If there’s one thing grad school has taught me, it’s that learning to be comfortable with/in discomfort is one of the most necessary parts of personal growth. Let’s be honest: conflict is a huge source of stress and anxiety for a lot of people, even more so for people like me who have mental illness and a lot of trauma specifically around confrontation. I’ve said before that I have too often cared far too much of what people think of me, and the more I heal, the less this is true. I was a mess in my marriage, partly because I put up with my ex-husband’s disrespect and neglect and dishonesty because I wanted him to love me more than I wanted to love myself. This lead to me becoming increasingly insecure and unable to handle difficult conversations and situations. It also meant I wasn’t willing to see the moments when he was manipulating me, and that added its own kind of baggage to our already dysfunctional relationship.

Leaving him was hard in so many ways, but one of them was that I knew I could no longer count on anyone’s love, affection, or respect. If my own husband couldn’t love me enough to work with me to save our marriage, then I couldn’t guarantee anyone else’s affection, either. And this was hard for me to accept. Even when someone promised to “always be there,” what they really meant was “so long as you don’t outgrow the unspoken parameters of our relationship.” And as a newly separated woman, I didn’t immediately start taking up space or asserting my boundaries. I had to unlearn all that shit. I had to recognize it and intentionally counter it, and that’s hard to do because it looks different in every situation and with every person. I genuinely didn’t know how to say, “Hey, this is a boundary and you’ve crossed it,” and I certainly didn’t know how to handle situations where my boundaries were consistently disrespected, because you don’t recognize something as a pattern until it’s happened multiple times, and by that point, unless you’ve brought it up each time it’s been an issue, it’s that much harder to enforce boundaries.

[Side note: a thunder and lightning storm just started and my entire body is tingling.]

And here’s something I learned that has genuinely changed the energy with which I approach my life: there’s nothing I can do that will convince someone to love me. Full stop. I can shrink myself, silence myself, ignore my instincts, pretend I’m not hurt even though I am, and contort myself into the exact shell of who someone wants me to be, and it won’t change a damn thing if their love/affection is immature, toxic, or shallow. I am someone who loves completely. I go all in, regardless of the kind of relationship it is. And it hurts like hell to realize that other people (most people, in fact) don’t love with that same intensity (nor do they have to, by the way). So by accepting these things, not only am I released from any feeling of obligation to try and “earn” love, belonging, and affection, it gives me permission to establish my own parameters for the kinds of treatment I will and won’t put up with. And that has been the most liberating lesson since my divorce: no one else gets to decide what I will and will not put up with.

I have some boundaries that are rigid. They will not bend, they are not flexible. But it’s not healthy for all of our boundaries to be rigid, because that doesn’t allow for the existence of someone else’s boundaries. Some of my boundaries are entirely bendable, easily and completely flexible. But it’s not healthy for all of our boundaries to be flexible either because then we end up ignoring our own needs. My marriage was a place where I could not define or enforce my boundaries because, even when my ex said he understood, his behavior didn’t change. Moreover, whenever I did try to enforce boundaries, he would become increasingly hostile, manipulative, and neglectful. This meant I developed habits of not even bringing up my boundaries because I was punished whenever I did.

Now what I’m learning is how to approach my boundaries in an in between place, a place where they’re neither rigid nor completely flexible. A place where I don’t ignore my own needs, but where I also don’t impose what I need onto other people. I cannot force someone to acknowledge or respect my boundaries. But nor do I have to tolerate their disrespect. In hindsight, I should have left my ex a long time ago, but love can be used to manipulate us. Love can be toxic as much as it can be healthy and liberating. It is not wrong to want happiness from a relationship. Moreover, as my partner has said, life is too long to spend it with someone who doesn’t make you happy.

My marriage was a catastrophe because my ex couldn’t respect my boundaries, and I couldn’t enforce consequences. I was too scared. Saw myself as too weak. But the more I’ve healed, the more I’m able to recognize even the subtle ways that people have tried to manipulate, use, control, and mistreat me for their own gain. But beyond that, the more I’ve healed, the more comfortable I have become in my own self. I am a deeply social person. I thought once that I was introverted because I can become overwhelmed by crowds and need my own space, but I’ve come to learn that this entirely depends on who I’m with. Some people drain me. Others infuse me with excitement, happiness, and joy. But no matter who I am around, I’m learning to love myself first, always myself first. It’s not that we can’t love others until we love ourselves, it’s that we can’t selflessly love others until we love ourselves first. And it is really uncomfortable to realize how little we love ourselves, and to then try and grow to a place where we can love ourselves.

I’m learning to accept where I am in any given moment. And I’m learning to sit with some of the more uncomfortable parts of the healing process. But the really hard part has been learning not to devalue my worth, my feelings, or my needs for sake of anyone else’s comfort or benefit. Because the validity of someone else’s boundaries does not invalidate mine, and I have lived far too long allowing myself to be abused by those who refused to treat me with the respect they demanded from me. The rain outside has now turned to an onslaught of hail, and I feel this is a symbol of exactly what it means to brave the storm of discomfort. It’s cold and it feels like needles pricking your skin, but on the other side is a gust of something fresh, something renewed. It’s opportunity.