Tukayote Helianthus: Unkillable
RECOVERY, EMOTION, CLARITY, PICTURES, AND TUNES. NO ANESTHESIA. NO BULLSHIT.
Tag: fear of rejection
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I’m living with an open heart and solid boundaries—and it feels really damn good. This piece is about choosing joy over fear, curiosity over conformity, and ethical connection over codependency. It explores relationship anarchy, sobriety, self-trust, and the gentle art of the Irish goodbye as a way of protecting peace, staying aligned, and keeping the…
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I didn’t quit drinking and magically fix my life. I quit drinking and finally saw how overfurnished it was. Sobriety turned the lights on, and what I found was wall-to-wall clutter. Substances, work, relationships, patterns, identities, and coping strategies I had been stepping over for years. Clearing them out wasn’t graceful. It was slow, messy,…
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The Cockroach Doctrine isn’t about resilience. It’s about being unkillable. This isn’t a polished recovery story or a warrior’s arc. It’s a ledger of endings—messy, brutal, deserved, accidental, and life-saving. It’s about crawling back when there’s no applause, no soundtrack, no redemption montage. About surviving in ways that don’t look noble. About relapse, rage, obsession,…
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For most of my life, I confused love with sacrifice and caretaking with connection. I believed that being useful, reliable, and endlessly patient was the price of intimacy—and I paid it without question. Over time, I lost my identity, my boundaries, and my sense of self. This piece is an honest examination of the patterns…
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Zero-Return Recovery isn’t a rebrand. It’s a controlled burn. I didn’t drift away or take a break, I deleted everything, cut the cords, and walked straight into the wreckage of my own patterns. On purpose. I burned bridges to stop myself from going back to what kept hurting me. No negotiating with addiction. No romanticizing…
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I was handed addiction, trauma, and loss before I ever had a choice, and I’ve spent my life cleaning up wreckage I didn’t create. This is a reflection on sobriety, accountability, grief, and the brutal resilience required to keep choosing yourself after everything falls apart. I’m still here. Still standing. Still moving forward, one honest…
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This week, I finally stopped arguing with permanence. Not the things I can change—I know that dance well—but the things I can’t. Chronic conditions. Lifelong diagnoses. Bodies and brains that don’t magically “turn around” if I just try harder. In IFS terms, I hit a trailhead where perfection, fear, shame, and denial were all standing…
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One month ago, I walked away from the IT industry—not impulsively, but out of necessity. What finally broke the spell wasn’t burnout or boredom, but a deeper realization: staying was costing me my emotional and physical health. This is the story of choosing emotional sobriety, radical self-love, and a different path forward—one rooted in recovery,…