i feel like ive been reconnecting with a part of myself i ignored for years and the feeling is indescribable

ive known so much about what went wrong in my past and how its affected me but the extent of which i had no idea, and i completely did not expect the kind of emotion acceptance and catharsis would actually create in me

i have been functionally unwell in the best way possible; i get overwhelmed with emotion at the unreality of it all that i have to put my head down or lay down because the intensity of it is so immense. i hate to wax poetic about it but this is the only way i know how to process

the most surprising thing about it all is how little it actually took. how simple it actually is. how strange and cruel it is that somehow i’ve just been deprived of this for so long that i assumed it was some kind of unrealistic fantasy. heaven, made up, a children’s fairy tale

i don’t want to get into deep specifics because it is deeply personal and far too much to get into so i’ll keep dancing around it in metaphors. it is the feeling of being held, of something lost in childhood being found again. it feels like home when i never had one

it is the feeling of being understood, finally, at your core. being pried open with careful hands. that thing you thought was so ugly inside your chest held tenderly, like it could break, like something priceless. it is a feeling i thought i’d literally never experience like this

i thought it was something i would have to learn. or earn. whatever came first. and i was so ready to do it. i have. i did. i grew so much within the last few years and i have this beautiful beginning of self love nestled inside me. i did that! and i’m really proud of myself

but it is not the same thing as being seen and understood. witnessed at your most vulnerable, and still loved.

i have made walls. i want to bring them down.

i am not afraid to be the person i know i am. i am not afraid of the emotions i have and i am not afraid to share them. i am not afraid to be seen because the people i love see me and love me all the same. i want to be authentic. i want to be true.

so i’ll tell you a secret:

it used to hurt, thinking about being held. something about it felt so incredibly wrong, like it went against the very laws of nature. all of that pain was fear and i was so very afraid. always

i thought i was weak. like this constant fear and longing and desperation meant i was somehow broken or defective because i couldn’t figure out how to function and carry on bravely like everyone else. it seemed so impossible, to be a person

but that’s just what happens when you grow up with something missing. you don’t stop growing— the fissure scars over and the wound no longer hurts, but it’s warped. you learn to live with a hole in your heart and never realize it’s even there

you can’t operate on yourself.

you need others. you need to trust. and it’s hard. it’s the hardest thing i have ever done in my life.

but i think i’ve begun to figure out how.

being held doesn’t hurt anymore

of course, the future holds hardship, heartbreak, and pain just as much as it holds love and possibility. pain never stops because the act of living is the act of exposing yourself to pain.

but it doesn’t have to scar you. i think i am slowly getting better at healing

i think i can learn to weather those storms. the ones that rocked me to my core and changed the chemistry of my dna. the lines of trauma encoded into my psyche that i will rewrite one by one

i have so, so, so much love to give and i’m so excited to share it with all of you