Here She Rises

The Awakening

One day you wake up and feel the entire world pressing against your chest.

You can’t fully breathe. Voices and sounds are faint.

Your heart pounds with a deep ache; your words feel hollow, your voice a ghost of itself.

You have no control. Nothing to grip, nothing to hold.

You panic. You spiral.

It feels like something inside you is dying, slowly, and you don’t recognize the face in the mirror anymore.

You barely trust your own thoughts and emotions to coexist.

Who am I?

You ask yourself over, and over, and over again.

You wear many hats. You carry many titles.

And yet, you cannot find… you.

Days fold into each other. Time moves, but you feel outside of it.

Moments that should feel special, don’t.

Presence is no longer your default state;

it becomes a foreign act — unfamiliar, unnatural.

You stop leaving the house because your eyes never stop welling,

brimming with all the tears you’ve kept inside.

You isolate yourself because you cannot bear to be asked,

“How are you doing?”

You feel trapped inside a dark tunnel with no way out.

Your chest is unbearably tight.

Any moment, you imagine your heart might stop.

But will it?

It feels never-ending. Drowning in grief.

And yet, even the abyss has its limits.

So, with time, you begin to notice…

Your phone buzzing with the names of people who genuinely love you.

The words “Mommy, Mommy” echoing louder, clearer.

Your husband’s kiss and embrace warming the ache in your chest.

And then —

One day, you wake up with a fire stirring quietly in your spirit.

You meet your own gaze in the mirror — not fully whole, not yet,

but no longer a stranger.

You whisper,

“Here she rises.”

And the words are not just spoken.

They are a promise.

A vow.

A beginning.

The tunnel is still there, the shadows still linger,

but now there is light — a flicker, a flame, a dawning.

And it is you.

Here. She. Rises.

Angelique Familia