How do I even start? Do I say it’s been a while? That feels so generic.

I always end up here—after not blogging for a long time, I get this sudden urge to start again. Then I do. Then I stop. It’s this stupid cycle I’d really like to break.

Writing makes me feel good.

Unfortunately, being a perfectionist makes that harder than it should be. I overthink everything instead of just letting myself do the one thing I actually enjoy. It doesn’t have to be perfect, right? Writing can be messy. Life is messy. God knows my life has been messy.

It’s 2026. I’m in my “a lady never reveals her age” era, so yeah. I’m also in my “I want to light the world on fire” era. Some people call it a villain era, but that phrase is overused.

To be blunt, I’ve been fucked over by mean girls more times than I can count and I couldn’t tell you why, but at this point I don’t even try to figure it out anymore. I’ve experienced it enough to sum it up like this: a large population of females are hateful. If you are different or confident in who you are, they will view you as a threat, and you will be their victim.

What really hit the nail in the coffin for me was when I started teaching high school. How naive was I to assume female teachers wouldn’t act like some of their female students? SURPRISE! They do.

If anything, teaching has been the biggest example of it. Some women don’t grow out of that behavior—they just carry it into adulthood and disguise it better.

And in a job that’s already exhausting and hard, you’d think there would be some kind of support from other women.

But no.

That would be too nice.

So here’s my experience and probably the biggest reason I’m saying goodbye to it all.

For several years, I moved around a lot for my husband’s job. This made it difficult to establish roots. I would start working somewhere and then have to quit. We finally moved back to our hometown and decided to never leave again. This gave me the opportunity to begin teaching (which is a profession I always wanted to pursue, but never could before).

It’s 2022. I was offered a job at a Title I high school, and I was excited to begin my journey. For the most part, I loved the kids. I stayed in my room, did my job, and left.

Looking back, I wish I had stayed in my room.

But I was lonely. And the job could be hard. I wanted friends. I wanted to feel like I belonged somewhere, so I stepped out of my room and tried to get to know people.

That was my first mistake.

I wasn’t met with kindness. I was looked up and down, talked about behind my back, excluded, ignored when I made an effort, and left out on purpose.

And look, I’m not trying to sound like Ashley Tisdale.

But this was real. It wasn’t in my head. I didn’t imagine it. It happened.

So do I turn this into some kind of advice blog post? No.

Because there isn’t really advice for dealing with mean girls. They are what they are, and they’ll stay that way unless something happens in their life that actually forces them to change. Trust me, you won’t be that reason.

Your presence won’t change them. Your kindness won’t change them. If anything, it might make them despise you more.

Their goal is to kill your spirit—to diminish your light, to snuff you out.

Don’t let them.

Just leave. Move on. Accept what it is and hold on to the people who have already proven they’re one of the good ones.

Will your circle be small? Probably.

But there’s such a thing as quality over quantity.

Stand by that.