I still treat money as proof of whether I’m safe

Dear Delyara, It’s not just numbers. It’s safety. Safety in the body, in the house, in the week ahead, in who I get to be around my children, in how much softness I can allow myself, in whether one extra problem would break the whole emotional balance of things. That’s why money still hits me so hard. It doesn’t stay financial. It becomes existential too quickly. One number, one bill, one cost, and I start feeling less steady in all directions, not only one. I wish I could say adulthood fixed that. It didn’t. It just made the consequences larger.