I am writing this in the middle of the night at my kitchen table in Moscow, looking up at the dim red stars and golden domes of the Kremlin.
But by the time you read this text, I will already be back in England, expelled from Russia as a threat to national security.
After more than 20 years of reporting from Moscow, I still can't believe what happened.
I suspected that something was wrong about a year ago, when the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs started issuing me short-term visas.
Even those were approved at the last minute.
At one point I was told I got the last visa before the official said she was wrong.
- The BBC condemned the expulsion of the journalist from Russia
- Belarusian authorities revoke accreditation of BBC journalists
- China bans broadcasting of the BBC World Service
But on August 10, I was taken aside from the passport control line at Moscow's Sheremetyevo Airport and told that the Federal Security Service (FSB) had barred me from entering Russia.
The officer who read the order, read it all, but without explanation.
“Sarah Elizabeth,” he used my middle name, “you have been denied entry into the Russian Federation - indefinitely.
"This is a step to protect the security of Russia," he explained, and then said that I was being deported.
I told him I was a journalist: "Do I look like a threat?"
"We are only enforcers," repeated the border policeman several times.
"Ask the FSB."
I arrived in Moscow that morning from Belarus, where I was reporting on the suppression of mass protests against President Alexander Lukashenko.
A close ally of Vladimir Putin was holding an annual "conversation" with journalists, and I took the opportunity to ask how he could possibly remain in the position of president after torturing and imprisoning peaceful protesters.
Lukashenko first called me a Western propagandist, then his loyal supporters surrounded me, and everything was broadcast live on Belarusian television.
That night, as we were adding this piece to our report, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Russia announced new sanctions against the UK: a group of unnamed British nationals were accused of engaging in "anti-Russian activities".
It was Moscow's delayed response to UK sanctions over human rights abuses in Chechnya and high-level corruption.
Since the last visa in my passport was about to expire, I was nervous.
- Putin defends Lukashenko and accuses the EU of double standards
- Support videos for Putin, and the participants sometimes don't even know what they are filming
- Vladimir Putin: the Russian president as the hero of an action movie
A few hours later, my colleagues crossed the border in Moscow, but I was stopped.
In the end, I was left to wander around the waiting room in the departures area, without a passport, while others frantically negotiated to stop my deportation.
I was sure it wouldn't work: the order against me came from the powerful FSB.
That's why I signed a form that said I would be breaking the law if I entered Russia again. I protested, but I had no choice.
At one point, I sat down on a broken airport chair and recorded how I felt, crying into the camera.
Suddenly, 12 hours after landing, I was told by phone that I could cross the border - just once, to pack up my previous life in Moscow.
My expulsion means the severance of long-standing ties in the country.
I have spent most of my life in Russia, having arrived in Moscow at the age of 18, when the USSR collapsed.
I witnessed the chaos firsthand: endless lines and shortages, even wars.
In the mid-nineties, as a student, I lived through the gangster days in St. Petersburg, when in the bar where I worked, men handed over their weapons at the door.
Those were difficult years for many Russians, but also a time of new and exciting freedoms.
Then came Vladimir Putin.
Ever since his election 20 years ago, I've been reporting from Moscow, documenting the collapse of freedoms, the increasing suppression of dissent, while Putin maneuvers to retain power.
The pressure on activists, critics, and now journalists has increased over the past year, since the poisoning of opposition politician Alexei Navalny. Ahead of parliamentary elections next month, the pressure is even greater.
Nervous after last year's mass protests in Belarus over a rigged vote, the Kremlin now appears ready to stifle critical voices; a hint of real competition. Silencing the free press is key.
In the week that I found out that I was forced to leave Russia, the largest independent channel in the country was labeled as a "foreign agent".
Television Dožd has joined the growing blacklist of media outlets that must declare "hostile" status every time they publish any news, or else face reprehensible sentences and criminal prosecution.
"The status of a foreign agent means that we are enemies of the state," Tikhon Dzyadko, the station's editor, told me.
The number of subscribers grew, and Dzjadko told me that some members of his team were proud of the label, as a mark of quality.
But Dziadko warns that the latest turn against the press is worrying.
"It's as if they say that we no longer need human rights activists or independent media here.
"It's very bad and it could get a lot worse - at any moment."
When they called me to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Moscow, they insisted that my deportation was nothing personal.
It is officially called retaliation for the reporter of the news agency Tas who was refused a visa to stay and work in the UK.
But that happened two years ago and at that time no dust was raised about the decision.
Senior officials claim they don't know about my "threat" status - even though I know they saw the form I signed.
For now, they refuse to confirm the information from one source - that I was on the sanctioning list.
Many of those I interviewed in the past years left Russia for security reasons. Others admit they have an escape plan.
I never thought for a moment that I would join them.
And that I will leave with the labels "anti-Russian" and "security threat" ringing in my ears.
But I try to drown out the noise.
Since my expulsion was announced, even strangers have not stopped apologizing to me. Some even say they are ashamed of their government.
I'm thinking about that kindness and warmth of the Russian people, it's raining and soon it's time to leave. Maybe forever.
I hope not.
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