To the Ones I Hurt Along the Way

Healing is not linear. 

A simple statement that holds a lot of weight for me right now. There have been many ups and downs in my attempt to get a grip on my mental health as well as trying to navigate what it means to be myself in a world outside of academia. The truth is that I have no idea what either of those things look like. 

What I do know is that in my attempt to find myself and whatever that means for me, I have hurt some important people to me along the way. I have put them in positions that created rifts in our relationships, in our friendships, or even ended them altogether. 

Saying I am sorry is not enough. I have been neglecting their needs, their signs of needing help, and caused some damage in the wake of everything that has happened. 

While my intention was never to hurt another person, this is a learning moment for me. I need to understand the same concept that I teach my students and it’s that intent does not always equal impact. While I may not have intended to hurt anyone, the impact that my actions had is far greater than I can imagine. 

Impact. Let’s take a moment to talk about that quickly. When using that word, we typically are talking about how others have positively changed our lives. Nostalgia seldom has negativity associated with it because who really wants to remember the bad things that have happened in our lives. 

Now that we covered that - let’s talk about the ways that ‘impact' can have a negative effect on those that are closest to us. As we are beginning our healing journeys, we can begin to put those same people on the backburner when it comes to understanding their needs and what they are trying to process… even things that we are unaware of. 

Why is this important?

Good question. Often when we are so focused on getting out of the never-ending tunnel that we have made our home for so long, we are only worried about the light at the end. Seldom are we concerned with who we have brought with us into the tunnel. They are still there. 

If you read one of my earlier posts, you may remember when I talked about the burning house and feeling like the group has left for safety while I am stuck watching from inside as the walls burn around me… this is the same idea, but switched. 

As we are healing, they may be hurting. 

I am still working on figuring out how to fix things. I am still working on figuring out how to make things better. Not just in the sense of needing to fix myself, but also in needing to fix the relationships that may have been adversely affected by the things that I have done while on my path of self-destruction. 

It is okay to hurt, it is amazing to heal. But never forget about the people who helped you get to the point where you knew you could continue again. 

So, to the ones I hurt along the way: I cannot begin to apologize. I am sorry that I compromised our friendships in an effort to climb up from this hole I dug. I am sorry that I put you in the way of the oncoming traffic that you continuously tried to pull me out of. I am sorry that I never took into account the effects of the things that I have done when it came to you. I am sorry. 

To the ones I hurt along the way, I hope you begin to heal too.