april broke me open

not the month i wanted, but maybe the month i needed

i promised myself that 2025 would be the best year of my life. that this would be the year in which everything finally aligned — my healing, my goals, my imaan, my writing. the year i returned to myself completely.

maybe it still can be.

but we plan, and Allah plans, and He is the best of planners.

i used to say that sentence all the time like it was nothing. i’d recite it to my friends when i didn’t know what else to say. i’d see it plastered everywhere on social media. it’s easy to say it when life feels good, when things are hopeful, when your heart’s still full from the serenity of ramadan and your mind is full of plans.

but nothing — nothing — teaches you the weight of those words like when they’re about your own life. your own body. your own heart.

this wasn’t the april i had planned.

i was going to use april as my catch up month, as i’d been away from uni for the whole of ramadan. i was behind on uni work (like, embarrasingly behind), so i thought, okay, let’s lock in. let’s be her. i even told myself i’d romanticise it a bit. cute cafe study sessions, Quran breaks in between, healthy dinners, and time to write again. it all sounded so balanced in my head.

but i forgot that life doesn’t care about your aesthetic pinterest routine. life will throw things at you without warning, and sometimes the only thing you can do is sit there, blink slowly, and say, wow... okay.

let me backtrack a little.

my younger brother came back to my uni city with me, as he needed my help preparing for his upcoming exams. i didn’t mind. i love helping him. i took him to different study spots each day, made a little adventure out of revision, and rewarded him (with food, of course) when he pushed himself. it was so fun. but it also meant sacrificing my own work, which inevitably piled up. the guilt crept in, followed by the stress.

still, i brushed it off. after a week, we returned home to celebrate some family achievements (alhamdulillah x1000) and those few days were honestly beautiful. i hadn’t felt that kind of contentment in so long. it was pure. it was peace. i felt like i was stepping into the higher version of myself, the woman i keep striving to become.

and then, a few days later, elif shafak, one of my biggest inspirations, acknowledged my newsletter. my writing. i was over the moon. i couldn’t have been more content in myself. in life. in everything.

but life, as it does, humbled me.

my chest pain returned.

for context, i’ve been having these chest pain episodes every month for almost two years. i experience identical symptoms to that of a heart attack. the pain spreads across my chest and down my left arm. i struggle to breathe. i feel dizzy. weak. my heart rate goes beyond the normal range. i’ve been to a&e before. the first time, they said it was an infection. the second time, they blamed it on my anaemia. my haemoglobin was so low that my heart wasn’t getting enough oxygen. but they told me it wasn’t serious. so they gave me the highest dose of iron tablets and just told me to rest.

i believed them. until it happened again. and again. and again. even whilst on the medication that was supposedly meant to make the pain disappear.

so when it happened this month — whilst i was in a cafe with my friend, celebrating the elif shafak news — i tried to ignore it. i told myself it would pass. but it didn’t. the pain got worse. and worse. i made a gp appointment the next day, still refusing to go to a&e because i didn’t want to waste time or be dismissed again.

but my gp took one look at me and said, “i can’t treat you here. this can’t be because of iron deficiency. you need to go to a&e immediately. ecg and bloods. now.”

i told her i had assignments to do. that i was meant to meet my friend and study in the library. that maybe i’d go in the evening. she looked at me and said, “you can’t think about deadlines when your health might be on the line.” she wrote to my university herself, requesting an extension. i had no choice but to go.

and that’s when my month took a turn for the worse.

every test came back abnormal. all three ecgs. my heart rate. my bloods. they found a protein — one that only shows up when the heart muscle is damaged — and it kept increasing.

“you might be having a heart attack.”

“actually, we don’t know.”

“you’re a heart patient now.”

“you might have a blood clot in your lungs.”

“never mind, you don’t.”

“you’re too young.”

“but we’re still not sure.”

“we’ll discharge you and let the cardiologist figure it out instead.”

i’m twenty. twenty.

and suddenly every monthly episode over the last year and a half didn’t feel like just “a bad period” or “a random infection.” i’d been dismissed again and again. and now they don’t even know what it is. yes, i’ve been referred to a cardiologist but God knows when i’ll be seen. the uncertainty alone is its own kind of illness.

i spiralled. i’ve never felt so fragile. of course i’ve had low days, but this was different. this was fear. helplessness. sobbing over things that wouldn’t usually phase me. i couldn’t recognise myself.

but Allah sees everything. and He sends comfort in strange, beautiful ways.

there was a woman in the hospital — an older woman, perhaps from back home. i noticed her looking at me when i first arrived, but i was quickly taken away by the doctors. after hours of waiting, i saw her again. and she came up to me, speaking to me softly in our mother tongue. “this life,” she said, “is nothing but an exam. the harder the test, the greater the reward — as long as you revise well. and for us, that revision is Islam.”

she didn’t know i had just published a newsletter called the tree remembers what the axe forgets, in which i’d reflected on the exact same idea. the test, the axe, the wounds — they don’t go unseen by the One who created both the tree and the axe. maybe that woman was a sign. maybe she was an ayah in human form.

and just when i thought that was enough for one month, i lost a friendship. a sisterhood of six years. i had been considering ending the friendship for a while as i felt myself outgrowing her, but this month brought about a situation that made her disregard my boundaries too much to ignore. i regret the way i cut her off. that’s something i’ll carry with me, and a lesson i’ll try to do better with next time. but i don’t regret the choice itself. some separations are a form of self-respect. sometimes, love means letting go.

and then, i spoke to him again. the same one i’ve written about before in a bittersweet way. it was a short, mature conversation, tied to the friend situation, oddly enough. i won’t go into details out of respect for both of them. but i will say this: it was refreshing. it made me remember we’ve never been toxic. we’ve barely ever argued. even during and after our breakup, it’s always been respectful. it’s just that my emotions sometimes clouded the way i perceived the situation. but alhamdulillah for peace. for reciprocated respect. alhamdulillah for him, which may sound weird after everything i’ve said about him previously. but i do mean it when i express my gratitude for him.

now that i’m writing all this out, i realise that maybe april wasn’t all bad. but it was hard. undeniably hard. and i’m still healing — emotionally, physically, spiritually.

april taught me so much. about health. about platonic heartbreak. about being misunderstood. about slowing down. about listening to my body. about trusting Allah when nothing makes sense. about how quickly life can change. about how we think we have time, but we don’t.

so here’s what i’ll leave you with:

don’t wait for your health to collapse to start honouring your body.

don’t wait for friendships to break to start honouring your boundaries.

don’t wait for pain to show up to start honouring your peace.

Allah is always teaching us something. even in the mess. especially in the mess.

and maybe 2025 can still be the best year of my life. but it’ll be His version of “best,” not mine.

and maybe that’s exactly what i needed all along.

love, imaan x

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