Dear HIV,
I hope you’re well. It’s been a while since I’ve written, and I want to take a moment to acknowledge you as another year begins.
You’ll recall the contract I required you to sign seven years ago when you took up residence in my body. In this contract, I conceded that your continued tenancy comes with these parameters:
You will be quiet.
You will not procreate.
You will not aggravate, vex, poison, or in any other way influence the cells and functions of the other organs and processes in my body.
You will occupy a small, windowless, doorless space approximately the size of the tip of a stickpin in a deep reservoir inside my body, where you will have no nourishment, no visitors, and no hope of escape.
Thank you, HIV, for respecting the simple parameters of this...
Broken Hearts
Dear People Who Use the “Battle” Metaphor for Other People Who Have the Distinct Displeasure of Cancer,
If I die of this relapsed, refractory Acute Myelogenous Leukemia, and you describe me posthumously as having “lost her battle with cancer,” I swear to God I will come back from wherever my soul may have been sent and haunt the living shit out of you for the rest of your days.
Perhaps you have never been in a real-life, actual fight or battle. Kindly allow me to explain, then, that a fight, battle, war, skirmish, or what-the-fuck-ever else you want to call it, is something that either adversary reasonably could win with superior manpower and/or firepower. Kindly allow me also to remind you that there is no cure for cancer. That’s why it’s not, you know, called “Breast-itis” or “...
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I write this never really believing this day would come . Two female friends I lost because they did not believe I had been abused by 2 former boyfriends.
To have to go through meeting 2 men and after leaving one who verbally and emotionally abused me, I met a second.
Only someone who had endured this can begin to know how much strength it takes to leave an abuser and go through it twice in 2 different relationships takes double the strength.
To compound the pain both of these men after I left made it their duty and mission to discredit me and make me look like I was pure crazy in my claims that they were abusers to my friends.
They maliciously made lies up claiming they were the victims and how I had made their lives Hell because both I kicked out of my home because of their...
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I have no right to ask for the forgiveness of the one person who has done nothing but forgiven me. I am a constant disappoint and have perpetually lied to hide how disappointing I am. I tried to fill this hole in my soul that continually ached with pain but I did so without thought, without reason and without any regard to what my actions would ultimately do. I’m not saying that I didn’t think of the consequences but because of my lack of self-control I acted anyway. I made a mistake that should not be forgiven and I compounded it with lie after lie so that I can conceal just how disappointing I am. When you hurt someone… I’m not sure it is a wound that ever heals. What I do know is that even with forgiveness, it will never be the same. I have spent the last 2 days trying to figure out…...
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I am writing this letter because I'm tired of reading or hearing about all these stereotypical breakup scenarios and ways to move on with you life. I recently broke up with a partner of 2 years and as I'm sure we can all agree...going through a break up sucks! But for magazines and other media to simplify a break up to the point where it is formulaic is just wrong and you have to be aware that no two relationships are the same, therefore no break up is going to be the same.
People are different and as a result they are going to respond differently to a breakup. So no matter what you might have prepared yourself for because you've already broken up with someone, doesn't mean your next breakup is going to be smooth sailing.
I have spent a bit of time thinking about breakup...
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Dear Dr. Phil,
What the disability community can do:
Learn more about the episode.
Read about the episode.
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Send Dr. Phil a message on Twitter. See our example.
Download a copy of this letter.
I am writing on behalf of the millions of people with intellectual and developmental disabilities (I/DD) in our nation and their loved ones that may have seen the April 13, 2012 Dr. Phil episode entitled “Deadly Consequences.” As the nation’s largest organization serving and advocating on behalf of people with I/DD, with a network of over 700 chapters across the country, we’ve received many outraged complaints about the content of this program, and after viewing it, I felt compelled to contact you to voice our concerns.
Frankly, we are appalled by the superficial...
3,087
I feel compelled to write this letter after meeting a work colleague who had essentially shut up shop emotionally and chosen to live out his days on a barge in solitude. I don't want my opening sentence to sound as though deciding to live in a barge is 'the end of your life', rather that I heard his story from a friend who informed me he had once been in love with a women but things hadn't worked out and he had never gotten over it and then decided to isolate himself.
I too had my first serious love when I was in my mid-20s and needless to say that didn't work out, so I know how heartbreaking and depressing that time can be. But I've never understood how some people can just seem to drop out of life and settle into feeling miserable on a daily basis. If anything you should want to be...
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Dear Ex-Boyfriend,
You were my first love, the first man in my life. I really looked up to you, and perhaps I still would, if not for the recent events post our break-up. Alright, I admit I have made my own mistakes, which are probably not easy for you to accept either. You never expected that I would walk out on you. Well, here’s the truth. I don’t know if you will like this or not, but here it is.
I didn’t like the person I had become when I was with you. Simple and straight. I thought, since I loved you, I should make all kinds of sacrifices I possibly could. So, I did. I let go of all my friends, my family, my social life, and even my own individuality. I gave myself up to you completely. My life, my days started with you and ended with you. Somewhere down the line, when I started...
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Dear Mr. Barkley:
I write you out of love. I write you out of profound pain. I write you out of deep concern. I hope you accept this letter in the spirit that I write.
Mr. Barkley, I understand that you said, in so many words, that slavery was not so bad and that you were tired of people bringing up slavery. I was shocked by both statements. Then I was mad. Then I was terribly disappointed. Finally, I was just in deep hurt and great pain. Now, I am trying to help you and all those who may think like you.
Mr. Barkley, allow me to tell you why slavery was "not so bad," but very, very bad. First, African people were snatched from their families, their villages, their communities, their tribes, their continent, their freedom. African people were made to walk hundreds of miles in...
3,187
You are likely reading this and thinking, "crazy ex girlfriend, jealous and obsessed" Just move on and forget it already.
Believe me I`m quite sane and I have moved on and I only lost something I never should have allowed in my life in the first place.
I am not thinking wishful thoughts of how I can get him back nor would I want to be in your shoes ever again.
I am not a vengeful ex girlfriend or do I wish to be.
I do wish to save you the pain I endured at having allowed this man in my life.
You see I am the previous ex girlfriend after his estranged ex wife dealt with him for years.
I am not his first girlfriend since he separated and I wasn`t his last and very likely neither will you be.
His track record isn`t very long since his marriage ended.
You see I...
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