(But eventually, I had to.)

When people hear I started a podcast and a brand about divorce and breakups, I think they assume I’ve always been loud about my feelings.
Like I grabbed a mic mid-breakdown and said, “Let’s monetize this!”
Or that I found empowerment right away.
That I was always this open.

No.

The truth is — I didn’t want to talk about it.
Not to my friends. Not to my family. Not even to myself.

Not when the marriage was crumbling.
Not when I filed.
Not when I was crying every day in a shared apartment with a man who still found ways to hurt me even after I said I wanted out.
Not when I was ghost-walking through my life, barely eating, barely sleeping or over-sleeping to not deal with anything, pretending I was okay when I wasn’t even close.

I am not someone who grew up being emotionally open. I’ve always been the capable one. The one who doesn’t ask for help. The one who holds it all together.
And when you’re codependent like I was (and still am, I am working on it), you learn how to make yourself small so other people can feel big. You prioritize their needs, their chaos, their comfort — even when it hurts you. Especially when it hurts you, not because you want it to, but you just do.
You keep secrets.
You apologize for everything.
You tell yourself, “It’s not that bad.”

And when it is that bad?
You still try to protect the person who’s hurting you — because you’ve convinced yourself it’s your job to absorb the damage and carry on.

So no, I didn’t want to start a brand.
I didn’t want to tell my story.
I didn’t even want people to know I was divorced.

Because that felt like failure.
And weakness.
And shame.

But here’s the thing about divorce:
You can’t hide it.
Not really.

There’s a before and after.
And even if you try to pretend everything’s fine, your life starts unraveling in ways that are loud.
You move out.
Your last name changes (Thank God I didn’t change mine yet because I procrastinated)
You cancel joint accounts and call lawyers and reintroduce yourself to people like, “Hi, yeah, I’m… not married anymore.”

There’s no casual way to mention that.
There’s no version of “I’m good” that covers all the ways your world just broke. (There are some really funny jokes to make though but beware people get super uncomfortable with those)

So I finally started talking.
Not because I wanted to.
Because I had no choice.
I couldn’t hold it all alone anymore.

I started in tiny ways — in therapy, on late-night phone calls with my mom, with friends who didn’t really understand but tried their best (love my girlies) And even that was hard. Because when you’re codependent, letting people see your pain feels like exposure. It feels like a risk. Like you’re the burden.

Spoiler: you’re not.

I wasn’t either.
But it took everything falling apart for me to realize that.

And as I started healing, I looked around for support — real support — for women like me. Late 20s. No kids. No house. No desire to be told to “just forgive and move on.”

And what I found?
Were rooms full of women in their 50s and 60s.
Brave, beautiful women. But they were talking about custody battles and retirement and how to co-parent teenagers. That wasn’t my reality. That wasn’t my grief.

I was mourning the future I thought I had.
I was trying to untangle gaslighting, emotional abuse, and years of making myself small.
I was wondering how I ended up in a marriage where I felt more alone with someone than I ever did by myself.
I was rebuilding my self-worth from scratch.

And I knew I couldn’t be the only one.

That’s where Girl, Hang Up came from.
Not as a business idea. Not as a content plan.
But as a need.

A need for a space where you can say:
“This fucked me up.”
“This wasn’t just a breakup.”
“I don’t recognize myself anymore.”
“I stayed longer than I should have, and I’m mad about it.”
“I left, and I still miss him sometimes, and that confuses the hell out of me.”
“I thought choosing myself would feel better than this.”

This brand exists because I couldn’t find that space anywhere else.

We live in a world that romanticizes heartbreak in aesthetic quotes and vague TikToks — but doesn’t really hold space for the rawness of it. Especially not for women in their 20s and 30s who are grieving relationships that looked fine from the outside. Who are told they’re “so young” and will “bounce back” and “could be on Hinge tomorrow.” (Also I swear my Hinge likes are out to personally victimize me because what the hell)

We’re not bouncing.
We’re rebuilding.
And that takes time. And community. And truth.

So that’s what this is.

Girl, Hang Up is for the ones who couldn’t say it until now.
The ones who left — or stayed — or are still deciding.
The ones who are scared of being seen but more scared of being stuck.
The ones who’ve cried in their car, deleted the texts, and blocked the number. (And then unblocked it. And then blocked it again. We’ve all been there.)

You don’t need to be polished or perfect or past it.

You just need somewhere real.
You just need someone to say,
“I get it.”
“You’re not crazy.”
“And no, you’re not too much.”

That’s why I’m here.
And if you’re here too, I’m really fucking glad.