The Phoenix Diaries: The Chapter Where I Took More Hits Than Rocky and Still Had to File Paperwork

Life kept swinging, I kept standing. No crowd cheering, just me versus PDFs, jet lag, and the dark that wouldn’t quit.

Phoenix Diaries
Personal stories of transformation, heartbreak, and rebuilding from ground zero.

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September 7th was a full moon lunar eclipse.

If you're not into astrology, think of it as the universe stamping "The End" across everything.

Two days later came the 999 portal, the ninth day of the ninth month in a year that adds up to nine. In numerology, nine is completion. Finishing line. Closure.

My life lined itself up with the stars like a cosmic intern keeping score: divorce papers officially submitted, banking complaints finally answered, and a mountain of admin that grew higher by the day, as if endings required a paper trail.

When you leave a marriage, you don't just leave a house or a person.

You inherit a part-time job in paperwork.

The past few months have been a battle against The Forms: insurance claims after the Air Canada strike stranded me in San Francisco, fighting with the bank over decisions my ex made without me, selling a house, and, of course, the divorce documents themselves.

Pages and pages of work that weren't mine to begin with, but somehow landed in my lap.

Endings are not only emotional. They are logistical. And sometimes the logistics are the heavier burden.

I would open another PDF and mutter, "I didn't sign up for this shit."

Some days, I pictured myself quitting paperwork altogether, as if the courts would shrug and say, "Fair enough, she's tired," and Visa would send me a sympathy card instead of a statement.

They didn't.

So I carried on, one signature at a time, and somewhere in that endless repetition every form, every phone call, every complaint letter began to feel like armour being forged.

Heavy. Dented. Scratched. But solid.

Armour that gave me the weight and the courage to keep walking.

Travel kept me from sinking too far under.

Not the Instagram version, not sunsets and cocktails, but the raw kind of travel that leaves you alone in a hotel room with jet lag as your only companion.

Or sick on a bathroom floor, cheek pressed against cold tile, bargaining with the Gods, Google Translate, and whatever deity oversees stomach bugs.

My prayer was simple: let me live long enough to find a pharmacy that sells Gatorade.

Nothing makes you feel more alone than those moments.

And yet they cracked me open in ways I probably needed.

There was no one to lean on, no one to rescue me, only the reminder that I was still here and still moving.

Travel didn't save me.

It forced me to meet myself.

Over dinner in London, and over tea in Yorkshire, friends reminded me of how far I've come.

People who've known me for years looked at me and said, "You should be proud".

And for the first time in a long time, I believed them.

This has been the most challenging year of my life, the kind that keeps kicking even when you're already down, but I didn't run.

I didn't drown.

I didn't disappear.

I kept getting up, again and again. Like Rocky dragging himself off the mat, except I didn't have a theme song or a sweaty montage, just cold tea and a pile of paperwork.

I am not polished, nor am I healed.

I still have days where bed is the only safe place.

Darkness has a way of seducing you, but I've learned not to stay too long.

You have to feel it, but you also have to know when to pull yourself back.

For me, that meant booking flights and chasing new landscapes, even when loneliness stung sharper than jet lag.

For you, it might be something different.

You have to find it, claim it, and hold on when the dark pulls hard.

Every piece of shit life has thrown at me this year has doubled as armour.

Soon I'll be walking into October—birthday, new cycle, new beginnings—carrying a full suit.

It's battered, scratched, and not pretty, but it's strong.

Strong enough to know I'm free.

Strong enough to laugh at the absurdity of filling out my fifth insurance form during a cosmic 999 portal.

Strong enough to keep moving, even if there's no training montage, no Eye of the Tiger blasting in the background, just me, tear-stained sweatpants, and the determination to go another round.

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Tell me…

What's your version of getting back up again and again? Drop a comment below, I'd love to hear your story.

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