As long as you do not stop

November 27, 2025 by kkamilah Leave a comment

If you haven’t read my previous post, go ahead and do that, because it’ll hopefully give you a good insight into the state of my brain at any given moment, firsthand. It may explain why I write the way I do (or, if you know me, act the way I do). You might be surprised. You might not be. You might have already diagnosed me. It’s 2025 and everyone’s autistic!

Back when I was a teenager spending as many free hours after school as possible carefully curating my Tumblr, I had this stupid Confucius quote seared into my brain a little more each time I created a new post (and, for an angsty teenaged youth, this was often).

“It does not matter how slowly you go as long as you do not stop”

A Slow Morning (tea, grass, and a naughty cat)

July 29, 2025 by kkamilah Leave a comment

cat amongst plants

I woke up early this morning and decided to stay at home. A slow morning, one that wasn’t riddled with the rigid rules I decided to set myself the day before, a structured check list of errands and things to do. I didn’t go to the gym. I didn’t go for a walk to get in my eight-thousand steps before nine-a.m. I didn’t go to the shops to buy my groceries for the week and I didn’t think about getting in my protein and healthy fats.

I simply woke up, went downstairs, and made myself a tea.

It’s just me and the cat. As soon as he spotted me, he started skulking around and meowing by the door to be let out – but I didn’t want to have to watch over him and devote these first precious hours to preventing his stealthy escape from the barricaded garden walls. Why does he want to do that? Why can’t he just want to be still like me on this slow Sunday morning? But eventually I give in and open the doors; kind of because I’d like to enjoy the fresh air myself this morning, but mostly because his little face and tiny paws propping him up on my legs to be carried have moved me, although I know it is but manipulation. He doesn’t actually want to be carried and he will jump away from me as soon as he feels the warm air on his whiskers.

A Letter to the Influencer Who Thinks I Can Do Pilates at 1pm

January 9, 2024 by kkamilah Leave a comment

Hi babybotoxlifter,

I hope this letter finds you in the midst of a groundbreaking, spirit-awakening culinary creation involving oats. Just thought I’d take some time out of my day to write to you; I’m exhausted after spending nine hours in front of a computer screen, so apologies if you see any typos.

First, let me start by expressing my deepest admiration for your morning routine, your ability to redefine breakfast entirely. The way you do it is so *chefs kiss*; from the freshest ingredients straight from Waitrose, to the way you ethereally put the dish together. I would never have thought it could improve my mental health to slow right down and take the time to procure a healthy, nutritious bowl; your invention of turmeric oats with lashings of agave syrup, hemp seeds and dragon fruit seems nothing short of a masterpiece that makes for a transcendental experience. And well done for discovering cinnamon sprinkled over apples – ground-breaking! I don’t believe anybody has thought of anything so innovative before, so thank you for showing us all about it in your perfectly posed selfie video.

Unfortunately, as I peel my eyelids apart and stumble out of bed at 5:30am, my morning is less magical. Most days I can only muster a quick, sad, film-topped coffee before I jolt out of the door to catch a train that smells of sweaty gym socks. Sometimes I manage buttered toast, if I’m feeling fancy.

I also applaud your commitment to dragging yourself away from the comfort of your post-breakfast reading time in your perfectly made cream bed to then reposition your camera in your pilates studio. Your very own pilates studio! I wish I didn’t have to share a gym with sweaty men who grunt during every rep. When the clock strikes 1pm, I am not donned in a cute, matching gym set. Instead, I find myself sat at a hot desk (that I had to book three weeks ago to secure, mind you!) convincing myself this £5 prawn cocktail sandwich from M&S was worth sacrificing a flat white from Caffe Nero for the office beans. In this moment, I am not gracefully extending opposing legs and arms and letting go of all negative thoughts. Instead, I find myself thinking this could have been an email. I could have been spared the torture of being trapped in a conversation about your children if you had just emailed me but saying ‘oh, I can’t believe it’s Monday again already! Honestly, where does the time go.’

2020.

January 16, 2021 by kkamilah 2 Comments

The cheers, the whistling, the joyful jostling consumed the room as the clock struck midnight and we were pushed, suddenly and violently, into 2020.

People were hugging, kissing, drunkenly singing Auld Lang Syne, slurring ‘happy new year’ into the phone, to their families miles away. Or just down the road, having a quiet one. We made our annual vows to make this year better, messier, louder, than the one that had just passed us by. In a blink.

We vowed to live our lives to the fullest, to travel the world, to quit our jobs, to cut people off, to make more money, to find love, to achieve things we hadn’t achieved over the last 365 days. We vowed… that this would be the year. Women in bathrooms telling each other they were too beautiful to let that man into 2020; leave him behind, you’re stunning, he doesn’t deserve you. Take my number, we should all go out one night.

The atmosphere was all joy; vodka, rum and whiskey sending sentiments sky high.

By the end of the night, strangers were sitting knee-to-knee, having wide-eyed conversations as they took shots together. Tequila, to melt away old memories and make space for new ones. The room softened and lines blurred.

‘2020 will be our year.’

The Voices (Bolted, part 2)

September 5, 2020 by kkamilah Leave a comment

Earlier. Around 8pm.

‘Please, just fucking let me go,’ she said slowly, trembling, and making sure I heard every single word.

‘No.’

I didn’t want her to go and she knew it wasn’t me, I just wanted to calm her down. I – whoever that was – probably hurt her, but that wasn’t me. It was not me.

Still, she could’ve screamed. She could have shouted, banged on the walls so people heard her; she knew how thin these walls were. She could have had someone running to rescue the damsel in distress, but she didn’t want to be saved. Because she enjoyed this. She would always come back to me because she loves me. I barricaded the door and that was the last thing I remembered when I was there.

–

‘Please,’ I heard her whimpering. I blinked and I was no longer by the front door; I looked down and saw myself holding her against the wall by the bathroom, my hand wrapped around her throat. Her eyes were bloodshot and her face looked slightly swollen. Her body was stiff and unmoving, the way it is when you’ve given up fighting and you’re bracing yourself for the worst. It took me four seconds to register what my hands were doing and I immediately removed them from her neck, allowing her to scurry to the corner of the bed.

‘Fuck,’ I whispered, looking down at my hands.

‘Tell me what just happened, what did I do to you?’

Panic attack

July 19, 2019 by kkamilah 2 Comments

Everything’s fine.

It’s sudden. It doesn’t happen gradually, it’s nothing and then it’s all encompassing. It’s zero, then it’s a billion, you’re breathing and then you’re choking.

But you do feel it creeping, that familiar feeling that you had forgotten about. It’s bubbling somewhere beneath the surface, and as soon as you realise, all of your senses switch off in a joint effort to combat it. You can’t hear anything around you, you can’t hear anyone talking to you because you’re using all your energy just begging for that feeling to go away before it erupts and forces you to experience it again. People around you will scream at you because you’re not listening to them but it’s because you’re too busy trying to fight it off before it comes.

But of course, life never happens the way we want it to and suddenly you can’t breathe.
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