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Today, my house is a true sanctuary. The children I raised alone are thriving, and the man who once thought he could demand my labor has become a distant, fading memory. I no longer replay that afternoon on the porch with a sense of doubt or guilt. Instead, I see it as the moment I finally graduated from the school of pathological self-sacrifice. I have learned to stand on solid ground, not by becoming “hard,” but by finally having the heart to love myself as much as I loved everyone else. The door is firmly closed to the ghosts of the past, and for the first time in my life, the silence inside is full of an indestructible peace.
