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Posts tagged with “healing”

A Simple Question That Helps When I Feel Anxious

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“In every walk with nature one receives far more than he seeks.” ~John Muir

I used to think life was like an obstacle course, a series of hurdles you either cleared or stumbled over. For a long time, I stumbled a lot.

What I didn’t realize then was how easily repeated setbacks can turn into a habit of expecting the next one. After a while, you stop living in the present and start waiting for the other shoe to drop.

After I graduated from college, I followed the path I thought I was supposed to take. I moved to Philadelphia …

I Broke My Patterns and Love Still Didn’t Last

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“When a flower doesn’t bloom, you fix the environment in which it grows, not the flower.” ~Alexander Den Heijer

 He was intelligent, well-read, and kind. A good father, careful about protecting his kids from meeting partners too soon. A man with a life philosophy, who kept his word, who told the truth with an honesty that didn’t flinch—and it wasn’t a performance. He wasn’t afraid of healthy conflict; he could sit in a hard conversation without disappearing. And he also happened to be tall, dark, and handsome.

He checked almost every single thing on my list. And I mean that …

Healing Is Happening Even When You Can’t See It

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“One never notices what has been done; one can only see what remains to be done.” ~Marie Curie

I almost didn’t go to my cousin’s wedding.

Not because I didn’t want to celebrate her. I did. But the thought of walking into a room full of people who knew the version of me from two years ago felt unbearable.

They knew that version well.

The one who cried in bathroom stalls at family gatherings. Who smiled through dinners while silently replaying an argument from three days earlier. Who drank a little too much at Christmas because it was easier than …

The Wholeness I Found When I Lost Someone I Love

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“The wound is the place where the Light enters you.” ~Rumi

The room didn’t change when she left. The chair was where it had always been, angled toward the window the way she liked it. What changed was that I could finally see the shape of the thing I’d been leaning on, now that it wasn’t there to lean on anymore.

For a long time, I called what I felt “love,” and some of it was. But underneath the grief was something I was slower to admit. A lot of what I missed wasn’t her. It was the version of …

Why Self-Care Matters Most When You Have No Time

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“Taking care of yourself doesn’t mean me first; it means me too.” ~L.R. Knost

We live in a society that celebrates pushing through; burnout is often worn as a badge of honor, and many job descriptions state bluntly, “Must be able to perform well under pressure and thrive in a fast-paced environment.”

I’m very well aware that self-care isn’t a luxury; it’s essential. “You can’t pour from an empty cup” and “You must put on your own oxygen mask first before assisting others” are two of the most well-known quotes. And while they might sound like a cliché, they are …

Same Café, New Me: How I Found Freedom Without Changing My Life

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“Trauma creates change you don’t choose. Healing is about creating change you do choose.” ~Michelle Rosenthal”

Today I am sitting in my favorite café in Venice Mall. I got my favorite seat, the one near the water.

I have spent countless hours here. I have cried here. Journaled here. Drawn here. Consoled myself here.

There was a time when this café felt like my only refuge from a life that felt too heavy to carry.

Today I am sitting in the same seat, drinking the same tea, looking at the same water. And for the first time, I realized something. …

Why It’s So Hard to Just Rest and Why We Need to Do It

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“If you don’t give your mind and body a break, you’ll break. Stop pushing yourself through pain and exhaustion and take care of your needs.” ~Lori Deschene

In November of 2021, my autoimmune issues flared up. My doctor and I are still unsure which of my conditions—rheumatoid arthritis or fibromyalgia—was the culprit, or if they were acting in cahoots, but the overall achiness and debilitating fatigue were a solid indication that something was more active than usual.

I woke up tired, needed naps, and often ran out of spoons—a phrase familiar to many with chronic conditions, based on a gorgeous …

How I Reframed Letting Go So I Could Move on from My Painful Past

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We are truly free when we let go of the thought that the past could or should have been any different than it was. This is so hard.

The challenge is born from our desperate need to validate our feelings and experiences. It often feels like we are invalidating ourselves if we let go of the thought that the past should have been different. We have been through hell, experienced things most people don’t know about, and it initially feels so devastating to think of just letting it go like it never happened. Where is the justice in that?

I …

Why Being Ignored Causes Such Deep Pain and Damage

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“There are wounds that never show on the body that are deeper and more hurtful than anything that bleeds.” ~Laurell K. Hamilton

My older sister had four years over me. As a kid, I worshipped the ground she walked on. She was so smart, so pretty, so cool. I wanted to be wherever she was, doing whatever she was doing.

I was desperate for any crumb of attention she might throw my way. I even let her loosen my baby teeth so she could pull them out one by one. In those moments she was lavishing me with attention.

Other …

The Hidden Survival Patterns I Mistook for Brokenness

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“The wound is the place where the light enters you.” ~Rumi

I grew up in a council house in the 1970s, in a world where children were seen and not heard.

We were kicked out in the morning and told to come back when the streetlights came on. On the surface, it looked normal. But what was happening behind closed doors didn’t feel normal at all.

I didn’t have the words for it then, but I always felt different.

People thought I was shy. And I was. But it was more than that. Being around people felt overwhelming, like I …

Embracing Slow Growth: The Big Turning Point That Never Came

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“It gets easier. Every day it gets a little easier. But you gotta do it every day, that’s the hard part.” ~ BoJack Horseman

If you’d told eighteen-year-old me where she’d be at twenty-eight, she would have laughed nervously and changed the subject.

That was her move, by the way. Laugh it off. Deflect. Eat another biscuit.

She was the girl who cried in bathroom stalls and called it “being sensitive.” The one who said yes to everything because no felt too dangerous. The one who googled “how to be more confident” at midnight and then did absolutely nothing about …

How I Broke My Painful Relationship Patterns for Good

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“Sometimes we fall for the same mistakes because we haven’t learned to love ourselves fully.” ~Unknown

As long as I can remember, my relationships followed the same script.

At first, there was charm. Attention. Sweetness. Intensity. That intoxicating feeling of being seen and chosen, sometimes for the very first time.

Then, slowly, the cracks appeared.

It started small. A comment like, “You’re overthinking it again,” said with a laugh when I tried to express how I felt, and suddenly I went quiet, wondering if maybe I was the problem.

Then came the silence, and instead of questioning it, I found …

The Small, Unexpected Ways Grief Stays with Us

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“The reality is that you will grieve forever. You will not ‘get over’ the loss of a loved one; you will learn to live with it.” ~Elisabeth Kübler-Ross

My friend Diana’s WhatsApp profile picture is of herself hugging her dog, Zibby.

Every time her name comes up on my phone, there they are. The two of them in a tiny square. I’ve seen that photo so many times I stopped really looking at it.

Until recently.

Zibby wasn’t just a dog. She was part of the whole rhythm of their life, the mornings and the evenings and all the …

The Subtle Ways You Lose Yourself in a Toxic Relationship

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“Emotional abuse is any pattern of behavior that undermines a person’s sense of self-worth and reality.” ~Beverly Engel

At first, the changes were small.

I stopped wearing that outfit everyone liked because they said it didn’t look good on me. I let certain friendships fade because it made him uncomfortable. I laughed less at things he didn’t find funny.

I face-checked myself to make sure my expression was pleasing to him. I shrank just slightly, in ways no one else would notice.

Then it got bigger.

I stopped trusting my own judgment because he told me I was too sensitive. …

Have You Had Fun Yet Today

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How to Heal on a Deeper Level After Moving On

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“Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate.” ~C.G. Jung

For twelve years, I believed I was the architect of a perfect life. I had the “Summa Cum Laude” degree, a respected career in human services, a devoted husband, and two healthy daughters. I had checked every box on the “Success” list. I truly thought I had outrun my past.

But trauma has a way of waiting. It doesn’t disappear just because you stop looking at it. It simply goes underground, like a silent program running in the background of a …

How to Feel Safe When Panic Feels Dangerous

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“Anxiety isn’t you. It’s something moving through you. It can leave out of the same door it came in.” ~James Clear

Years ago, I had a panic attack while driving across a bridge, and I thought I might die that day.

Suddenly my heart started pounding. My breath became shallow and tight. My chest felt constricted, and a wave of dizziness washed over me.

I was driving sixty miles per hour, and there was nowhere to pull over. The bridge stretched for miles, suspended over open water, and I was alone in the car.

A terrifying thought shot through my …

What Happened to My Body When I Suppressed My Emotions

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“Our bodies communicate to us clearly and specifically, if we are willing to listen.” ~Shakti Gawain

As a child, I was never taught to regulate my emotions. I learned instead to override them—pushing through stress, swallowing tears, and even hiding a cast at dinner, afraid that showing what had happened to me would create anger instead of care.

By the time I was a teenager, I turned to drugs and alcohol to manage my emotions. It was easier to feel nothing at all than to be bombarded by emotions I had no clue what to do with.

This turned into …

What My Body Taught Me: 13 Surgeries, One Coma, Countless Powerful Lessons

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“Out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls; the most massive characters are seared with scars.” ~Khalil Gibran

I was born with spina bifida. When I was ten years old, doctors told me I might not walk again after a surgery that would change my life.

I don’t remember every word they said, but I remember the feeling, the air shifting in the room, the adults speaking carefully, the quiet that followed.

Paralysis was a possibility.

By that point, my body already knew hospital ceilings well. I had been through multiple surgeries before I fully understood what surgery meant. …

Healing Doesn’t Go Backward

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