I remember when I was deep in my depression and addiction, at one point in time I was trying to cut down/stop on my drug of choice (tabs, fast, speed, or crystal meth) and I had tried to reach out for help, but either I was told me to get over it or they walked away from me. I didn’t understand how they can do that, when I was there for them at their weakest moments and gave them the support, they needed at the time. What I have learned is that not everyone is like me and that’s ok. The more that I had learned about myself and the actions of others towards myself, I was observing everyone who was in my life and how I would react around them.

I had quit shortly after that, I had started to observe everyone and how they had reacted to my boundaries that I had set in, when I started to heal. I was not aware of who was using me or tried to help me because I didn’t know the difference. I had to learn a hard lesson with people and who I wanted around me. The people who had used, betrayed, abused, and abandon me aren’t in my life anymore, some took a while to see who they were and the others broke my heart in the process.

Instead of blaming them for everything bad in my life I decided to try something different, I had to look in the mirror and ask myself “what part of myself made me think that this kind of behavior was acceptable to accept?”. I had learned to accept what was from my past because of the lack of love from my childhood  and it had a major impact on how I viewed relationships. I had to learn to accept that my parents were as hurt as I was, for not being to give me the love I deserved, and they were on survival mode from their own childhood.

I learned to be alone because it was what I needed at the time to see clearly and ask myself those awkward questions. I didn’t trust anyone in my life anymore, because I was afraid of being hurt by anyone and there were people who did try to come towards me, but I would either run the other way or keep them at a distance.  I had learned to love myself but in that I had to learn to love the parts of myself that I hated which were a lot. I had hated who I had become and the things that I’ve done.

I had to look at my own actions towards others and how I would react to my triggers. I had to learn to become more aware of my thoughts, as I was triggered to even realize I was triggered, because everything I was feeling felt normal to me. My anxiety had this overwhelming sense of feeling like everyone was out to get me (seems like it is crazy thinking, but when growing up in a world where it was normal to betray each other it was kind of normal). I am going to be honest I still struggle with those thoughts but I now know that there are good people who are there, because I know some. I had to learn to accept myself for my choices, my mistakes, my guilt, and what I did not see or know about.

Opening up my heart to accept any form of love, I had to accept my past for what it was and accept myself for the choices I had made which was the hardest thing I had to do (still working on guilt part). There is hope that you can accept healthy love if you choose to heal after all the pain and see it is for what it is.