“Acceptance is the bridge between pain and peace.” There was a time when pain felt like my shadow—always there, always heavy. I tried to fill the silence with binge drinking six times out of the year, hoping the ache would fade. But pain doesn’t just disappear; it waits for you to face it. My turning point came in the spring of 2014. I remember sitting alone in my apartment after a heated argument with my brother. The silence that followed was deafening—no calls, no messages, just the echo of old wounds. I reached out to my mom, hoping for comfort, but her response was neutral, and soon after, her number was disconnected. My family, once my anchor, felt like a closed door. I tried to patch things up with flowers for Mother’s Day, but the delivery was refused. That moment hit me hard. I felt abandoned, misunderstood, and completely alone. For years, I replayed those arguments in my mind, waiting for apologies that never came. I thought if I could just fix things, the pain would go...