Day Zero - The Sacred Shit Show Before the Start
Welcome to Day 0—the sacred, often chaotic prequel to any great adventure. You know the one: the “just-getting-ready-to-get-ready” kind of day. The pre-party. The stretch-before-the-marathon—except it’s more like searching for your running shoes, realizing they’ve been missing for a week, only to look down and see you’ve been wearing them the whole damn time.
If you’ve been diagnosed with ADHD (or you’re just deliciously human with a touch of existential dread), you know starting something is a whole damn journey by itself. So in order to begin this journal on an actual Monday—because we’re classy bitches who pretend structure exists—I had to prepare on Sunday.
Hence: Day 0. Here. We. Fucking. Go…
As April creeps around the corner like a dog in heat, I find myself reflecting on March—specifically the emotional garbage that it was. Career chaos, romantic misadventures, family drama, and the ever-fun game of “Will I Cry Over My Bank Account Today?”—all of it came at me like a freight train made of feelings. And yeah, it made me want to projectile vomit on the nearest unsuspecting houseplant.
Change is terrifying. Like, wearing-a-thong-to-a-wind-tunnel kind of terrifying. But it’s also necessary. It’s the only way we grow, evolve, and stop dating emotionally unavailable disasters who think "communication" is sending a meme at 2 a.m.
I’ve never believed in “when one door closes, another opens” more than I do right now. I'm finally learning to let go of the shit that clogs my soul. I’m speaking up. I’m standing up for myself. I’m letting love and light in. It’s freeing. But, hot damn, it’s also emotionally exhausting.
Why? Because sometimes I get anxiety about… not having anxiety. Like, I’ll be sitting there, calm, and suddenly think: “Oh no. Why am I calm? What the fuck is about to happen?” It’s a fun little mental spiral I like to call “catastrophizing for sport”.
Healing is a slow, annoying, mind-bending process that sometimes feels like trying to do yoga in a straightjacket. And when life gets quiet, my brain—being the chaotic cunt it is—fills the silence with worst-case scenarios and imaginary arguments with people I haven’t spoken to in years. Staying in my Positive Polly era is a full-time job, but sometimes it just feels like the world is crumbling and I’m stuck underneath it with a tiny plastic spoon and a half-charged vibrator for support.
But let me be clear: my life is not in shambles. In fact, it’s pretty great. And that’s thanks to the fact that I’ve changed what I allow into my space, what I believe, and how I protect my peace. I fully believe everything happens for a reason—even the messy, awful, scream-into-a-pillow kind of stuff.
That’s been my biggest lesson.
People enter and exit your life for a reason. Some stay. Some leave. Some boomerang back like a bad rash. But I’ll never again force a relationship, situationship, friendship, or family-ship. I’m not begging for time, attention, or basic respect.
I’m all set.
Still, the thoughts? They wander. Endlessly. My mind is like a browser with 47 tabs open, and at least two of them are playing videos I didn’t click on. But now that I have a bit more time and space, I’ve made a promise to myself: write more, worry less, and lean into the chaos like it’s a weighted blanket made of medical marijuana and a chilled glass of Sancerre.
Welcome to The Hollow Quill. This is my daily-ish, raw, possibly NSFW, journal of healing.
Maybe you’ll write along with me. Maybe you’ll laugh. Maybe you’ll cry. Maybe you'll scream into your couch pillow and then feel better five minutes later.
Either way—this is it.Grab a notebook and a great pen and let’s start writing…
