The Version of Me I Became to Survive

The Version of Me I Became to Survive

There are versions of us that were never meant to be permanent. They were built for emergencies, usually out of stubbornness, caffeine, sarcasm and the absolute refusal to fall apart because there was still stuff that needed doing. That version of me learned how to keep going when everything felt heavy. She learned how to smile when she was exhausted, how to sort everyone else out while quietly shoving her own feelings into a cupboard marked “deal with later”, and how to function on the sort of emotional battery percentage that would make an iPhone start begging for a charger.

For a long time, I thought that was just who I was. Independent, strong, capable, always the one who could handle it. There is a difference between who you are and who you had to become to get through something though. Sometimes what looks like strength from the outside is actually survival mode with excellent PR. You get praised for being the one who always manages, while internally you’re thinking, “Yes, lovely, but I would quite like to stop managing everything for approximately three business days.”
A lot of the things I used to think were personality traits turned out to be armour. Always being useful. Always fixing. Always thinking ten steps ahead. Struggling to rest without feeling guilty. Finding it easier to give than receive. Feeling weirdly suspicious when life is calm because surely something must be lurking around the corner with a clipboard. Very efficient, very practical, and absolutely knackering.
The awkward part is that survival traits often work. They get you through things. They help you cope. They keep everything moving when stopping feels impossible. That is exactly why letting go of them can feel so strange. Even when they are exhausting, they are familiar. They have kept you safe before, so part of you keeps thinking they must still be necessary.

Healing, for me, has started to look less like getting rid of those parts and more like understanding them. I do not hate that version of me. I am grateful for her. She got me here. She carried things I did not know how to carry at the time, protected me with whatever tools she had and kept the lights on internally when things got dark. She did her job brilliantly.

She just does not need to stay on duty forever.

I can be strong without constantly bracing for impact. I can care about people without draining myself dry. I can rest without having to earn it first, and I can let someone show up for me without immediately feeling like I need to repay them with interest. I can stop treating peace like a suspicious package and start trusting that calm does not always mean something bad is about to happen.
That is what healing feels like to me at the minute. It is not becoming a completely different person, and it is not pretending the old version of me never existed. It feels more like slowly taking off armour that has become too heavy, keeping the wisdom it gave me, keeping the strength, keeping the parts of me that fought like hell to get here, while finally making room for softness too.

The version of me I became to survive deserves love, gratitude and a very long sit down. She got me here.

She does not have to carry me forever.

Daily Affirmation

Onwards, Nova x