I have observed many stories. friendships. partnerships. families. I have even lived inside some of them.

And I noticed something.

Relationships rarely die from one dramatic moment.

They die from a hidden cancer.

It grows quietly. invisibly. accumulating over years. no one sees it. no one feels it. until one day, it is strong enough to turn love into resentment, and resentment into distance.

I gave this cancer a name in February 2022.

I called them small black dots.

One black dot is harmless. almost invisible.

But many of them together are lethal.

A black dot forms the moment something is left unresolved.
Not when two people fight loudly.
Not when voices rise.

It forms when the conversation ends… but something inside you did not.

It is the sentence you swallowed.

The apology you waited for.

The explanation you crafted on their behalf.

“My friend hurt me, but maybe they didn’t mean it.”
“He changed, but I shouldn’t bring it up now.”
“I’ll wait until they say sorry.”

These are self-closed loops.

We close them inside ourselves instead of with the other person.

And each time we do, a dot appears.

We often create reasons to protect the people we love. We soften their mistakes because we cannot hold resentment toward them. But the wound remains. And when these dots accumulate, something subtle begins to shift.

Faith weakens.

Trust thins.

Disappointment becomes harder to explain, so it gets interpreted as carelessness… or worse, hate.

Notice something strange:

These dots rarely exist with strangers.

If someone crosses a line and we do not love them, we confront them immediately. We argue. We resolve it.

What we are really doing in that moment is removing the dot before it settles in the heart.

Because it does not belong there.

But with those we love, we hesitate.

We are afraid to bother them.
Afraid to seem sensitive.
Afraid to create tension.

So we carry the dot instead.

And the heart becomes heavier.

What I want for us is simple.

Let us speak. directly. gently. honestly.

So that no black dots ever build a wall between you and me.

If we truly want to keep holding hands tightly, we must protect the invisible spaces.

Thankfully, I do not think we are the type of people who ignore these things. Clarity and resolution have always been part of our language.

I want that to continue.

I do not want that to change.