The Wounds I Gave Myself

Why we stay stuck on purpose

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I had always thought my problem was my body.

The skin. The weight. The bloating that came and went. The cycle that never quite worked the way it was supposed to. I tried every protocol. Every elimination diet. Every functional medicine workup. Every supplement stack.

I spent so much time and money trying to fix the things I was sure were the problem that I never stopped to wonder if part of me actually wanted the problems to stay.

The problem was not my body. The problem was that as long as I had a problem with my body, I had something to focus on. And as long as I was busy fixing, I never had to feel what was underneath.

I never wanted to face what I would have to feel if there were nothing left to fix.

The extra weight I could never seem to lose, the gut issues, the hormonal chaos. Those were not the wound. Those were the wounds I gave myself, because they hurt less than the real ones and they let me believe I was in control of fixing them. They were the things I focused on so I didn’t have to feel what was underneath. The fear. The grief. The parts of me I wasn’t ready to see.

As long as the problem was my body, the problem was never me.

I was not overeating because I was hungry. I was overeating because there was something I did not want to feel. It was easier to believe something was wrong with my body. Easier to believe the next supplement would fix it. The next protocol. The next plan. Easier to chase an answer outside of myself than to ask why I was reaching for the food, what I was trying not to feel, and what I was trying not to know.

As long as the problem was my body, I never had to look at what the food was helping me escape.

The extra weight gave me a reason to stay hidden. It gave me a reason not to be seen. It gave me something to focus on. Something to solve. Something to monitor. I loved having a problem to fix.

But the weight was the wall. The fixation on losing it was the second wall. And the real thing both walls were protecting me from was the same thing.

The terror of being fully alive in a body that could be seen. Loved. Hurt. The kind of pain that cannot be solved with a supplement or a protocol. Real pain. Grief. Loneliness. Abandonment. The fear of being lost, alone, and scared.

We often create problems to avoid risking ourselves to the pain of being alive.

We chase the man we know will never see us, because being chosen by the one who can would mean opening ourselves up. Letting someone in. Being seen. Potentially getting hurt.

We get the ick from the kind man for the same reason. Steadiness feels scary. Peace feels scary. Calm feels scary. We think chaos must mean chemistry.

We feel safe in the reassurance after the fight, so we pick the fight to get the reassurance. We chase intensity because it feels like love. We chase the makeup because it feels like proof they will not leave. But that is not love. That is fear dressed as love.

We leave before they can leave us. We pull away the moment we sense we have not been chosen. Pulling away first means we got out before the pain could get us.

We act indifferent. We act chill. We say we are not really looking for anything serious because the risk of saying we want to be loved is unbearable.

Chaos feels like love because chaos is familiar. The fight. The rupture. The reaching for each other afterward. The relief when they come back. That cycle is what we mistake for intimacy. And we chase it because we do not believe love can live in the quiet. We do not believe we are safe in love without it being constantly reassured.

In the silence, the peace, the ordinary Tuesday, we do not know how to feel chosen.

Because we do not know how to choose ourselves.

So we spend our lives outside of ourselves, looking for somewhere safer to be.

We obsess. Over the weight. The skin. The cycle. The hormones. The gut. The relationship. The protocols. The texts. The timing. The meaning of his tone.

We obsess because obsession is the part where we feel in control. Analyzing the past. Worrying about the future. Anywhere but the present moment of our own lives.

We believe that if we can just fix the body, find the partner, finish the protocol, land the job, then we will be safe. We spend our lives entirely outside of ourselves. Fixated. Monitoring. Scanning. Solving.

Compulsion, obsession, control. They are a strategy for not being present. And when we live in them, we end up missing our own lives.

What would we have to feel if the problems were gone tomorrow?

Ask yourself if the thing you are trying to solve is the problem. Or the wall between you and a deeper fear.

A lot of us would rather have a problem we think we can solve than a life we have to be present for. The joy. The peace. The calm. The grief. The loneliness. The pain. The uncertainty of not knowing what comes next.

A problem has a solution. Life does not. A problem can be controlled. Life cannot. A problem keeps us outside of the present moment. Life can only be lived inside it.

The alternative to the exhaustion of creating and solving problems is learning how to be alive. And being alive requires presence. And presence requires surrender. The surrender of the belief that if we can just figure it out, fix it, control it, plan for it, we will be safe.

But we have been looking for safety in all the wrong places. It was never going to be found in the protocol, the partner, or the plan.

It has only ever existed inside of us.

If I am not at war with my body, I have to be in it.

If I am not in the relationship that hurts, I have to be in the one that might see me and love me.

I have to risk loss to love and be loved.

If I am not chasing the weight loss, I have to ask what I have been trying to escape through food. I have to feel what’s underneath.

If I am not chasing the next thing, I have to be here.

The hardest part is never the problems we create. The hardest part is staying.

Staying in the relationship with the person who actually sees you, when every part of you is scanning for a reason to leave before you get hurt.

Staying in the discomfort of pain when all you want to do is reach for the food, the wine, the phone.

Staying inside joy without bracing for it to be taken away.

Staying inside grief without reaching for the thing that will blunt it.

Staying is the work. There is no protocol for it. There is no supplement that will make it easier. There is no magic breathwork sequence that will get you to the other side of it.

There is only the practice of choosing it. Over and over. The morning you don’t reach for the phone. The evening you don’t reach for the wine. The conversation where you don’t reach for the joke that would make it lighter. The relationship where you don’t reach for the exit when the love starts to feel too real. The body you stop trying to fix.

Every time you stay, you are choosing to be alive.

You will not feel safer at first. You will feel more exposed. You will feel everything you spent years trying not to feel. The love. The grief. The joy. The loneliness. All of it. Without anything standing between you and yourself.

We get one life. Let it be one you were actually alive for.

Love,

Annie