We live in the age of highlights
Smiles are uploaded , struggles are archived
Strength is filtered , pain is cropped

But mental health does not live in captions
It lives in the quiet spaces , between
Expectations and exhaustion , faith and fear
Success and silence

I learned this the hard way
There was a time I thought strength meant endurance without confession
That resilience meant silence . That being okay was a responsibility not a reality
I could motivate others , show up for people , lead , build , create ,
Yet still go home internally empty . functioning but not fine

Mental health struggles rarely arrive with announcements

They arrive disguised as fatigue , irritability , loss of joy ,
Spiritual dryness , disconnection
A constant mental noise you cannot switch off

In many of our communities we are taught to pray but not always to process ,
To believe but not always to speak
To endure but not always to feel ,

Yet healing begins where honesty enters ,
Let us speak
Let us listen
Let us heal , out loud.

By MAKHOSINI S MPOFU

The post The Quiet Battles We Don’t Post About~ By MAKHOSINI S MPOFU appeared first on Sheevolves.world.

The Morning After

One morning,
she’ll find herself
scrubbing her body too hard.
trying to peel off
the fingerprints he left behind.
not just on her skin
but in the corners of her silence.

The water will burn,
but not as much as the memory.
She’ll cry without sound,
because screaming
never helped her then either.
She said no
but the room swallowed her voice.
he heard power, not pain.
took what was never his
and left her shattered
in a world that still asks
“what were you wearing?

They will call her survivor,
but she is still bleeding in places
nobody can see.
and yet… she rises,
not because she’s healed,
but because she has no choice.

Poem By: Aisosa Joseph aka AJ Pearl

Instagram: sheisajpearl

The post The Morning After ~ By AJ Pearl appeared first on Sheevolves.world.

This voice of mine,
this prayer born of my tongue,
I will never let it fade away.
In celebration, I will stomp through the open fields,
my heart bursting with a joy so deep,
wrapped in the quiet embrace of my faith.

Oh, I will pray and praise,
the ancient thanksgiving prayers and songs
my mother hummed into my soul,
words that held worship in one hand
and comfort in the other.
I will lift them high
until they disappear like smoke.

For if my greatest laughter
can hold within it a river of tears,
then why can’t my deepest sorrow
be stitched through with gratitude?

I will gather my gratitude like precious stones
and string them together,
and though my hands are still rough from healing,
I will steady my breath and let this praise mend
what is broken inside?

I will let every word become a release,
a gentle pull drawing the ache from my veins.
I will offer this as my constant prayer,
for a gentle grace found me when I was lost.

I have been turned inside out by the storm.
I have been weathered and worn.
And this story of my rescue is etched into my bones
in a language only I can truly feel and understand.

And so, I will pray and praise,
not in spite of the chaos, but because of it.
I will pray when my voice is nothing but a whisper,
because my spirit has always been the truer instrument.
I will voice my endless gratitude.

Because I have walked through fire

and made it through the rain, I will praise.
I will send my thanks echoing
from the highest peaks so it may carry far.
Yes, I will keep praying and praising…
until my very being forgets the shape of sound.
I will never stop singing the songs of praise.

By: Mutshidzi

The post I Will Pray and Praise~ By Mutshidzi appeared first on Sheevolves.world.

A soul so bright,
Torn apart by darkness and endless fight.
Bipolar disorder’s waves crash on her shore,
As schizophrenia’s whispers echo evermore.

Her loved ones, they couldn’t understand,
The turmoil raged like a stormy land.
They rejected her with words that cut deep,
Leaving her to face the demons, asleep.

Her thoughts, a jumbled mess, like a puzzle unsolved,
As paranoia’s grip tightens, her heart evolves.
The world, a distorted lens, through which she views,
A reality warped by the voices that accuse.

Oh, Shamyne, dear one, don’t lose your way,
Through the darkness that surrounds, there’s still a ray.
Of hope, of love, of light that shines so bright,
Guiding you through the blackest of nights.

You are strong, though your mind may stray,
You are brave, though the voices whisper, night and day.
You are loved, though rejected, by those who don’t see,
The beauty, the worth, that’s you, wild and free.

Shamyne, dear one, hold on to hope’s refrain,
For you are not alone in this struggle, this pain.
Some care, who understand, who see,
The beauty, the strength, that’s you, wild and free.

By :Shamyne Mwila
Facebook: Shamyne Mwila

(20+) Facebook

The post Dear Self~ By Shamyne Doreen Mwila appeared first on Sheevolves.world.

I spent my entire school career in a boarding school, where I was expected to look after myself from the tender age of 8, in Grade 2, until I graduated in Grade 12. I remember when I started boarding school during the second term of Grade 2 in the middle of winter, my shoes were stolen from my locker. When I told my mom, who was a domestic worker, that my shoes were stolen, she told me that she didn’t have the money to buy me another pair of shoes, so I had to attend school barefoot for the whole term. Then there was a time when my feet were cracked from walking barefoot and eventually bled, but I didn’t feel anything; only the other kids could see blood flowing from my feet, and they were the ones who showed me.

I never knew a mother’s love/attention since I started boarding school. l had to spend my holidays with a guardian, and I could feel a sense of not belonging there. If there is work to be done at home, no one else could do it besides me, starting from cooking, cleaning, laundry, and milking goats. I did not spend my holidays resting; I worked hard so that I could get a bar of soap and lotion for boarding school.

I had to do laundry for other girls in order for me to use their soap water to wash my own clothes, and iron their clothes so that I could iron mine because I did not have the privilege of getting full toiletries termly. I got old clothes from family members, especially from girls of family members where my mother was working. I never knew wearing store-bought underwear; only from the leftover fabric that my guardian was not using, she sewed some underwear or two.

Imagine a teenager who gets her period every month. Not having any sanitary towels to use, I had to use the mattress I was sleeping on. Every month, I would cut 3 or 4 pieces from the mattress, cover them with part of a t-shirt I cut up, and use that as a sanitary towel. It didn’t help much, but it was better than nothing. When the bleeding was too heavy, I had to skip school for the day.

Coming home for the holidays, you will face a constant reminder that it’s not your home. Since I was the only one doing all the domestic work, after I mopped the floor and the other kids came from playing and they wanted to use the bathroom, and I told them that the floor was wet, I was constantly told that I should let them enter their house, I should remember that it is not our house… this reminder lives with me until today.

Whenever you want to do something or you have an idea and you are looking for validation or support from your guardian, there was always a negative comment and eventually a big NO! That caused me to start feeling that I am not good enough, or anything l do is not good enough, or I cannot be better than someone else.

I am fighting daily to be better and to know that I am good enough, but this childhood trauma is stuck with me, that it causes me to procrastinate or delay very important things I have to do in order to make my life better and that of my daughter. I know I am stronger than my past. And every day, I choose to fight for a better life-not just for me, but for my daughter. I may still carry the scars, but they remind me how far I have come. I am learning, step by step, to believe in myself. No one can take away my power. No one can erase the fact that I survived.

And now, I am trying to build something new… a life where my daughter will never know the pain I knew. She will grow up loved, supported, and sure of her worth. The little girl who walked barefoot, who sewed her own underwear, who made do with nothing, she is still inside me. But she is not broken. She is a warrior. And warriors keep rising. My story isn’t over yet. The best chapters are still ahead.

Written By: Jasana Uandia

Instagram: Jasana Ijemue Uandia

Facebook: Jasana Ijemue Uandia

The post Growing Up In A Boarding School By Jasana Uandia appeared first on Sheevolves.world.

Imagine this… a wide, clear blue African sky above you with the horizon that disappears behind the green hills and mountains, in a village filled with old, interesting stories passed down through generations. This is where I come from. My roots are fixed deep in the red most fertile soil that helped me grow. There, time moved with the wind and the Sun, not the clock. Our elders talked in wise sayings and idioms, teaching us about life from their perspective… the only one they knew. Respect runs within our blood, it’s part of who we are. And at night, the stars shine so bright, that they feel close enough to touch. For 18 years my village was my world.

For years, I introduced myself with an apology. I thought my worth was tied to my struggles… the poverty that shadowed my childhood, the doubts that whispered I would never be more than where I came from. I wore my hardships like a name tag as if they were the only thing worth saying about me.

But life has a way of teaching you lessons when you least expect it. I remember one evening, as I sat by the fire with my mother, she told me an old Venda folktale about a baobab tree. “The baobab”, she said “stands tall not because it encounters no storms, but because its roots go deep. The wind may bend it, but it never breaks”  She looked at me, her eyes full of quiet knowing. “You, my child, are like that tree”

Something shifted inside me that night. I began to see my life differently. Yes, I came from a village where opportunities were scarce, where dreams often withered before they could bloom. But I also came from a place of immense beauty, where kindness and respect were a currency, where laughter was medicine, and where the land itself seemed to whisper, You belong here.

As a gentle reminder to myself, I started writing my thoughts, feelings, affirmations, and experiences in a journal… not to escape my story, or silence my voice, but to claim it. At first, my words were shaky and uncertain. But with every page, I grew stronger and became better and better. I wrote about the scent of rain on dry soil, the way my mother sang while cooking early in the morning, and the stubborn hope that clung to my bones even on the hardest days. Slowly, I realized that my voice mattered. Not despite my past, but because of it.

There was a moment… one I’ll never forget when I stood at a crossroads (before I knew what the word crossroads even meant). An opportunity came – an acceptance letter to study in the coastal city approximately 1600 km away from home, far from everything I ever knew. Fear and doubt nearly paralyzed me. What if I fail? What if they see a village girl and nothing more? And what if I am not good enough for that new world? But then I heard my mother’s voice: “The baobab does not fear the wind. It holds on to the hope of a better future.”

So, there I was, 19 years young, bravely journeying to the Southern coastal city by myself. I embarked on a journey that has forever changed my life. One that has made me a better person today. It wasn’t easy. There were days I felt like an outsider, days I questioned whether I deserved to be there over and over again. But I carried my roots with me… in my heart, in my words, in the quiet strength my family had planted in me. And that made all the difference. Today, when I speak, when I write, I do it for the little girl I once was – the one who thought her circumstances defined her. I do it for anyone who has ever felt too small, too unseen, too bound by where they come from.

Because here’s the truth… Your roots are your power. The struggles, the joys, the love, the losses, they don’t limit who you are. They prepare you. They give you a story no one else can tell. So let me reintroduce myself, not as someone who overcame her past, but as someone who honors it.

I am a Survivor, a Fighter. I am the voice of a village that taught me true strength. I am the dreams my ancestors whispered into the hollering wind. I am the product of my mother’s fasting prayers. I am proof that where you start does not decide where you finish. And if a girl from the poorest South African village outskirts can rise, so can you. Because the world isn’t waiting for you to be perfect. It’s waiting for you to be “brave”. It is time to reintroduce yourself.

Written By Mutshidzi Kwinda
Born and raised: in South Africa ����, Limpopo, Venda Tribe, Ubva Ha-Makhuvha

The post Reintroducing Myself ~ Mutshidzi Kwinda appeared first on Sheevolves.world.

You wake up, not because you want to, but because the light creeping through the curtains demands it. The weight of the night clings to you like a suffocating blanket, leaving you paralyzed, unable to shake the darkness that’s been following you for so long. You lie there, staring at the ceiling, wishing for something, anything, to make it stop. But nothing does. It never does.

The mirror shows you something you don’t recognize anymore. The person staring back seems like a stranger, someone far removed from who you thought you were. There’s a hollow emptiness in your chest, a gnawing ache that won’t go away no matter how many times you tell yourself that you should be better, should be more, should be worthy of love. But you’re not. So tears run down your chicks like a silent stream in the dark valley. You can’t even remember the last time you felt like you deserved anything good. You’ve made too many mistakes. You’ve hurt the one person ever close to you and so it feels like you’ve hurt the entire world. And that’s all you can see now; the wreckage of your choices, the face of those you’ve let down, and the unforgivable things you’ve said and done.

You can hear their voices, even now. The echoes of their disappointment, their anger, frustration, and their sadness. Like the boomerang, no matter how far you keep throwing them away, they always find their way back to haunt you, follow you like shadows that grow longer with each passing day. You try to silence them, but they only get louder. You wonder if they’re right. Maybe you’re just a failure, destined to disappoint. Maybe everyone was right to walk away. Maybe you’ve always been unworthy of the things you wanted… of the love they had to offer.

There are moments when you think back to the times you’ve had the brief glimpses of happiness, and you wonder why they couldn’t have lasted. Why did you let them slip through your fingers, why did you sabotage every good thing that ever came your way? You realize you are to blame for it all, that you’ve got to account for it all, and that no reason under the earth is going to make it make sense or justify it all; it was just pure evil. And so you feel so small. So invisible. You wonder why you even bother to keep going, why you haven’t just given in to the numbness that calls to you, that promises peace in the silence.

And yet, you still breathe; heavy breaths, as though from collapsed lungs and a slow beating heart. Even though you don’t think you deserve it, even though every breath feels like a burden. You can’t seem to stop yourself from waking up each day, from dragging yourself through the motions. It’s as if something deep inside of you, buried beneath the layers of shame and sorrow, refuses to let go. Maybe it’s hope, or maybe it’s just fear, fear of truly giving up.

You don’t know how much longer you can keep going like this. It’s hard to imagine a world where you find peace with yourself, where you can look in the mirror without feeling like you’re staring at a ghost. But somewhere, in the deepest part of you, there’s a tiny, fragile whisper. A part of you that still believes it’s possible to be more than this, to find redemption, to somehow

Be worthy again. You don’t know if you’ll ever reach that place, or if you even deserve to. But it’s there, and for now, that’s enough.

And so, you continue. Even though you don’t believe you’re worthy. Even though you feel the weight of regret like a heavy chain around your neck and feet. You keep going. Because, somewhere deep inside, there’s a small part of you that refuses to give up completely. Maybe that’s all you need to hold on to, for now.

By- Azwi-Hilton

The post For Now by Azwi-Hilton appeared first on Sheevolves.world.

But love, I am so tired.
The betrayal sits inside me
like an elephant on my chest.
Every fight drags it deeper
not just the infidelity, the lies,
But the why.
Why her? Why them?
Was it my body? My brokenness?
Was I not enough, or was she the dream
You couldn’t resist?
I see her face sometimes,
A ghost in my mirror.
She’s beautiful.
And I am here,
stitching my worth back together
with hands that keep shaking.

I forgave you.
But forgiveness isn’t forgetting.
It’s learning to breathe
around the knife still lodged in my ribs.
Some days, I wield it against you…
hurl accusations like stones,
Watch you crumble.
Then guilt swallows me whole.
I hate who I’ve become:
a woman who measures your pain
to see if it matches mine.
That isn’t love.
That’s a war neither of us wins.

But I don’t want war.
I want us.
The way we were.
The way we could be.
I want to believe
In the man who held me through storms,
Who called me his future
long before rings made it official.
I want to trust
that the vows we whispered in the dark
are stronger than the wounds.
Because despite it all,
I still choose you.

Every morning,
every battle,
every stumble towards grace.

So here’s my truth, love:
I am broken.
But I am yours.
And if you’ll still have me…
If you’ll fight beside me
to rebuild what the desert storms
tried to steal…
Then take my hand.
Not as penance,
not as surrender,
But as a promise:
We are one.
Even when it hurts.
Even when we forget how
Seven years have passed.
Then ten.
Let the next seventy be softer.
Let them be ours.

Yours, always

Anonymous

The post The Woman I’ve Become (part 2)~ Anonymous appeared first on Sheevolves.world.

Stay!
The day has gone by
And I still have so much to say
But I’m yet to ask if you still want to stay

Stay! I’m not trying to do things my way
But I will be lying if I say I want them this way

Maybe you can hold me a little bit longer
So it doesn’t hurt
So it doesn’t burn

Funny how it all sounds like a joke
But I’m not playing all I want to ask is,
Do you plan on staying?.

By: Rosalia Ndjimba

(20+) Facebook

The post Stay!!!~ Rosalia manoula appeared first on Sheevolves.world.

If I knew today was the end of the world,
I wouldn’t have woken up.
I wouldn’t have forgotten to make my bed,
I wouldn’t have rushed out without kneeling to pray.
Instead, I scrolled on my phone till past eight,
I envied those I did not personally know.

If I knew the world was ending today,
I would have eaten more and taken a bath to wash away the buggy eyes on my face.
A result of staying up too late yesterday,
Trying to replace the hours for the job I hate.

If I knew the world was ending today,
I would have called to tell my parents,
“I’m sorry I never said thank you,”
Especially to my father,
Before he passed away.

I would have fulfilled the promise I made to myself ten years ago-
To travel the world and look fear straight in the face.
Because I’ve been so afraid
To live an authentic life,
To do the things I wanted to do.
But now that the day is coming to an end,
And the earth hasn’t shaken,
I haven’t felt any earthquakes,
And there’s a possibility of another day.
If I knew the world wasn’t ending today,
I will wake up early and remember to pray.

Maybe even start that hobby,
I’ve always said I would.
I will make my bed and take a warm shower.
I will eat so much food until I say,
” I thin I’ve had enough for today”
I will call my parents and thank them for all they did-
Maybe if I had done that before hearing the news of my father’s passing,
I would finally be at peace.

If I knew the world wasn’t ending today,
I will quit my job and use the money I’ve saved
To write beautiful poetry,
Then travel the world and visit all the places I’ve always wished to see.

Because I’m tired of saying I would have,
And I want to live a life of ” I will”

By LuSee

The post I Will~ By Lucy appeared first on Sheevolves.world.