I Miss Her, But I Can't Go Back

There’s a version of me I think about sometimes. Not because I want to be her again, but because she carried me through seasons I didn’t know how else to survive.

She was a little delusional. In the best and worst ways. She had no real worries, no deep self-doubt, no clear vision. She moved through life without asking many questions. She carried other people’s visions of who she should be and called it purpose. She didn’t yet know those visions weren’t her own.

And in some ways, I miss that ease.

She survived things that should have broken her. Bad relationships. Feeling displaced. Feeling invisible. Feeling like her value was always conditional. She learned how to endure. How to adapt. How to keep going even when she didn’t feel chosen or safe.

"To change what you get, you must change who you are." -Vernon Howard

Survival was her gift. Resilience was her language. A quiet “so what” attitude that let her keep moving forward.

That part of her still lives in me. It’s just quieter now. More intentional.

But survival came at a cost.

To survive, I hardened myself. I learned to be sharp when I was meant to be soft. I put my feelings on the back burner to keep the peace. I lowered myself to fit into spaces that were never meant to hold me. I learned how to be strong in ways that drained me because softness felt unsafe.

Being hard-shelled was never who I was supposed to be.

I sacrificed the femininity God placed in me. The tenderness. The gentleness. The ability to feel deeply without apologizing for it. Always being strong, always being guarded, always being “fine” kept me functioning, but it kept me far from myself.

I miss her sometimes because ignorance really is bliss. There is comfort in not knowing there is more.

But I can’t go back.

I can’t go back because that life was never God’s intention for me. I was never meant to live in mediocrity. I was never meant to simply get by. I was meant for joy, peace, and fulfillment rooted in Him. And once you see that, you can’t unsee it.

Growth didn’t come quietly.

Friends started disappearing. Slowly at first. Then all at once. The habits I used to tolerate began to feel uncomfortable. The spaces I once fit into began to reject the version of me I was becoming. I realized that the new me could no longer survive in old patterns without shrinking again.

And that grief is real.

Outgrowing isn’t always empowering. Sometimes it’s lonely. Sometimes it feels like loss before it feels like freedom. It requires letting go of versions of yourself that once kept you alive, even if they were never meant to keep you whole.

The turning point came when I got tired of just existing. When I knew I had to show my children that life could be more than survival. That fulfillment was possible. That purpose wasn’t something you waited for, but something you chose to pursue.

Choosing forward cost me everything emotionally.

I had to change how I saw myself. The way I interpreted the world. I had to unlearn beliefs formed in survival mode. Theories that kept me safe, but small. I had to release identities that no longer fit, even when they once protected me.

But it gave me something too.

A new desire.

A new outlook.

A deeper drive to become better, not just tougher.

There is more. But it comes at a price.

The price of leaving the old behind.

The price of shifting everything into forward motion.

If you’re still living in survival mode, hear this clearly.

There is more for you than just this.

But it will require you to release the version of you that only knew how to endure.

I miss her because she got me through.

I can’t go back because I was never meant to stay there.

And becoming isn’t betrayal. It’s obedience.

Until next time, trust the unfolding.

-Kam