My Journey Back to Me

I haven’t written in quite a bit of time. Life got heavy, and I needed to tend to myself first before I could put my energy anywhere else.

There have been many losses, more in a three-month period than in my entire 53 years. Stress. A season where keeping my head above water took more energy than I expected. And somewhere in all of that, I realized I wasn’t just reacting to circumstances — I was finally paying attention to myself. I would have expected all of that to make me shrink back and put myself on the back burner, since that’s what I was used to doing. Instead, it had the opposite effect.

I remember years ago when I would have a particularly stressful day, my ex-husband always laughed about the fact that those were the times I would cook the biggest, most complex meals in our home. He’d ask where I got the energy to do that after having such a rough day. It was therapy for me. It didn’t require energy. It gave me release — a place to put my stress and frustrations. So I guess this season has been sort of like that.

For most of my life, I looked confident. I sounded confident. If you asked people about me, they’d probably say I was bold, outspoken, and strong. And in many ways, that was true — just not in the way people assumed.

I was bold for other people. I spoke up when someone else was being mistreated. I carried confidence on behalf of the room.

What I didn’t do very well was advocate for myself.

I learned early how to read people, manage situations, smooth things over, and stay useful. I learned how to be “fine.” How to not need much. How to keep my feelings tidy and out of the way. It wasn’t that I didn’t feel things — it’s that I didn’t feel safe letting them land. When I did let them out, it could be explosive and scary — for me and everyone else. So I learned to bottle them.

So I shrank myself in small, quiet ways. Just enough that no one would be uncomfortable — except for me. I was always craving truth and authenticity. Part of that is my legal mind, but part of it was me wanting to come out — to be, say, and do what I’d hidden for so many years.

From the outside, I guess it looked like maturity, sacrifice, and strength. From the inside, it just created pressure.

That pressure showed up as anger I didn’t recognize, frustration that surprised me, and exhaustion I couldn’t quite explain. I wasn’t exploding because I was volatile — I was exploding because I had been silent for way too long. No different than a Pepsi bottle shaken and then suddenly released.

But something has been shifting lately. I haven’t become less kind. I haven’t stopped caring about other people. I just stopped leaving myself out of the equation.

I’ve spent years in counseling that talked about parts. To me — probably like most people — hearing anything about parts reminded me of Sybil and the Sally Field days. But honestly, if you’ve lived and experienced any heartache or difficult situations, especially as a child, you more than likely have parts. I believe that’s how God made us so we could handle things in the moment. What we don’t learn is how to move past that moment and integrate those parts. That’s what I’ve been learning — without really even meaning to.

There’s a healthy place in the middle — a place where you can be generous without disappearing, thoughtful without self-erasure, honest without cruelty. Where love doesn’t require you to abandon yourself to prove it’s real.

For me, that’s looked like simply talking to myself. I’ve been recording myself talking about life — what’s happened, how I handled it, how I wish I had handled it. Just talking to me. And then I listen. I traded the pen and paper for a recorder for this season. There’s something about hearing yourself speak. I guess it’s kind of like the difference between a letter and a phone call. Words on paper are great, but when they are paired with the sound of a voice, they stick in a deeper place. I guess that’s why the Bible talks about being careful with our words and how the power of life and death are in the tongue... spoken words.

For years, I felt like no one really listened to me. So I became the person I was craving. I started listening to myself and taking it all in. That’s when healing really started to take place.

I still get angry. I still get frustrated. But it feels healthier now. I’m no longer mad coupled with rage. I’m just normal-mad, and it passes through instead of taking over. My body doesn’t carry it the way it used to, and that feels like grace. All the grace I’ve given to other people, I’m finally giving myself, too.

What’s surprised me most is how much joy shows up when you stop suppressing parts of yourself. The fun parts. The playful parts. The youthful parts that missed out on a lot of youth. The parts that don’t fix anything — they just get to exist. I didn’t lose those parts — I parked them while I handled everyone else’s needs. Now I’m letting them back in and enjoying them.

I’m paying attention to myself the way I’ve always paid attention to others. Intentionally. Honestly. And for the first time, I can say this without hesitation: I like me. Part of that may be tied to a drastic weight loss — nearly 100 pounds. But the weight itself wasn’t the work. The work was getting gut-level honest with myself and putting in emotional effort alongside the physical. I had been figuratively eating my feelings for so long that I ballooned into a person I didn’t recognize. When I began dealing with my emotions instead of suppressing them, my body responded.

And honestly, even now, an old part of me wants to pop up and say, don’t say these things. Don’t write this. It sounds like too much — me, me, me. But I’m telling her it’s okay. There’s nothing to protect here. It doesn’t matter today if someone thinks it’s too much about me. It is about me and my journey. I’m sharing it because I have no doubt I’m not the only one who’s struggled this way.

I think especially as Southern women, we’re taught to be polite. To be pleasing. As children, many of us were taught to be seen, not heard — to speak only when spoken to. So many things we’re taught in our culture that silence us in ways I don’t think were ever truly meant… or maybe they were. Whether they were intentional or accidental, I’m not playing by those old rules anymore.

Maybe some of this will feel familiar. Maybe it won’t. I’m writing it because it took me years to name what I was doing to myself — and I doubt I’m the only one who’s lived this way. This isn’t instruction. It’s acknowledgment. I know there are more of us out there than are speaking about it. My way of saying, I see you, friend.

I adapted. And for a long time, that’s what kept me going. But survival doesn’t have to be the end of the story. I’m stepping into a new chapter — one that looks a lot more like thriving. I lived in my own head, and in a body I didn’t recognize, for far too long. That’s shifted. I’ve found my way back to myself.