Have you ever gotten a cut? Like a deep cut that hurts really badly when you touch it? Well, in order to avoid that cut getting infected, you have to clean it, right? And take care of it and put on ointment and a Band-Aid, until it finally heals and doesn’t hurt anymore. Sometimes though, the healing can take weeks, maybe because you’re picking at the scab, or you let it fester and get infected. Sometimes, it doesn’t even happen on purpose. Sometimes, you don’t even realize you’re picking at that scab, and it’s just a habit. Sometimes, you don’t realize it’s getting worse until it’s already infected.
This is what healing is: sometimes, it’ll seem like you’re mostly healed and out of nowhere the pain will come back full force. That’s okay. It doesn’t mean your healing is reversing itself or you haven’t healed at all. It just means that the healing you’re doing is working. Your healing process is never going to be easy or linear. Healing is extremely messy and you’ll probably cry more than you’ll laugh until you’re healed more than hurt.
My healing process is still going on, even now. Sometimes, I feel like I’m back in my eleven year old self’s shoes, looking at myself in the mirror and hating myself so much it made me cry. But it’s a one percent chance because overall, ninety-nine percent of the time, I show myself I’ve moved past my own wounds and scars.
Sometimes, you’ll go one step forward, three steps back and that’s okay. The fact that you even took that one step forward in the first place, makes it that much easier to take another one. Something you’ve already done proves that you can do it one more time, and then another time after that.
Nobody likes the process of healing. It’s painful and messy and extremely disorganized (which, if you’re like me, frustrates you more than anything). It feels pointless and it feels discouraging sometimes, but healing will only ever help you in the long run. I think a lot of us forget that being hurt isn’t forever. It doesn’t last as long if you’re willing to heal. If you’re going to continue picking at a scab that has been trying to heal, you’re only ever going to keep bleeding. If you don’t take care of a wound and you let it fester, it’ll only get infected. You get what you give in. If you’re willing to work to heal, the reward will come soon enough.
So no more excuses. No more saying that nothing will ever change, that you’ll always be sad and miserable and heartbroken. Because the more you say that, the more you prove to yourself that nothing will change. Take the action to heal yourself, push your brain to love you as much as your heart does.
Your healing is only beginning, sweetheart, but you have to help yourself. Sometimes, it won’t feel like you’ve gotten anywhere, and that’s okay, but you can’t give up during that time because I promise you, that in a year when you look back at this exact moment, you’ll realize how far you’ve come. But you have to keep trying. So promise me you will.