Introduction: Letters to My Ex

This isn’t a polished love story—it’s the scraps, the scribbles, the late-night voice memos, and the poems written on napkins when my heart was breaking. It’s the things I never got to say to the man who once felt like home, and to the others who taught me what love is not.

Author: Kali Kay

from the pages of the — Dirty30Diaries

Letter's to my Ex - is all the words I never sent, the healing I had to write. The scraps, scars, and survival—love letters to the past, and to myself. Every heartbreak left a note. Together, they tell my story. Not just about the men I loved, but the woman I became.

From heartbreaks that shattered me, to moves that forced me to reinvent myself, to the quiet moments of forgiveness that stitched me back together—Letters to My Ex is the raw, unfiltered journey of a woman learning to love not just the men who came and went, but the person she had to become because of it all.

It’s messy. It’s honest. It’s healing. And it’s for anyone who’s ever had to rebuild themselves from the ruins of love.

Let's Dig In....

I started Letters to My Ex as more than just a pile of words—it’s basically a scrapbook of my emotional chaos. It’s the letters I never sent to men who broke me, the voice memos I recorded at 3 a.m. when insomnia and panic attacks tag-teamed me, the chicken scratchings on napkins when my brain was screaming louder than the bar music, the notepads full of poems, and the journal entries I scribbled when my heart was busy auditioning for the role of “shattered glass.”

It’s every scrap of paper I could find, every raw thought I had to purge just to survive another day without spontaneously combusting.

This project was born out of heartbreak, but it mutated into something bigger—like heartbreak’s messy cousin who shows up uninvited and eats all your snacks. Yes, it’s about the men who came and went (and boy, did they go), but more importantly, it’s about the woman I became because of them. I didn’t grow up in a home where love was modeled, so I entered adulthood with the emotional GPS set to “???.” That meant I had to learn through trial and error: narcissists, cheaters, good men who weren’t ready, and those who thought ghosting me was their version of charity work.

One man in particular shaped much of this collection. He was the one who felt like home. But here’s the thing about home: sometimes you have to leave it to grow. We met while still duct-taping our own traumas together, still figuring out who we were, still pretending we had it all under control. Spoiler: we didn’t. He was hurting so badly he thought escape was the only option. And so he left. What unraveled after that wasn’t pretty—it was chaotic, messy, and about as romantic as a tax audit. Communication was nonexistent, distance felt like the Atlantic Ocean, and neither of us knew how to fight for each other without accidentally setting the house on fire.

For a long time, I carried anger, resentment, and sadness like they were designer handbags. I replayed the “what ifs” on a loop, wrote letters I never sent, and clung to pain like it was my emotional support animal. But healing has a way of sneaking in quietly—like a cat that shows up at your door and refuses to leave. Over the last couple of years, I’ve learned to forgive—not just him, but myself. I’ve learned that home isn’t always a person. Sometimes home is the version of yourself you fought like hell to become.

And here’s the kicker: even when someone leaves, the door is still open for them to return when they’re ready. But the thing about home is that it’s cozy, and cozy doesn’t always equal growth. You don’t grow by staying in the comfort zone of your trauma blanket. If you don’t know how to be a partner, if you keep soothing yourself with unhealed pain, you’ll never evolve into the person you’re meant to be—for yourself or anyone else.

These letters are my way of piecing myself back together. They are the real, the raw, the gritty. They hold the humor, the pain, the sadness, and the brutal honesty of heartbreak. They tell the story of miscarriages, of starting households over from scratch, of moving and reinventing myself again and again. They are proof that even in the wreckage of failed love, there is growth, wisdom, and the discovery of self-love.

Letters to My Ex is for anyone who has ever felt lost in love, who has had to rebuild themselves from the ground up, who has carried scars but still found the courage to keep going. It’s for the women in their 30s navigating dating, career, and identity, feeling pulled in every direction but still searching for meaning. It’s for the readers who, like me, know that heartbreak can break you—but it can also build you.

This is my story. My scraps. My survival. My reminder that even in the darkest chapters, there is always a way to write yourself back into the light—preferably with a pen that doesn’t run out of ink halfway through your emotional breakdown.

— Until Next Time, Kali Kay

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