Every Word Has a Purpose
A LOVE LETTER TO THE VERSION OF ME WHO DIDN’T KNOW HER WORTH
Writing with purpose is hard—especially when life has handed you enough material for a Netflix docuseries. My life is a string of events so traumatic I dissociated through half of them. I’ve wiped the slate clean more than once, only for my brain to mail the memories back, return-to-sender, years later.
Writing it down has become my way of planting healing fields in my own head. Even my fiction leaks the truth. In Quinn’s story, my trauma bleeds through: her sarcasm as a shield, her strength to fight back, her anxiety, her self-doubt, her stubborn humor.
Quinn is funny and caring, and she kicks ass. If she fails, she kicks ass harder—and so do I. Raeban is fierce, loyal, broody, a little possessive—sound familiar? Nece is insatiable, wild, island-girl energy personified; I channel her whenever I can. And Bri’s no-nonsense nature? That’s me now, after a lot of work.
But there was a long stretch of time when I wasn’t any of these things. Trauma ran my life. I was a depressed shell, doing what anyone asked so I wouldn’t ruffle feathers, fighting anyone at the slightest provocation. Younger Laura had no idea she needed to heal.
So, let’s pause. Let’s talk to her:
Baby girl, you didn’t deserve what they did to you. You were never the problem.
Back then, you believed you were the problem. You believed you didn’t deserve nice things or fun times. Your siblings even made sure you felt the sting: “Mom said you’re not my real sister. I don’t have to listen to you.”
That’s a knife to the gut for a girl stepping into womanhood.
Especially a girl who didn’t know what a good man—or even a good person—looked like.
But you were tougher than you had to be. You smoothed out the clothes too small for your body and kept going. You tied your worth to other people’s approval and convinced yourself you didn’t deserve attention. You thought, more than once, “I wonder if anyone would notice if I killed myself.” And it wasn’t even a question, just a statement. Because the truth is, they probably would’ve taken three business days to find you—and you’d have done it on a Saturday.
Worst of all,
as a beautiful teenager,
you were forced to hate your body.
Constant comments shamed the beauty that was yours instead of teaching you to love it. You stopped taking care of it, and you’ve regretted that.
But here’s what you didn’t know then: one day you’ll learn to say:
fuck the haters.
One day you’ll love every curve, every wrinkle, every ripple, and show them off—most of the time.
You’re still working on loving your legs. When you hear the echoes of “thunder thighs” in the back of your head, you just smile, knock something over with your hips on purpose, and tell the haters to kiss your fupa while flashing a friendly little hand gesture that says they’re No. 1.
Every word you write now—blog, book, text banter—is for the girl who didn’t know her worth.
Every word has a purpose.
Every word proves you survived.
You survived the daddy drama, the momma trauma, the familial abuse, the self-entitled siblings, the suicidal thoughts, the sexual assaults (yes, plural), the abusive marriage, the narcissism, the manipulation, the coercion, the anxiety, and the self-loathing.
And now?
Now you feel free.
You feel liberated.
You feel at ease in your own skin. You feel whole. You feel like everything in your life has brought you here—fed you writer-fuel, gave you the tools to be a better mom, forced you to evaluate yourself, figure your shit out, and finally become the person you were meant to be.
