By Stephanie Carey
Photos by Travis Young

What if you could sit down with your younger self? What would you say? What warnings would you give? After an agonizing break-up, I found myself wishing I could do just that—give myself all the wisdom I learned the hard way. Since time travel gummies don’t exist, I did the next best thing: I wrote a novel about it. 

Writing this story was a personal journey of distraction and healing after a rough breakup. Yes, I, a 46-year-old woman who has been married and divorced twice, found myself boo-hooing over a man I wasn’t even married to. I did not have “monumental heartbreak” on my 2024 BINGO card, but that’s where I found myself in March of last year. I honestly dismissed the validity of “just dating” breakups, thinking I had my battle scars from two divorces. Nothing could touch me.