You asked. Here's what I think:

This is very well written. I'm not entirely sure if it's fact or fiction, though!

I see you are new to Medium. There are typically a few things expected from stories here. These include a headline, subheadline, and a photo. (You can find one on Unsplash. It's built right into the editing software.)

It's also best to format your story in small bursts so it's easy to read on a phone. If you go to my profile page, I write on a wide variety of topics and in different genres, so you'll get some examples of what I mean.

There are a lot (and I mean countless) stories on Medium about how to write on Medium. Some of them are useful, most of them are garbage. The reason there are so many is that a lot of people read them: more eyeballs mean more money.

A good person to follow is Linda Caroll. It's worth signing up for her newsletter (it's free and she doesn't try to sell you anything) because, if you do, she sends you a great document with 25 tips for writing on Medium that helped me a lot. After you get the tips, you can always unsubscribe if you don't want to get a newsletter every week. Here's the link: https://lindac.substack.com/

If you make those few formatting changes, you should have no trouble getting your stuff accepted into a publication. Illumination accepts practically everyone, but your stuff will get lost in the sauce pretty quickly. Try for smaller publications like Rogue's Gallery, The Top Shelf, or just self-publish like you did this one. Use the tags to lead people to your story by topic. You can also put a header above the title like "fiction" or "self-help." Linda's tips sheet tells you about that.

You write very well. You just need to learn the ropes here and you should do fine. Welcome to the jungle!