Some people outrun their pain with noise and movement. I’ve never been built that way. I tend to sit with it – sometimes because it feels honest, sometimes because I don’t know what else to do. There’s no virtue in that. It’s just the shape of my wiring. Pain doesn’t get smaller when ignored; it just gets creative. So I let it stand in the doorway until it stops insisting on being the whole story. And maybe that’s all this is: a moment that hurts, a breath that tightens, and me, not looking away.