u/Beautifully_brokn83

I am 42(f) and after a messy divorce 3 years ago, I’ve slowly started building my financial structures up again. No where near where I want, but basically had to build from the ground up.
I am about to receive a large lump sum of money. I currently owe $700k on my PPOR, in which as a single Mum (to teens)is scary. Most of the money will go into a mortgage offset account, but I am also wanting to start investing.
I have no clue where to start, as financial literacy was not something I have ever really learnt, other the Barefoot process years ago when I was looking at buying.

Super is currently at 40k after having to withdraw some a few years ago for medical expenses.
Going forward, I am so overwhelmed by all of the options etc to help build my wealth. I am currently employed PT in the education space, with 0.4FTE however I do work additional hours equivalent to 0.8 at the moment and will do for the foreseeable future.

Where do I start? Help teach me these things.

There are days
you pull me close enough
that I forget every doubt I swore I had.

You look at me like I matter,
like I am something soft
you never expected to find again.
And in those moments
I can almost see the future.

Quiet mornings.
Shared laughs.
A life built from ordinary things
that somehow feel extraordinary
because they are with you.

But then the distance comes.

Suddenly your hands are gone.
Your words become careful,
measured, guarded.
Like loving me is something
you need to recover from.

And I never know
which version of you
is walking toward me.

The man who makes me feel chosen,
or the man who disappears
behind walls so high
I cannot even hear his heart anymore.

You run hot and cold
like you are fighting yourself,
and I am left standing in the middle
trying to understand
how someone can hold me so tightly
while still keeping me
an arm’s length away.

That is the part that hurts most.
Not the silence.
Not even the confusion.
But the constant jumping
between closeness and distance,
between hope and uncertainty.

Because this is not
how I imagined love would feel
at this stage of my life.

I did not picture myself
forever decoding mixed signals,
wondering if the man I care for
is ever truly going to let me in.

Your walls are not walls anymore.
They are a fortress.
Built brick by brick
from old hurt, old fear, old survival.

And I know you think
they protect you.
Maybe they do.

But they keep me outside too.

Outside your thoughts.
Outside your truth.
Outside the words
I have spent so long hoping to hear.

Because sometimes
I think you feel everything deeply.
So deeply it terrifies you.

And instead of saying it,
instead of trusting it,
instead of simply letting yourself be loved,
you retreat.

Leaving me to wonder
whether this connection is real for you
or whether I am only visiting a heart
that never intended to open its door.

I do not need perfection.
I do not need grand declarations.

But I need honesty.
I need steadiness.
I need to know
whether you are building something with me
or just hiding from yourself beside me.

Because loving someone
who cannot tell you how they feel
is like trying to warm your hands
by a fire
that keeps choosing
to burn out.