I didn’t tell anyone. Not my mother. Not even Noor, who knows everything about me—even things I haven’t said aloud. It felt too fragile, too immense, to name. So, I carried it quietly.
I’d loved him the halal way—or at least, I thought I had. Every intention was clean. Every prayer was sincere. My istikhara was inconclusive, but I interpreted the silence as a "maybe." He was respectful, called my father, brought his mother over, and then… he ghosted. No calls returned. No explanation. Just whispers around the community about his engagement to someone else—someone thinner, brighter, better, apparently.
I laughed at first. That brittle kind of laugh. Then I stopped laughing at all.
The days after were blur lines. I went to work. Smiled when spoken to. Ate enough to avoid suspicion. Prayed—moving through the motions like a shadow echoing something once alive. My heart felt like a crushed fig, sweet and ruined. People told me to be strong, that "everything happens for a reason," but that only made me more tired.
One evening, after Maghrib, I sat in my car outside the masjid. I couldn't make myself go home. The streetlights turned the windshield pale gold. My hands trembled without reason. And then I whispered, “Ya Allah… I’m trying. I really am. But I’m so tired.”
No one heard it.
Except the One who always does.
I don’t know how long I cried. I hunched into the steering wheel and let it come—all of it. Not because I thought it would change anything. Just because I needed to stop pretending I was okay.
That night, after I dragged myself to bed, a verse drifted into my mind. Something I hadn’t read in a while.
“For verily, with hardship comes ease.”
And again:
“Indeed, with hardship comes ease.”
(Qur’an 94:5–6)
I almost dismissed it at first. But I’d always found it strange that the verse was repeated. Why twice? My Qur’an teacher once told me, years ago, that repetition in the Qur’an means emphasis. Reassurance. It’s like Allah knows some aches aren’t soothed the first time. He repeats it, not because He forgot—but because He knows we will.
I recited it softly, again and again, until I drifted off to sleep.
The pain didn’t disappear the next morning. But something small did shift. I started seeing my own resilience not as a burden—but as a sign: I hadn’t died from this. I was still choosing to pray. Still offering every heartbreak as a dua, asking, “If he’s not written for me, then please replace this loss with something better—maybe not someone better… but maybe a better me.”
Little things began to heal me.
A student at work who handed me a crooked origami dove and said, shyly, “I made this for you... because you’re always nice.”
The soft breeze through my window one Fajr, when my heart felt like a bruised peach—but the air whispered, You are still breathing. Still worth mending.
And slowly, I stopped checking his social media.
Stopped replaying every conversation.
Stopped measuring my worth against who he chose instead.
I no longer begged him to come back—instead, I begged Allah to make me whole again. And that became the turning point.
Heartbreak did not make me unlovable. Or forgotten. Or punished.
It made me empty enough to be filled, again, with something purer.
Now, every time I see someone walking with invisible wounds—the tired smiles, the swollen eyes—I whisper a quiet prayer. Because silent battles are fought by the strongest of souls. And Allah sees all of them.
Especially when no one else does.
Especially when we say nothing.
Especially then.
---
Qur’an & Hadith References:
I didn’t tell anyone. Not my mother. Not even Noor, who knows everything about me—even things I haven’t said aloud. It felt too fragile, too immense, to name. So, I carried it quietly.
I’d loved him the halal way—or at least, I thought I had. Every intention was clean. Every prayer was sincere. My istikhara was inconclusive, but I interpreted the silence as a "maybe." He was respectful, called my father, brought his mother over, and then… he ghosted. No calls returned. No explanation. Just whispers around the community about his engagement to someone else—someone thinner, brighter, better, apparently.
I laughed at first. That brittle kind of laugh. Then I stopped laughing at all.
The days after were blur lines. I went to work. Smiled when spoken to. Ate enough to avoid suspicion. Prayed—moving through the motions like a shadow echoing something once alive. My heart felt like a crushed fig, sweet and ruined. People told me to be strong, that "everything happens for a reason," but that only made me more tired.
One evening, after Maghrib, I sat in my car outside the masjid. I couldn't make myself go home. The streetlights turned the windshield pale gold. My hands trembled without reason. And then I whispered, “Ya Allah… I’m trying. I really am. But I’m so tired.”
No one heard it.
Except the One who always does.
I don’t know how long I cried. I hunched into the steering wheel and let it come—all of it. Not because I thought it would change anything. Just because I needed to stop pretending I was okay.
That night, after I dragged myself to bed, a verse drifted into my mind. Something I hadn’t read in a while.
“For verily, with hardship comes ease.”
And again:
“Indeed, with hardship comes ease.”
(Qur’an 94:5–6)
I almost dismissed it at first. But I’d always found it strange that the verse was repeated. Why twice? My Qur’an teacher once told me, years ago, that repetition in the Qur’an means emphasis. Reassurance. It’s like Allah knows some aches aren’t soothed the first time. He repeats it, not because He forgot—but because He knows we will.
I recited it softly, again and again, until I drifted off to sleep.
The pain didn’t disappear the next morning. But something small did shift. I started seeing my own resilience not as a burden—but as a sign: I hadn’t died from this. I was still choosing to pray. Still offering every heartbreak as a dua, asking, “If he’s not written for me, then please replace this loss with something better—maybe not someone better… but maybe a better me.”
Little things began to heal me.
A student at work who handed me a crooked origami dove and said, shyly, “I made this for you... because you’re always nice.”
The soft breeze through my window one Fajr, when my heart felt like a bruised peach—but the air whispered, You are still breathing. Still worth mending.
And slowly, I stopped checking his social media.
Stopped replaying every conversation.
Stopped measuring my worth against who he chose instead.
I no longer begged him to come back—instead, I begged Allah to make me whole again. And that became the turning point.
Heartbreak did not make me unlovable. Or forgotten. Or punished.
It made me empty enough to be filled, again, with something purer.
Now, every time I see someone walking with invisible wounds—the tired smiles, the swollen eyes—I whisper a quiet prayer. Because silent battles are fought by the strongest of souls. And Allah sees all of them.
Especially when no one else does.
Especially when we say nothing.
Especially then.
---
Qur’an & Hadith References:
