist.

NEWS FLASH: some people are simply born differently. Some people are fighting battles in bodies you only observe from the outside.

What about married women who do not yet have children? The pressure placed on them to produce babies on demand, like machines. And if they cannot meet society’s deadline? They are shamed. Insulted. Whispered about. Called barren. Called infertile. Made to feel less than.

Leave women alone!

Society has created impossible standards for how women should look. But beauty should never have a single standard. People are allowed to have preferences, yes, but why the constant cruelty?

“Oh, she’s not slim enough.”
“Oh, she’s not thick enough.”
“Oh, she would be prettier if…”

Women are exhausting themselves trying to survive impossible conditions while also trying to survive impossible standards.

Dear Women, And I say this with sadness. I thought we were meant to protect one another. To lift each other up instead of tearing each other down. Yet I see women becoming the analysers, the instigators of cruel comments, the reason behind another woman’s tears, insecurities, and pain. Sometimes the loudest cruelty towards women does not even come from men.

So I say this to you too: Leave your fellow women alone.

I am speaking for myself and for countless other women when I say this: We are tired.

Tired of shrinking ourselves because somebody does not approve of the way we look. Tired of staring into mirrors and hearing society’s voices louder than our own. Tired of constantly trying to measure up so we do not feel invisible. Unseen. Overshadowed. Tired of feeling like we are never enough for your gaze. Tired of being reduced to bodies before being recognised as human beings.

And to every woman silently struggling inside a body that people constantly criticise, analyse, mock, sexualise, or misunderstand.. I see you!

Your body is not a public discussion.
Your pain is not weakness.
Your softness is not failure.
Your survival is not something to be ashamed of.

Leave Women Alone!!!

~Hania♡

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Why do you cower, sister?

Why hide the fire that was born in your bones?

Raise your head let the sun meet your eyes

And place courage gently, firmly

In the rhythm of your stride.

They say that because I am a woman

I should sit stiff

Legs crossed, lips sealed

A quiet shadow in the corner of my own story

But who wrote that rule?

And who gave them the pen?

Why don’t we remind them

Of the sons and leaders we have raised

Of the worlds we have built with tired hands

Of the hearts we have carried without breaking?

Or have they forgotten the Yoruba adage:

“Bí a bá bọ̀wò fún obìnrin, a bọ̀wò fún ayé.”

To honor a woman is to honor the world.

For we carry life

And we carry dignity

Two treasures too heavy

For the faint hearted to bear.

Ask for the definition of grace

And hear our names echo back

Not whispered, but thundered

Ask for strength

And watch our shadows stretch into mountains

Ask for love

And you will taste our resolve.

So rise, my sister

Not because the world permits it

But because you were born

From a lineage of warriors

Who wore tenderness like armor

And turned endurance into art.

~ Hania♡

A Semi-Traumatic (but Slightly Dramatic) Retelling

On the 26th of January, 2026, I did what every student both anticipates and dreads with equal passion: I began my exams.

Now, let me confess something. My greatest fear has never been monsters under the bed or snakes in dark corners. It has always been Failure. The quiet kind. The kind that whispers, “You weren’t enough.” That fear and I? We go way back!

That morning, I woke up with my heart racing like it had somewhere important to be. It felt like the world might end at exactly 9:00 a.m. in an exam hall. Dramatic? Yes. Accurate? Also yes.

I prayed. Not the calm, poetic kind of prayer. The urgent kind. The “God, please, I beg” kind.

At the very start, it always feels like everything is about to collapse. My chest tightens. My hands get cold. My thoughts start doing gymnastics without my permission. But over the years, I’ve learned something about myself: I can calm the storm. I used to have frequent panic attacks. The kind that makes you feel like you’re losing control of your own body. But growth has a funny way of teaching you survival.

So there I was, giving myself shaky affirmations like a motivational speaker who wasn’t fully convinced. “You’ve got this.” “You studied.” “Failure is not your destiny.”

I have always believed that if no one else shows up for me, I must show up for myself.

Abi, if dem no clap for you clap for yourself!

And somehow, on the 26th, I did.

The exam went well. Suspiciously well. I walked out thinking, Maybe this is a sign. Maybe the universe and I are finally on good terms.

Unbeknownst to me, my resolve was about to be tested the very next day.

On the 27th of January, I had a meltdown.

A proper one..

The kind where your emotions decide to unionize and strike at the same time.

The exam had not gone well.

Thankfully, I wasn’t alone. I had my friends. And let me tell you something , there is something sacred about being held together by people who refuse to let you fall apart alone. We held each other. Encouraged each other. No one was going to be left behind. Not on our watch.

For someone who sometimes believes she can thrive alone, life keeps gently and sometimes aggressively, reminding me that humans are not built for isolation. Community is not weakness. It is oxygen.

I am surrounded by people who remind me what kindness looks like. What a blessing!

On the 28th, I held strong. Not because I felt strong, but because sometimes strength is simply the decision not to give up.

Then came the 29th.

I received a call from a friend who had graduated the year before. Normally, during exams, I avoid calls from family and friends. Not because I don’t care about them, but because any reminder of the world outside my exam bubble makes the pressure feel heavier. When I’m trying to stay composed and focused, even a small emotional shift feels like it could throw me off balance. 

And just as predicted, I cried.

Just a little.

There’s this strange habit I have when I’m overwhelmed. I talk to myself. Loudly. Stuff along the lines of;

“You’ve got this.” “You’re so strong.” “It’s almost over.”

And I never, ever forget to tell myself, “I love you.”

It sounds small. Maybe even silly. But in those moments, it feels like warmth.

Then came January 30th. The final day.

And something was different.

The usual knot in my stomach was missing. The nerves that had taken up permanent residence all week? Gone. So I did what any slightly unhinged but determined person would do. I used the calm to push harder.

I have this habit of imagining the ending before it arrives. I pictured the relief. The freedom. The deep breath I would finally take..

By exactly 12:00 p.m., it was over.

I was done.

I was free.

I could breathe again.

Except… not quite.

You would expect pure relief. Celebration. Maybe even that cinematic moment where everything feels lighter, and life is supposed to make perfect sense for at least five whole minutes. Instead, I felt… off. Empty. Odd.

Every single time exams end, this happens. It’s like I’ve been running on adrenaline for weeks, and when it stops, I crash. Hard. There’s this quiet question that starts echoing in my head:

What is my purpose now? Like, what am I supposed to do with my life now?

It’s the low that follows a constant high. The silence after chaos. The stillness that feels louder than the noise ever did.

And so, I crawled back into my shell. I felt like I needed to recover in solitude.

Today is the 16th of February, and I am still navigating my feelings.  Recovery isn’t a straight line, and crashing after a high doesn’t come with a warning label.

But writing this? Writing this feels good. ‘It feels like reclaiming the narrative instead of being swallowed by it.’ (quoted this from a movie btw)

And if you’re reading this and thinking, Wait… I feel that way too! My love, you’re not alone.

Somewhere, in the next house, on the next street, maybe even on a different continent, there’s another girl learning how to carry big feelings in a small body. She thinks her emotions are abnormal. She thinks she’s the only one who crashes after surviving.

She isn’t.

And neither are you.

~Hania♡

WHERE IS HOME?

Home

What is Home, really?

We have shrunk the meaning of home so much so that we made it small.

Turned it into walls,roofs,

an address you can point to when people ask where you’re from.

But home was never that.

Home lives in people.

The ones who let you fall apart without stepping back.

The arms that know your weight because you’ve leaned on them before.

The voices that soften your fears instead of trying to fix them like it were something broken.

Home is peace,

but not the loud kind.

The quiet kind.

The kind that lets you breathe again.

Home is ease.

Home is where your loved ones breathe.

Where you finally drop the heavy luggage you’ve been dragging through life and realize no one expects you to carry it alone.

Home is where pain is allowed.

Where silence doesn’t need an explanation.

Where you don’t have to be strong to be welcome.

Home is who you run to

when the world has already bruised you enough.

Not to escape,

but to survive.

Home is quiet.

Home is solitude that doesn’t feel lonely,

but wraps around you and stays.

Home was never an object.

It was never a place you return to.

Home is what remains when everything else leaves.

Home is a feeling.

~ Hania♡

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A JOURNEY HOME

Today is the day I finally do it.

I picked up my pen and held my notebook like an old friend I had been too shy to call. It’s been three years. Three years mind you, since I last felt the familiar urge to write, to let my thoughts bloom.

But what do I write about? I have no idea. All I know is that my hands want move, and in my mind there are dancing words without rhythm. For so long, it felt as though a part of me had quietly slipped away. And it’s one of those quiet loses you don’t chase; you simply let it drift, hoping it will wander back and find its way home in its own time.

I have had no motivation, no zing, no spark, no pulse of inspiration. The kind of long stillness that makes you forget what used to be.

But one day this past month, something stirred quietly in the back of my mind. A familiar presence. That old feeling, very shyly it crept. The desire to shape thoughts into meaning. To sit with my mind as we watch words dance, slowly finding a rhythm for themselves. Not pushing, not forcing… just listening and feeling.  Letting them sway and return in their own way. Such a delight it is to be present again in the tune of my own creativity and in its gentle return.

What joy it is to feel a beginning again. I think you would understand better if I compare it to the feeling that hums in the mind when you see the light, slow, and golden rise of the morning sun. I hope this bubble of excitement stays a while, and that my dancing words do not tire. And that this pulsing thrill does not wander again. After all, we have only just begun the journey back to each other.

                                                                 ~ Hania♡

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