Toxic Patterns

I heard something the other day that really stuck with me: 

Every relationship you are in is a reflection of what you truly believe you deserve. 

And honestly, the more I reflected on it, the harder it became to ignore how true that feels. This doesn’t only apply to romantic relationships, but also to friendships and the kinds of people we allow into our lives.

When you find yourself continuously repeating the same painful relationship dynamics, eventually you have to stop and ask yourself what unhealed part of you is drawn to this familiarity. Why does something that hurts still feel so comfortable?

After a lot of reflection (and many therapy sessions ) I started to understand how deeply childhood shapes the way we connect to others. When you grow up in a dysfunctional family dynamic, whether with a narcissistic parent or an emotionally unavailable one ( or both) inconsistency can start to feel normal. 

Love becomes something unpredictable. Attention feels earned rather than freely given. You feel the need to be seen and chosen and you feel the longer you tolerate and stay the more loyal you will be and the more they will appreciate you and see your worth. The sad truth is when you show someone you’ll stay regardless of how they treat you only teaches them that they can put you through anything and still keep access to you.

So later in life, emotionally unavailable people can feel strangely familiar. Not because they are healthy for us, but because they mirror what we once knew. The inconsistency, the mixed signals, the emotional distance it recreates a dynamic we spent years trying to survive and subconsciously hoped to finally fix.

The hardest realization is that familiarity is not the same thing as love. Sometimes we confuse the two because chaos feels more natural to us than stability ever did. We tell ourselves this connection is so special or see a deeper meaning behind it and romanticise it like he was your " soulmate" or you were meant for each other. But no healthy love or connection should cause this much pain and anxiety and make you wonder where you stand.

Healing begins when you stop trying to earn love from people incapable of giving it consistently, and start believing you deserve relationships that feel safe, mutual, calm, and emotionally available.

 You can only end these toxic patterns when you stop accepting the treatment you don't you don't deserve no matter how much love is in your heart. Never allow your need for deep connection to become the reason you tolerate mistreatment. Know your worth and heal yourself and only then will you attract what you truly deserve.

The Grief No One Expects

There is a kind of heartbreak that surprises you the kind that arrives unexpectedly yet quietly and leaves you questioning yourself more than ever before. 

Sometimes it comes from a connection that was never clearly defined. A bond that existed somewhere between closeness and distance. Just enough warmth to make you believe it meant something, but never enough certainty to know if it was real.

You tell yourself you’re imagining it. That maybe you’re asking for too much. That maybe, if you’re patient, things will eventually make sense.

But inconsistency has a way of slowly wearing down even the strongest sense of self. When someone gives you moments of attention and then disappears into silence, you begin searching for meaning in every small interaction. You start wondering why you were so open, so giving, and so transparent with this person. Was it because you believed the connection was something rare? Or was it simply because, after a long time, you wanted to feel something again?

The hardest part isn’t the ending. It’s realizing that what hurt you most wasn’t the person themselves, but the feeling they awakened inside you, a feeling you thought you had already overcome. The quiet fear of never being enough. Of being easily forgotten.

Sometimes people enter our lives not to stay, but to reveal the places within us that still need healing.

And grief doesn’t always follow logic. You can grieve something that was never fully yours. You can feel the loss of something that never truly had a name.

But with time comes clarity.

The people who truly value you don’t leave you guessing about where you stand. They don’t create confusion where there should be sincerity. Real connection doesn’t rely on uncertainty.

Eventually, you stop asking why things unfolded the way they did. You are actually grateful they walked away from you because you were unable to take that step yourself. You are thankful for the good memories and for this ache that made you realize that you really don’t need them or their validation to be happy. 

You begin to recognize something far more important: your ability to care deeply was never a weakness. It was simply given in the wrong place.

And that realization, quietly and slowly, is where healing begins.

Survival Mode

For most of my life, I thought the way my mind worked was normal. Recently, a close friend of mine who is a therapist told me something that initially confused me. She said that after getting to know me, she realized I seem to live in a constant “Survival Alert Mode”

At first I didn’t fully understand what she meant. But the more I reflected on it, the more it made sense. 

When someone experiences repeated trauma throughout their life, the body and mind adapt in order to survive. One of the ways they do that is by constantly scanning for danger. You read body language, you read the room for signs, you analyze words and refer to previous scenarios in your mind. Your mind starts overthinking , predicting worst-case scenarios, and mentally preparing for everything that could possibly go wrong. It feels like a form of protection as if being mentally prepared will somehow soften the blow when something bad happens.

But one of the most important lessons I’ve learned is this no matter how prepared you think you are, when something truly painful happens, it is almost always worse than anything you imagined. It’s like studying a subject for a test you are not sure you will take but finding out you were tested in a whole other subject. And usually it’s POP Quiz 🫨

All that constant vigilance, all that overthinking it doesn’t actually shield you from the pain.

So I’m trying to shift my perspective.

I’m trying to let go of the illusion that I can prepare myself for every possible outcome or control what life brings my way. Because the truth is, none of us really can.

What I can hold on to instead is something much more grounding is my faith in Allahs will. And my Faith that everything that is meant to happen will happen and now I will focus on this verse from the Quran.

“إِنَّ مَعَ الْعُسْرِ يُسْرًا” 

It means:

“Indeed, with hardship comes ease.”

Looking back at everything I’ve been through, I can see that even in my hardest moments, Allah was always there in my life in so many ways and has sent me so many amazing people to lift me up from my lowest guiding me, strengthening me, and helping me find my way through things I once thought I would never survive.

Maybe the goal isn’t to stay in survival mode forever.

Maybe the goal is to trust that whatever comes, Allah will give us the strength to get through and to have that kind of trust is far more powerful than any attempt at control. 

Living in a constant state of anxiety and hyper alertness is exhausting both mentally,emotionally, and physically. 

Trusting that Allah is guiding me allows me to release the impossible burden of trying to predict and prevent every impossible outcome, and instead, find strength and peace in the present moment and comfort knowing that Allah will always be there 💕 and to always say الحمدلله

Soul Mates?

For as long as I can remember, I was a hopeless romantic.

I believed in “the one.” In a love that felt like destiny rather than a choice. I believed that somewhere out there was a person designed specifically for me someone who would understand me effortlessly, love me endlessly, and never make me question where I stood.

I didn’t just want love. I wanted epic love.

The kind of love I saw in movies like The Notebook, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, and most recently Wuthering Heights 🥹

The kind of love that no memory loss, no dementia, no obstacle could erase.

The stories where love conquered everything.

Kont habla…

But the truth didn’t arrive dramatically. It came quietly, through disappointments when reality gave me the biggest slaps in the face🫠 

I learned that someone who feels like “the one” can still be the one who causes you more pain than you ever imagined. The one who breaks your heart into so many pieces that you don’t know if you’ll ever trust another man again.

I realized I had romanticized the idea of true love and fate so deeply that I ignored every red flag waving right in front of me. I told myself that if I just worked harder, loved harder, stayed longer I could still get the magical story I had written in my head.

What I didn’t know then was that my low self-worth then that was quietly influencing my choices. It made me tolerate what I should have walked away from. It made me justify the unjustifiable.

I still believe in love.

I’ve just let go of the fairytale version of it.

Love is consistency.

Butterflies are usually anxiety, not magic.

Love is choosing your person every single day.

Strong chemistry does not automatically mean compatibility.

Believing too deeply in the idea of “soulmates” can make you overlook red flags. It can make you stay longer than you should. It can convince you that intensity equals destiny.

It doesn’t.

Now, I’m not looking for epic.

I’m looking for steady.

I want consistency.

I want safety.

I want someone who deeply cares for me, supports me, sees my worth, and loves even the parts of me I struggle to love myself.

Who chooses me without doubt and never makes me question their love.

I deserve that kind of love.

I deserve happiness.

I deserve to be loved the way I love deeply and effortlessly.

And this time, I won’t settle for anything less and now all I want is to heal and to gently gather all the pieces of myself that were scattered in loving someone who couldn’t love me the way I deserved.

Maybe soulmates do exist.

Some arrive to show you what love is NOT so you can finally recognize what love IS.

Some people come into your life and leave fingerprints on your soul. They teach you how deeply you can feel. They show you parts of yourself you didn’t know existed.

But maybe they aren’t limited to just one person.

Maybe a soulmate It’s about understanding that love should not require you to abandon yourself. isn’t a once in a lifetime destiny written in the stars. Maybe it’s anyone who meets you in a way that feels aligned and familiar.

Someone who mirrors yours souls in ways you can’t understand.

Someone who awakens something in you that you thought died a long time ago.

Maybe we have different soulmates for different stages of our lives.

Not every soulmate is meant to stay forever. Soulmates that awaken you maybe will always hold a special in your heart and you have to live knowing that the weren’t meant to stay and walking away has nothing to do with the lack of love.

Soulmates are not always a romantic connection it can be your best friend. Someone who feels like home. They understand you without explanation, stand by you without conditions, and love you the way you are. It’s the kind of connection that’s deep, loyal, and forever built on trust, laughter, and being completely yourself around them. I will forever be grateful to have my best friend now who has supported me like no other person and is the biggest blessing in my life. 

And maybe the most important soulmate you’ll ever meet… is yourself.

Maybe the lesson isn’t that there is only one person meant for you. That we have many soulmates in life and I am blessed to have met more than one soulmate. 

Maybe the lesson is that you are allowed to choose someone who chooses you back fully, safely, consistently. 

And if this love soulmate connection never appears in my life.. I am whole enough to know that I will always be enough to make myself happy and I don’t need someone else to complete me. 

Life After Divorce

 

Last post I posted was about me being in an endless loop. Well I am out of that loop…

So after 18 years of marriage we agreed on Divorce and it’s the best for everyone this way.People will always ask you why?

Especially after this long and truth is divorce isn’t an overnight decision and whoever takes this decision obviously tried every single thing to fix the marriage till divorce is the best decision for all.

Divorce is often described as the end of a chapter, but in reality, it’s more like a sudden plot twist in the story of your life, one you didn’t ask for but one that can shape you in ways you never imagined. 

For anyone going through it, the emotional rollercoaster can be overwhelming. One day you feel relieved, the next day heartbroken. One moment you’re angry, the next moment strangely free.

The truth is, life after divorce is a mix of loss, discovery, and opportunity. It’s messy, unpredictable, and deeply human but it’s also a chance to rediscover yourself in ways a marriage sometimes doesn’t allow.

All I can say is that I’m looking forward to the rest of my life and I have no regrets because I truly believe everything happens for a reason and Allah has a better plan for me and I have my wonderful girls. 

I will share some positive thoughts for someone who is recently divorced.

I can sleep diagonally in my bed or like a starfish.

I watch any show I want on tv.

I have my friends over at anytime and best thing of all is I have my.. PEACE!

So weird to adjust to the idea of being single after so long 

Al Hamdulilah for everything.. 

Life on Loop

 Did you ever wake up to a realization that your life has been in the same cycle and you are caught in the same loop that you can’t get out of. You tell yourself things will change or you can end this cycle and years later you find yourself in the exact same place wondering how you are still here. 

You find yourself unable to break from a negative situation because your negative thoughts tell you it will only be worse and what you know and are familiar with is better than the unkown .

You are now living in your uncomfortable comfort zone. 

You live the same struggles and emotions. You are so familiar with the cycle that you can predict what will happen next. Yet.. you don’t have the courage to break it because the fear of what is out of this cycle is crippling. The fear of the unknown. The fear of failure.

My wise friend once told me that Allah sends us the same tests and makes us relive the same experience even sometimes with different people till we finally learn the lesson we were meant to learn and understand it.

I hope one day I am able to break the negative cycles in my life and that I fine the inner peace that I need.

My Trip to Azerbaijan

 I never got a chance to blog about my trip to Azerbaijan with my bestie! I think any trip is a million times better if you travel with your best friend! So have always wanted to take a trip and checked all the countries that don’t require visa application for Jordanians living in UAE and saw a picture of a rollercoaster in the snow in Azerbaijan and said yala beena! Hathhhh hooooo

I think to honest its not about where you travel as much as who you travel with. Most important when travelling with a friend is that you don’t only have inside jokes but share the same appetite and love the same things. Someone who really knows how to enjoy themselves rather than make the trip Nakad complaining. 

So Azerbijan was nice and we walked around the market and had lots of good food. I highly recommend this cafe. Although I never ever loved vegetable soup this soup was so so good we went there twice and some meat from heaven *dina drools remembering mazkaaah

 https://www.instagram.com/thehousecafe.baku?igsh=N2NqODI5N2kxczk5

                

I also loved this other cafe had so much options for yummy food *dina pats on belly

https://www.instagram.com/centralbakuaz?igsh=bXB2Zmh5ejE1cDF2

So other than eating we explored the famous sites and went to a museum of art and handmade dolls and cars! And ofcourse we went to a carpet museum. 

* Dina carries sujadeh with luggage back to Dubai

               

And a took a ride on a boat in mini Venice and the whole ride the man steering the boat kept saying “Mashala Mashala” with eyes full of love.

 We loved walking in the old city and it even rained and it’s so nice to wear winter clothes for once! 

I saw a monkey that I didn’t dare get close to as I have a history with monkeys biting me🤣 *twitches

My ultimate best part of the trip was the SNOW and the rollercoaster in the snow! Well I have to admit that I regret buying the video recording of me on the ride as apparently I turn into a 7ajeh and I kept smiling in a very 7ajjeh in wonderland kind of way and making weird sounds of ohhhh wooow… didn’t know fe صوت و صورة 

Not only that I found that I lick my lips like 1 kizillion times  throughout the video.. maybe because it was very cold .. or because ims sometimes I can be wired.. we laughed so hard at the footage that I will never share here.. 

So this place was shahdag mountain and we stayed in a very nice hotel called Pik Palace

And no Ana majnoone to swim in talajeh weather.

So me and my bestie decide to take the selfcare another level and every night we would apply all the creams we had on our faces. Laghwas laghawees. And keep in mind I don’t even know half the creams I have with me but I made it a mission to finally use the creams I have. 

So one night during the face care session my friend was applying a cream and saying wow it smells so good.. wow I didn’t know kerastese makes face creams.. and asked me what is this cream for.. I read it was “HAIR SERUM” and couldn’t stop laughing and couldn’t answer her question  .. and she kept asking me

Cream shuu!! Ijrayn!!(feet) cream shu!! Haha

Best times ever is when you LOL with your bestie till you can’t breath after applying hair cream on your face .. which is surprisingly was very effective 🤣 *dina washes face with shampoo and then applies hair cream

So no Kerastese doesn’t make face creams that I know of but I will happily market your hair serum for the face🤣

One thing I didn’t know about SNOW since I’m only a pro in desert areas. Is that when the snow is fresh you can easily SINK in it. So one snowy day I was trying to take a photo of my bestie on a mountain of snow and I kept sinking in and couldn’t get up. A family next to us was laughing so hard at me struggling to get up! 

Don’t make fun of my ⛄️ snowman

 So what I learnt in life is that what makes any trip the best trip isn’t only the place you go but who you travel with so choose your travel partner wisely.

 

Jordan AdventuRes SuMMary

ok now that im back im remembering my days in jordan and i decided to share some interesting adventures with you.. surprisingly I didn’t hear any ghaz ice cream truck please tell me they still have that!


There was an accessories shop ... its supposed to be PRETTY ... written BRETTY... im thinking jordan needs a major spell checker! im not a spelling Wizz but if i make a poster or banner i think id get some spelling EXPERT! not to forget to mention the menu that said " TEA WITH MALIK" intead of tea with "MILK" for a second i wondered if the tea comes with a guy named MALIK! :S

I highly suggest when Amman you take one of those day trips that take you to Ajloun, Al Karak or Al Salt for amazing hiking experience ! Last trip I went to Wadi Bin Hammad in al karak through https://www.instagram.com/yalla_adventure_jo?igsh=MTYxbWJmNTdiaDB6ag==

                  I highly recommend it!

anyway.. you must must also try “ SADISM” coffee meant for qahwa Saada.. *dina gives restaurant owner judgemental look of ya 3eeb il shoom🤣

Everytime I go to Jordan I must must must pass by swiefieh village and have Majnoon Qahwa. I just love the vibes there and sometimes a stray cat finds me and sits in my lap. 

I also love Rainbow street and Al Balad downtown which is surprisingly super busy even late at night! Not like blad il ajaneb when I was in Canada and Italy the streets are dead by 5 pm! *sound of saraseer

 

Unfortunately this time when I was in Amman it seemed I got a sandstorm and heatwave with me so my short stay there was like I was in Dubai heat only worse because not everywhere has proper AC! But nevertheless the trip was nice and saw my family and friends and ate my main goals which were.. CHILLI  HOUSE, Al Day3a shawerma and Gerard! 

 

And Yes I will proudly take a selfie with a shawerma and ice cream! 

I love taking pics with the graffiti walls and discovering       new hidden places and cafes everytime.

 

    My fav cafe with a view was Dar Ne3meh https://www.instagram.com/dar_nemeh.jo?igsh=OWh0bDFrZWR5YXZh

Amazing view!

My favourite breakfast other than Abu Jbara is Khashoka

https://www.instagram.com/khashoka.jordan?igsh=bTFta3Uyc3VjM3Vy

And Also my fav restaurant is Renchai .. Soo latheeth

https://www.instagram.com/renchai_jordan?igsh=dnlvOHRweXN5bTdl

I Love Amman ❤️ will leave you with some pics from my trip and yes I know it’s Mostly food  *dina om karsha *pats on belly

🤣 I’m back to the gym now burning Italy and Jordan adventures