This post generated an unusually large number of comments and private messages, many from strangers all around the world who deeply resonated with this experience.
Thank you for sharing your stories with me—it makes me feel seen, and I hope you feel that too.
“Thank you for your sharing I’m also constantly processing how I have been treated by well meaning ppl and there are a lot of shoulds and looks of disapproval.”
“At least now I know I’m not alone and it’s really considered pushing the boundary. So thanks for sharing! N Just coincidentally in recent months I stared to push back with no, even though it’s not easily accepted. So got to keep resisting with a firm no. This came as a confirmation I’m in the right direction.”
“You put into words what I had always felt but didn’t know if I was overthinking.”
“Thank YOU for sharing this. It totally resonates with me.”
“I second this 😭 I came across your page a few days ago and it’s been so healing! Thank you for sharing your stories with us 🙏💖”
“I felt seen while I read your post. All along I have been trying to find the right words for it but you wrote it all with honesty and yet with kindness. So, thank you.”
As has happened a few times over the past year, an anonymous account that repeatedly reappears under new usernames sent me vitriol (again), accusing me of humiliating my visitor through this post, among other things.
A small clarification that may have been lost in the writing: the kind visitor mentioned in this story was certainly not the person who gave the gift, but simply the messenger. I know most of you in this space think the best of me and never assumed otherwise.
As someone who writes personal stories and is currently working on a memoir, I do my utmost to preserve truth while protecting and anonymizing the identities of those involved, sometimes omitting or changing details where necessary without distorting the essence of the story.
This doesn’t mean I’ll get it right 100% of the time, and I am always open to healthy discourse and gentle, relational conversations.
But meaningful conversations require relationship, accountability, and mutual goodwill—qualities anonymous hate mail rarely offers.
This is a tension many memoirists, journalists, and writers hold: the tension between telling the truth, putting in small, consistent efforts to dismantle harmful systems, and protecting identities to the greatest ethical extent possible while still conveying what is true.
Ultimately, my hope in sharing these stories is that others might recognize themselves in similarly harmful situations, feel less alone, and find language for their own healing.
To those of you who have been healing and telling the truth, remember— there will be naysayers calling you names and mocking you.
Some of them will be real people in your ecosystem of harm. Some of them will be anonymous critiques.
I hope that after reflection and discernment, you can identify the bitterness in their voice, and count your growing indifference as a deep victory.
Thank you for journeying with me, for believing the best of me.