What doesn't kill your needs attention
The moment I wrote the last few words from Rin’s perspective, energy raced through me. It was warm and cold, making my limbs heavy. All the emotion that I’ve felt over the years and poured into her story rushed to the surface to acknowledge what an amazing accomplishment it was to finally come to the end. The end that is not an end but a beginning.
The Moon Beetles series explores what it’s like to have a dark and heavy interior world while navigating outside realities that push you to your limit. But with the installment of the series, I wanted to make a point that the darkness inside isn’t a limitation but has potential. Before making that point, I needed to validate everything that created the darkness, all the loneliness, the anger, the pain, the numbness, and the shame. And I take a long time to do that because I’ve always felt that the phrase “what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger” was out of touch.
What hurts us has long-lasting and far-reaching effects that seep into our everyday lives, our emotional reactions, our self perception, and our thoughts. Sometimes the effects show up as resiliency, and other times we shut down. And when these events that hit so hard happen in childhood, I think it’s even more devastating to brush it off and label it “character building.” Character is what we uncover once we’ve processed all the shit, stripped it away from us, and find what was supposed to shine all along.
Essentially, my problem with “what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger” is that people use it to brush off legitimate emotional damage, trauma, or needs that haven’t been met. It’s implied that you should be strong after hardship, but in reality, a lot of us are just hurting and all together dysregulated. “What doesn’t kill you” needs attention. That’s what I wanted to do for Rin through the three books of the Moon Beetles series. And now it’s almost complete. Here are her last unedited words:
Finally, I am moving forward, and my memory serves me well—a solid, heavy foundation. Something to grow from.