I love celebrating holidays and achievements, and after being a girlfriend for 5 years of my adult life, I think I started getting really caught up on anniversaries. Almost as if somewhere along the way, I started believing that having an anniversary to celebrate, meant it was another year I was chosen, another year I was still someone’s person, another year I didn’t have to be alone.

But I realize we don’t often celebrate being on our own, especially after being in relationships. We don’t celebrate it as a new chapter like we do marriage, even though it really is. If anything, I realize it is now the most important chapter I could’ve had, but almost missed.

I am so blessed to have had a full year to myself. This week marks that year. The first year I spent as a single woman since 17, and as a whole person for the first time in my life.

I’ve done a lot of reflection and learning on relationships in the past year. Probably because I wasn’t so sure why I had been seeking one anymore and what it meant for me. I’ve come to realize that even as deeply broken as I’ve been, that I’ve never properly loved or been loved. And all that I knew of “love” was just based on movies, what I had seen growing up, or on social media. And that much of our experiences isn’t anyone’s fault, because we are human, so young in retrospect to the universe. It is impossible to expect us to know everything from the start. Yet, at times I can’t believe I was ever in a relationship. I can’t believe how much I didn’t know, because I truly thought I knew love best. But I realize, I didn’t know it at all and I am starting from scratch and redefining it.

It’s officially a little over a year since I left my full-time advertising agency job, to dive into self-employment in social media management and content creation.

August was my official anniversary but I was so busy I didn’t get to fully process it nor celebrate.

With the fall season calming down a little now, it was a perfect chance to really reflect and maybe even share some things I’ve learned along the way.

After all, it’s not everyday we get to leave stability, and somehow still survive a year later.

For as long as I remember, I always aimed to live life as I thought it should be. Most of that means, living it and achieving what a perfect and successful Hmong woman would achieve. Go to school, have a career, get married before 30, be good to my in-laws and have kids. I almost obsessively lined up all the pieces in my life to match this road map, even sabotaging myself to hold onto it.

The first time I truly recall becoming conscious of intergenerational trauma, was listening to my Pog (grandmother) talk about all the things she could never forgive her mother for; for abusing her, for marrying her off at such a young age and taking the whole family and leaving to another village without a word, and for not treating her grandson like her own blood. “How could she do those things as a mom? My mom never knew how to love us. I can never forgive her. I will never be like her.”

Toxicity, something our refugee parents have never had the luxury to reflect on, learn, and teach us. For their generation’s assignment was survival and rehoming.

As I have been diving deep into my own mental health journey of healing in the midst of a global pandemic…I have come to realize just how much more complex and human “toxicity” is than it is credited to be in self-help blogs and Instagram feeds.

And just how easily the word “toxic” is thrown around as a means to stay clear of someone, blame someone, or make sense of pain.