Hi friend,

Years ago, I found my sister after she took her own life. That sentence still feels unreal when I write it. It was the kind of moment that rearranges your bones and divides life into a distinct before and after. In the after, there was grief I didn’t know how to carry. There were questions that had no answers. There was the haunting realization that someone I loved deeply had been hurting in ways I didn’t fully understand.

And beneath all of it, there was one quiet truth that kept surfacing:

Pain feels unbearable when it’s carried alone.

Since then, I’ve devoted my life to working in grief and trauma. I sit with people in their most fragile seasons of life. I’ve learned that strength doesn’t look like having it all together. It looks like honesty. It looks like reaching. It looks like staying when everything in you wants to disappear or shut down.

Strength to Stay was born from that understanding.

Not because I think words can fix everything. I know they can’t. But because sometimes one honest voice can interrupt the lie that says, “No one gets it.”

We all struggle. Every one of us. We all have moments where life feels heavier than we expected. Where the future feels uncertain. Where we question our worth or our place in this world. And in those moments, connection can be the difference between collapsing inward and steadying yourself enough to take one more step.

This space is a collection of letters from real people offering you love, wisdom, support, perspective, and quiet strength. Not advice. Not pressure. Just reminders that your story is not finished, and your life is not defined by one hard moment or season.

If life feels heavy right now, I’m really glad you found your way here.

I may not know your exact story, but I do know what it’s like when things feel overwhelming… when your thoughts get loud and everything feels isolating.

You are not alone.

You are not broken.
You are not failing at life.
And you are not the only one carrying something hard.

What you’re feeling makes sense.

This moment matters. Your pain matters.
But it isn’t the final chapter of your story.

Stay with yourself. Stay here. Please.
There is more ahead than you can see right now.

Surrounding you with so much love.
-Mezi