My Story

As the days passed, I found myself making more and more tasbihs. I chose beads that felt beautiful that day- shades that stood out, pendants that pulled at me quietly. I thought I was simply picking what I liked... What I didn’t realize then was that each tasbih was carrying meaning long before I understood it. Each one I made was during a certain phase or stage of my awakening. One day I made a really pretty blue/silver tasbih. When I finished, I realized I had enough leftov

I went through some of the darkest days and nights of my awakening It started after my intense dhikr. Multple nights went by where I felt so much despair. It truly hit me that THIS is my test.. Yes, I have experience tests before especially during my marriage, in the grief of losing the love I once had with my husband, and through the heartbreak I experienced with Rafiq. But this moment was different. This felt like the test of my life. I wanted Allah to take me away. To take

A few days ago, something came over me. I suddenly felt this deep urge to go all in with my prayers and dhikr. For many months, I was praying just the daily five prayers and doing light dikhr, mainly reciting Astaghfurullah. But after a long time, I felt pulled to do more. I started praying isthikahra two times- once after Isha and once before Fajr. I began doing intense dhikr for hours at a time. This went on for a few nights. I don't know what got into me. I felt like I am

I was visiting my friend Zaria- the one who went to Casablance with me and witnessed my awakening experience. We spent the day talking about random things, just catching up. At some point, I noticed a tasbih sitting on her kitchen counter. It was one I had given her from Makkah- from my trip last year. When I went to Makkah, I bought several tasbihs. Some for friends and family, and one for myself. But after moving out of my husband’s house, I realized I couldn’t find mine an

The day my legal divorce process began was the same day I got all of my belongings back from my husband's house- was also the same day that I recieved a call from one of our mutual friends from Iran. She wasn't aware of my divorce.. at all. She didn't even know that I left my husband's home. That I had been staying with my cousin for months. This was the first time I was going to share it with her. I picked up the phone and we talked as usual.. I told her that I have somethin

I was staying at my cousin's house and my "cocoon" phase had started. The cocoon phase is simple to explain. It’s like when a butterfly retreats into a cocoon- developing, changing, reorganizing, but all of it happens invisibly. For me- it's when absolutely nothing is happen for a very long time. It's hard. Days pass. Weeks pass. And I sit here realizing that everything is exactly the same.. My heart feels stuck- but so does my life. Externally, nothing moves. Internally, not

Do you want to know how bad it gets? It gets really bad. Sometimes I wonder to myself- how did I make it this far? I have spent countless days thinking about Rafiq. Days turned into weeks, and now weeks into months… and I am still not over him. It feels impossible. I have tried everything. I tried to stop fantasizing. I cut off music for some time. I stopped reading our old text messages. I tried blocking out any thought of him. I stopped imagining the future. Nothing works.

I am so tired. So tired of going back and forth on literally everything. If you feel like you’re constantly at war with yourself, just know: it's normal. This has been my reality for a while now. I guess that is the point of an awakening. It's not a "one and done" sort of situation. If it were that easy to make up your mind and move on, it would defeat the entire purpose of this journey. Just last week, I was mentally done with Rafiq. Truly done. I told myself: no more fantas

Allah's silence- It feels brutal. At some point everything quiets down. So completely that it feels like nothing is happening at all. And strangely, it makes me miss the times I used to feel annoyed and overwhelmed by signs. It makes me miss all the times in Paris and Strasbourg when my body felt alive with constant sensations. I miss when every other thought seemed charged with meaning. When colors, symbols, words, and names felt unavoidable. At the time, I felt overstimulat

The past few days I started getting an overload of signs. At first I kept telling myself to ignore them and how I need to move forward with my life and stop overthinking the signs.. But the signs become way too much to ignore. They're constant. My signs include phrases like.. leak, spill, slip, drunk, rage, low, pierce, explode, sick, tears, fights, caught, videos, audios, and many more.. At the same time I've been getting signs of "girls", "cheat", "betray". I am not sure wh

So I'm leaving my parent's home and staying with my cousin and her husband.. They have a room available, which feels like exactly what I need right now. More than anything, they’re busy with their own lives-and that alone gives me the space I’ve been craving. Space to finally sit with everything that’s happened over the past few months without feeling watched, questioned, or rushed. I love my family deeply, but I had to make this move for my own sanity. I’ve just left my husb

I got back from my Paris trip a few days ago and returned to my family. When I first had the dream instructing me to leave my marriage, I was in denial thinking that I will simply go back to my family's house and stay there until I get re-married again, if i get re-married again. I imagined it would be calm. Peaceful. I pictured myself resting, spending time with my parents and siblings again, writing in quiet, and slowly settling into my “new” life. I was completely wrong. I

There's a pattern to awakenings. I’m starting to understand that now-slowly, painfully, as I live through it. It often begins the same way: The man pulls away. The woman is left devastated. Then the awakening begins. The woman is shown that this is the one. The soulmate. The divine love written for her. After this point, the woman likely spends many months obessing, fantasizing, and day-dreaming about this love.. She believes this love is sacred- that Allah showed it to her b

After staying in Paris, I headed over to Strasbourg- a quiet beautiful city in France. I spent a few days there as well and similar to Paris; my emotions were super raw. I was crying constantly, no matter where I was. My last night in Strasbourg was when I hit my first real breaking point. I didn’t expect it to get that bad. I was in so much pain. I remember sitting alone in my hotel room, throwing things around. Sitting on a chair, completely losing it. I had been patient f

It was only Day 3 in Paris; my last day before I left for Strasbourg. And that's when I experienced my Paris moment. After getting ready, I decided to take my airpods.. I didn't understand why, but I had a feeling I'd need them. I honestly thought it was for my own relaxation since I'm into music. I stopped by the same breakfast spot that I had gone to the day before.. the breakfast spot had Rafiq's name on it with the word "Original". The name of the spot was "Rafiq Original

Within a few days of arriving, it finally hit me what the true purpose of this trip was. This was my first solo trip ever.. And it wasn’t about sightseeing or taking cute pictures. It was about something much heavier, much deeper. It was the first time since my awakening began that I was truly alone. No noise. No distractions. No family. No routine. No one to run to. Just me. And Allah. And that's when it hit me how much my heart had not processed. On the surface, my days in

I started getting signs for Paris and for a small French city called Strasbourg. I knew it meant something, but I kept ignoring it off. But the more I ignored it, the louder the signs became.. Until one night, I decided to book the ticket for Paris. I planned to go by myself. My first solo trip ever. I didn't mention it to anyone, not even my parents, because I knew I was meant to go alone. I packed my bags with zero idea what Allah had planned for me. But the moment I got t

The first time I ever thought about wearing hijab was during my trip to Turkey with Zaria; back when my awakening quietly began. Something inside me shifted there. I remember feeling, for the first time, that I wanted my external to match my internal. But when I came home, I kept delaying the decision. Honestly, out of all the rulings in Islam; wearing hijab was the hardest one for me. It's more than just covering hair. It would change my lifestyle, my identity, how I dressed

Before I came to my family's house, Allah started showing me new signs. It started right after my trip to Pakistan, while I was still living with my husband. I call them the signs of Mr. T... Up until that point, every sign I had ever received pointed only toward Rafiq. So when the signs suddenly shifted, I panicked. I remember thinking: What is happening? Why is everything flipping? I had read about signs flipping for awakened women; that sometimes Allah redirects their hear

Facing my family was one of the hardest parts of this entire journey. I went into it knowing I had no real “story” to give them. I had nothing to say. And I definitely couldn’t tell them the truth- Rafiq, my awakening, the signs, the unveiling. They would never understand it. If anything, they would think something was wrong with me. How would I explain to them.. that I want to leave a good man? There was nothing bad I could say about my husband. My marriage wasn’t terrible.