A Small Goodbye

For 35+ years, I had three tiny warts on my neck.

They weren’t beautiful. They weren’t ugly.

They were simply part of me.

They were there when I was a little girl growing up without emotional stability. Without a mother steady enough to guide me through fear, confusion, or self-doubt. I learned early to sit with my own emotions. To survive quietly. To build strength without being shown how.

No one walked me gently into womanhood.

I figured it out.

They were there when I married young, still forming, still uncertain, but determined to create something better than what I had known.

They were there when I became a mother and privately questioned, Am I capable of being a good mom when I didn’t have one modeled for me? No blueprint. No reassurance. Just instinct and courage stitched together.

They were there through sleepless nights. Through tears I didn’t always explain. Through moments of doubt that felt heavier than I admitted.

They were there when I called myself an entrepreneur without truly knowing what I was doing. Long nights. Financial fear. Walking into rooms feeling underqualified. Building anyway.

There were seasons I stared into the dark and asked myself, Will I cross through this? Or is this who I am..surviving, not thriving?

Through every identity shift.. girl, wife, mother, builder, those tiny marks remained. They were constant when nothing else felt constant.

In Febraury of 2026, I went to the dermatologist for the first time. Just routine. I wasn’t planning to remove anything. I wasn’t insecure. But I had developed a habit of fiddling with them, especially during stress.

The doctor said removing the top two would be simple.

So I said yes.

It took only seconds.

But when I came home, I felt a quiet ache I didn’t expect.

I kept touching the space where they used to be.

Because they weren’t just skin.

They were there through the doubtful mother. The unsure entrepreneur. The woman who wondered if she would survive her own darkness.

They were witnesses.

Removing them felt like closing a chapter I didn’t realize I was still holding open.

I didn’t lose my story.I didn’t erase my survival.

But I did let go of a physical reminder of the girl who had to figure it out alone.

And as I sat there processing it, Karthik said softly,“Why did you remove it? It was so cute. It was you.”

That’s when I understood.

It wasn’t about appearance.

It was about continuity. Proof that I endured. Proof that I built. Proof that I became.

But here’s the message I’m sitting with now. We don’t need physical evidence to validate our growth.

We don’t need scars, marks, or symbols to remind us that we survived hard seasons.

If you walked through instability and created stability…If you grew up without guidance and still became grounded…If you doubted yourself and still showed up…

That is enough.

Growth isn’t about clinging to proof of pain.

Sometimes it’s about honoring who you were, and releasing the need to carry visible reminders of it.

I didn’t remove my history.

I simply acknowledged that I am no longer defined by the darkness I once had to fight through.

And I don’t need a witness on my skin to prove that I made it.