Healing the Hurts

Healing is such an interesting word.

We talk about healing like it is a destination. Like one day we wake up and suddenly the hurt is gone, the lesson has been learned, and we have officially moved on.

But that has not been my experience with healing, and it is not what I see in the human experience around me.

Healing is messy.

Sometimes it is beautiful and empowering. Sometimes it is uncomfortable, lonely, confusing, and honestly a little ugly.  Often times it’s a mix of all of these things.

Things we are healing from are not only the things that happened to us, we are healing from our own patterns.

Our own dysfunctional behaviors.

The friendships we kept trying to make work

The relationships where we ignored what we knew.

The times we abandoned ourselves because we were afraid someone else might leave us first.

The boundaries we did not have.

The red flags we painted a prettier color because we wanted something, or someone, to be different than they actually were.

Those are heart hurts too.

Healing Is Not About Blaming Yourself, but it is about taking Responsibility for Ourselves, our Behaviors, understanding that our Actions have Consequences

There is an important difference between taking responsibility and carrying shame.

Part of healing can involve looking at ourselves and saying, “There are things I want to do differently.”

That does not mean everything that happened was our fault.

It means we are willing to become curious about the parts of our lives that we actually have the power to change.

Maybe I cannot change what someone did to me.

Maybe I cannot make a friendship become healthy.

Maybe I cannot make another person communicate differently, love differently, apologize, understand my perspective, or give me closure.

But I can begin asking:

Why did I stay?

Why did I tolerate something that hurt me?

Why was I afraid to speak?

Why did I keep explaining myself to someone committed to misunderstanding me?

Why did I confuse being needed with being loved?

And maybe the biggest question:

What do I want to do differently now?

That is where healing can begin to feel less like something happening to us and more like something we are participating in.

The First Stage: The Hurt

Before we can heal something, we usually have to admit that it hurts.

That sounds simple.

It isn't.

Sometimes we minimize pain because the relationship was “only” a friendship.

Sometimes we tell ourselves we should be over it.

Sometimes we compare our pain to someone else's trauma and decide ours is not important enough.

But the heart does not organize pain into categories.

Friendship breakups can hurt.

Family relationships can hurt.

Losing the version of someone you believed existed can hurt.

Realizing someone cannot meet you where you are can hurt.

And realizing that you participated in your own hurt by repeatedly ignoring yourself can hurt in an entirely different way.

Acknowledging the hurt is not weakness.

It is information.

The Second Stage: Anger

Anger gets a bad reputation.

But sometimes anger is the part of us that finally says:

Enough.

You may feel angry at another person.

You may feel angry at yourself.

You may replay conversations and think of everything you wish you had said.

You may suddenly recognize behavior that you previously excused.

Anger does not necessarily mean you are going backward.

Sometimes anger shows up when we finally recognize that something mattered.

The goal is not to live inside the anger forever.

The goal is to listen to what it might be telling us.

Maybe it is telling us a boundary was crossed.

Maybe it is telling us we abandoned ourselves.

Maybe it is telling us something needs to change.

The Third Stage: Grieving What You Thought It Was

This part can be incredibly painful because sometimes we are not only grieving a person.

We are grieving the story.

The future we imagined.

The friendship we thought would last forever.

The person we believed someone could become.

The apology we thought would eventually come.

The relationship we kept hoping would finally feel safe.

There can be grief in accepting reality.

And two things can be true at the same time.

You can love someone and recognize that the relationship is unhealthy.

You can miss someone and know they do not belong in your life.

You can forgive someone and still have boundaries.

You can understand someone's behavior and still decide that behavior is not acceptable for you.

Healing often asks us to stop confusing compassion with access.

The Fourth Stage: Looking at Our Own Patterns

This is usually the part nobody wants to put on a cute healing meme.

Because healing is not only bubble baths, journaling, affirmations, and removing toxic people.

Sometimes healing is realizing we were part of the pattern too.

Maybe we people-please.

Maybe we avoid conflict until we explode.

Maybe we choose emotionally unavailable people because their distance feels familiar.

Maybe we overfunction for everyone around us and then feel resentful that nobody does the same for us.

Maybe we give too much, too quickly.

Maybe we expect people to know what we need without ever telling them.

Maybe chaos feels strangely comfortable because peace feels unfamiliar.

Recognizing these patterns is not about beating ourselves up.

It is about understanding ourselves well enough to make different choices.

Self-awareness without self-compassion can become punishment.

Self-compassion without accountability can become avoidance.

Healing needs both.

The Fifth Stage: Boundaries

Eventually healing begins changing our behavior.

This is where things get interesting.

Because people may have loved the version of you who did not have boundaries.

The version who always answered.

Always fixed it.

Always forgave.

Always accommodated.

Always explained.

Always gave one more chance.

When that changes, some relationships change too.

A boundary is not about controlling another person.

It is about deciding what you will participate in.

And sometimes the healthiest boundary is not dramatic.

It is simply less access.

Less explaining.

Less rescuing.

Less reacting.

Less abandoning yourself to keep someone else comfortable.

The Sixth Stage: Learning to Trust Yourself Again

One of the deepest parts of healing can be rebuilding trust with yourself.

When we have repeatedly ignored our intuition, minimized our feelings, or talked ourselves out of what we knew, we can lose confidence in our own judgment.

So we start small…

I feel uncomfortable.

I am allowed to notice that.

I need something different.

I am allowed to say that.

This relationship does not feel healthy for me.

I am allowed to step away.

I changed my mind.

I am allowed to do that too.

Self-trust grows when our actions begin matching what we know inside.

The Seventh Stage: Peace Looks Different on Everyone

This is where I think we need to stop comparing healing journeys.

Some people need to talk.

Some people need quiet.

Some need movement.

Some need therapy.

Some need community.

Some need distance.

Some need to understand every detail.

Others need to stop analyzing every detail.

One person may heal by forgiving.

Another may heal by finally allowing themselves to be angry.

One person may need closure through conversation.

Another may discover that closure is something they create for themselves.

There is no universal timeline.

There is no prize for healing quickly.

And healing does not always mean you stop caring.

Sometimes healing simply means the memory no longer controls what you do next.

And Then Sometimes…It Hurts Again.

This is important.

You can do a tremendous amount of healing and still have a hard day.

A song can bring something back.

A birthday.

A place.

A photograph.

Seeing someone you once loved.

Watching an old friendship continue without you.

That does not erase your progress.

Healing is not proving that something never mattered.

Healing is being able to remember that it mattered without allowing it to define everything that comes next.

Maybe Healing Is Really Coming Home to Yourself

I think sometimes we spend so much time asking why someone hurt us that we forget to ask what the experience is teaching us about ourselves.

Healing can be grieving.

It can be accountability.

It can be forgiveness.

It can be boundaries.

It can be learning healthier relationship patterns.

It can be choosing differently even when the old choice still feels familiar.

And sometimes healing is simply becoming someone who no longer has to betray themselves in order to belong.

You do not have to have your healing figured out before you begin.

Sometimes beginning is simply being willing to look at what hurts and becoming curious about what your life could look like if you responded to that hurt differently.

Healing is not becoming someone new.

Sometimes it is finally meeting the version of yourself who was underneath all the surviving.