“Now you’ll never marry my son!” my mother-in-law laughed, setting my wedding dress on fire. I wiped my tears, smiled coldly, and said, “Enjoy destroying that dress, because the wedding was never the real trap.” Her face went completely pale when I made one quick phone call…

heavily of cardamom, I felt the heavy armor I had worn in Cleveland begin to unlatch.

We instituted a protocol we dubbed “Reality Tethers”—fifteen-minute windows, twice a day, where we allowed ourselves to connect to the venue of our trauma.

“Dad just emailed an update,” Jason said on our fourth morning, squinting at his screen against the equatorial continue reading …