01/13/2026
There’s something I’ve been noticing about myself lately.
Anytime I talk about my past, past versions of me, past choices, past seasons, I still tend to use words wrapped in shame.
Unfortunately…
Back when I wasn’t healed…
When I wasn’t a good person…
When I failed the people I loved…
And the truth is…
that kind of self-talk matters more than we realize.
Those weren’t failures.
They weren’t moral flaws.
They weren’t proof that I was broken.
They were survival.
They were the best I could do with the tools, awareness, and capacity I had at the time.
Every version of me, even the messy ones, carried me forward.
Every version deserves honor, not punishment.
One of the greatest lessons on my healing journey has been realizing that growth doesn’t come from rewriting the past…
it comes from finally telling the truth about it with compassion.
There was a season of my life that cracked me wide open.
A season that held up a mirror and quietly asked me to look at myself differently.
Not to erase who I had been…but to choose who I was becoming.
That season became an invitation.
To heal patterns I had been carrying for years.
To soften places shaped by survival.
To stop passing down silence, self-abandonment, and unhealed wounds-starting with myself.
And here’s the part that still humbles me:
In doing that work, I began to understand that healing isn’t something we “arrive at.”
It’s something we practice…gently, imperfectly, over time.
I learned what matters.
I learned how to return to my soul when life tried to bury it under responsibility and fear.
I learned how to see myself through a lens of truth instead of judgment.
At 50 years old, I can say this honestly:
Healing didn’t just change how I show up in the world.
It changed how I see myself.
And maybe healing doesn’t mean rewriting our story,
maybe it means finally honoring how we survived it.
And if you’re in a season where you’re doing this kind of inner work too, learning to honor where you’ve been while gently stepping forward, I’m quietly opening space to support others who feel called to this path. No pressure. Just an open door, if and when it feels right.
