These last few days have been the heaviest in memory.
Not for any single tragedy, but because I finally said something I’ve been carrying far too long. I sent an email to my mother. One to my brother. Words that had sat in drafts, edited and re-edited, while I walked the edges of doubt—wondering if I was overreacting. If I was just going crazy.
But I wasn’t.
It turns out that quietly witnessing a country fall into fascism, while most of your loved ones treat it like political weather, has a psychological toll that’s hard to name. Especially when you’re halfway across the world in a place where the people around you either come from similar regimes or don’t care at all. Surface-level bar talk. Gentle nods from acquaintances. YouTube videos and AI conversations standing in for real dialogue. That’s been my reality.
I had to write them. Not to argue. Not to convert. Just to say it plainly: I can’t keep pretending things are okay when they’re not. I sent the messages, hit send, and went to the bar. Drowned the noise. Came home and cried.
The next day brought responses. One brother called it cryptic and confusing, said it felt like AI wrote it, but ended with a blessing and love. Another brother—one I hadn’t expected to hear from—wrote with stunning clarity. Said he felt it too. That he’d been watching the collapse unfold with the same dread. That he understood why I stepped back.
That response cracked something open. Not fixed. Not solved. But less alone.
Then my mom wrote. Not combative, just confused. Loving, worried, still rooted in the belief that family transcends all. That prayer can hold the line. She didn’t dismiss me. She just couldn’t meet me where I was. Not yet.
I wrote back, carefully. Told her I’m alive, I’m okay, but I don’t have much space for small talk or pretending right now. That the message I sent was the hardest thing I’ve ever written. And that she deserved the honesty.
This isn’t a story of resolution. There was no big reconciliation. No dramatic fallout. Just a moment where I stood still inside my own sanity and said: this is real, even if you don’t see it.
And for anyone else who’s feeling that same fracture—who’s watching the world slip and wondering if they’re the only one noticing—it’s not just you.
You're not broken. You're not alone. You're just awake.