Before I found my tribe… I lost someone.

This episode is for the grief we never talk about. The friend who never became a full chapter, but left their name on every page.

Joseph wasn’t a boyfriend. He wasn’t a fling.

He was the friend who saw me when I didn’t even know how to be seen.

We never said it out loud, but I felt it. And maybe he did too.

This is the goodbye I never got to give and the truth I never said out loud.

🦋 In this episode, I talk about:

• Unspoken love and silent grief

• Being emotionally overdrawn from people-pleasing

• How one loss shaped every connection after

• My journey from performance to peace

• What healing really looks like when it’s not pretty

And this weekend? I’m going to the concert we would’ve joked about going to together… with a jersey that honors him. Because some love shifts, but never fades.

💔 Contrary to popular belief… unspoken love is still love. And grief? It doesn’t need permission to be real.

This episode is all about true friendship and the hard, honest road it takes to get there. I’m talking about the loneliness before the love, the lessons that broke me, and the women who showed up when I stopped begging to be chosen. Sit back, feel your feelings, and let this one remind you: you’re not hard to love just used to surviving.

I was stood up… but I didn’t fall apart.

Instead, I found clarity. In this pilot episode, I unpack the moment that sparked it all. How being left alone became the mirror I didn’t know I needed. This is where the journey began: not with heartbreak, but with the decision to choose me. Welcome to Contrary to Popular Belief™️, a safe space where healing isn’t always pretty, but it’s always worth it.

The Safe Space I Needed Didn’t Exist, So I Made It