I see you.

I see the desperation with which you are clinging to your truth, the strength with which you are braving this storm. I see the toll that it is taking, the calluses wearing on your soul, the sacrifice being made, and the flicker of fatigue in your face.

I see myself in that face.

That struggle, that fight for love, it’s all so familiar while still being completely your own. It’s the bruised veins and the lost sleep of a weary soul. It’s restless nights and long days and nowhere left to turn. It’s showing up when you wish you hadn’t, holding tight when you want to let go. It’s making the hard choices, one after another, until you barely even blink at the gravity of it all. It’s rolling up your sleeves and digging in your heals and working hard as hell to be your own anchor in the storm. Stoic but suffocating. It’s all just so familiar. It’s my reflection in your eyes, your pain on my chest. It’s a breath stolen, a dream squandered, a bond forever forged. It’s a fight for love, for truth, for the chance to wake up and begin again tomorrow. To be better, to do better, to know it wasn’t all in vain. I don’t presume to know what wars you’re waging, but I feel your pain.

And so I heave my heart onto this page as I beg of you to believe me when I say:

You are not alone.

I don’t know the depths that you have dug. I can only imagine the way that you have walked. But the truth of the matter is, it is a privilege to bear witness to your bravery. Because when the world was looking left, you turned right. You risked it all to be true to yourself which is more than most of us can say. And in the wake of that risk lies a better way forward – for you, for her, for  all of us. A way in which happiness is sincere and honesty is revered and love is something worth fighting for.

And it isn’t easy. And it isn’t painless. And sometimes when you’re doing everything right it will still feel wrong. But hold on.

Hold on to the morsel of truth that set you free in the first place. Hold on to the respect you have for yourself, for the love you have for her, for the future you want with him. Hold on to knowing that however it ends, wherever this goes, you fought hard as hell and that has to be enough. Hold on to the only thing that I know to be true –

– that when there is nothing left to do we have to fight for love.