Very much fact. Steemit provides a unique opportunity to get a lot of stuff "out of my head" and onto the computer screen. That itself is a very therapeutic act -- and I intend to use this blog for that.

Every so often I find people who write about how Steemit has changed their lives -- to the point they feel they need to introduce themselves again. They don't seem to understand why, but they are both puzzled by and grateful for that.

Journaling is a form of therapy. The chance to reminisce, to relive certain experiences and events, to examine yourself and your past, to understand things differently in light of maturity or new information -- it changes a person. It changes perspectives. You can come to terms with difficult moments. It helps you make different decisions and choices. Clearly, that's part of the change.

Going forward, I know most of the pieces that fill this theme won't be easy to write. I spent most of the day yesterday lost in memories of the past -- specifically our past together. Remarkably, it occurred to me for the first time that just as she was the one person in the world who loved me ... I was almost certainly the one person in the world who loved her. It explains why we "clicked" -- and why the rest of my family and I didn't.

Had I understood that fact in that way at the time, it would have transformed our whole relationship into something ... different. Maybe it would have changed us both for the better.

I also thought for the first time ... what it must have been like for her at that final parting -- watching me walk away into a future she would soon no longer be able to help, driving back home again into what lay ahead for her. The loneliness and terror must have been wrenching.

So I have promised myself that what I write here will be the absolute truth as I know it -- often unpleasant but all of it real. None of the major players are alive any more. No way to defend themselves on the one hand. No way to pressure me into protecting their feelings on the other. That honesty is another thing therapists reach for.

I tell myself nobody has to read it but me -- and there's a very good chance nobody will. That's the paradoxical beauty of Steemit. Something is both preserved forever and likely lost twenty minutes after it's published.

What remains is whatever changed.

Those changes are why some people here come to realize ... they have been born anew.

Thanks for stopping by. Srsly. I'm glad it spoke to you, too.