I would love to say,

that losing Ariana hasn't changed me, that I'm still that person, the person I used to recognise.

Nowadays I have no idea. I feel like I don't know anything about myself any more. Like everything I knew has been torn away.

I know I'm stronger. I know I'm wiser, more courageous, more able, and willing than ever before to stand up and fight for what I believe, what I think and what I feel. I know thats the good stuff to come out of it.

But with the good, comes the bad. I've lost patience. I'm tired. I'm emotional. I'm strained. I'm not as willing to let stuff fall by the wayside. I'm more invested, perhaps too invested in relationships with people around me. I question everything. I jump to conclusions, I get angry, I get upset. I cry. I cry a lot. I wonder if it will get better, If I will get better.

I feel like I have a sickness inside me. It's nasty, and it's here to stay. It's called loss, and longing, and heartache, and despair.

I hope, that I'm strong enough to stop it from becoming bitterness. I'm really trying, with all that I have. I'm doing all I can think of, all I can imagine, to try and keep things going. To keep myself together. To keep my life, my world together. My family together.

I'm trying to be strong. I'm trying not to be changed, altered. I loved my life. I loved how it felt, how I fitted into it and what I knew and cherished.

Almost all of it is gone. I can't find any small steps of normality, nothing resembles what used to be. I feel lost, shattered and broken. I'm tired of fighting with people, explaining to people, worrying about people. I just want to be left, to be me. To heal. To recover. To find a way forward, without others wanting things from me, expecting things of me, and trying to force me in directions that I don't even understand, let alone know that I accept.

I can't be what everyone some want me to be. I never fitted into the mould very well before all of this, but now, I just don't want it anymore. I want to be accepted, the way I am today, and tomorrow.

I would love to say, that i'm not changed from all this. I would love to. But it would be a lie. I'm so different. Nothing is the same. And I'm so lost in the middle of it all, I don't even know which way is up anymore.