Healing, Glowing, and Growing – One Act of Self-Care At a Time

For most of my life, I didn’t understand my anger.

Not the deep, buried kind I’m feeling now…

but the little flashes that slipped out over the years.

The sharp tone.

The sudden irritation.

The moments where something tiny knocked me off balance and I reacted stronger than the situation deserved.

I used to blame myself for those moments.

I told myself I was being dramatic, overreacting, too sensitive.

I’d feel ashamed almost immediately — swallow the anger, shut myself down, and smooth it over because perfection felt safer than honesty.

Now, sitting with this massive wave of anger — the ancient, grief-soaked kind — I’m finally seeing the pattern:

Those moments were never random.

They were early warning signs that I was hurt.

I just didn’t know how to listen.

Back then, I didn’t have the language for trauma.

I didn’t recognize the alarm bells inside my body.

I thought anger meant I was the problem, so I smothered it as fast as possible.

I didn’t realize that the anger I directed outward in tiny bursts was actually the anger I couldn’t bear to face inside myself.

It was never really about the moment.

It was about the years I spent in survival mode.

The years of being unheard, unseen, and overloaded to the point where even the smallest thing felt like too much.

And because I never believed I was allowed to be messy, or emotional, or imperfect, I did the only thing I knew how to do:

I shut down.

I hid.

I pretended I wasn’t hurting.

I shaped myself to fit a narrative of perfection — the “strong one,” the “quiet one,” the one who didn’t need help.

Because if I cracked even a little, I was terrified everything would spill out.

So I built walls around my reactions and convinced myself they meant nothing.

But they did mean something.

They were messages from a version of me who was drowning but didn’t know how to ask for air.

And now, as I finally sit with this huge, overwhelming rush of anger — anger at the years I lost, at the person I had to become to survive — I’m seeing the truth:

This isn’t new anger.

It’s old anger finally allowed to exist.

This time, I’m not shutting down.

I’m not hiding.

I’m not rushing to make myself look okay for the world.

I’m letting the anger be what it is — a signal.

A compass pointing back to the parts of me that were hurting long before I had words to say it.

A reminder that survival mode didn’t give me room to feel anything fully, so my emotions escaped in whatever small ways they could.

Now, I’m learning to sit with it.

To reflect rather than react.

To ask myself:

What is this anger trying to show me?

Where did I first feel this?

And what would have happened if I had felt safe enough to express it back then?

Healing is messy.

It’s not a straight path, and it definitely doesn’t look like perfection.

But the difference now is that I’m not running from myself anymore.

I’m not swallowing the truth to keep the peace.

I’m not hiding behind the illusion of “I’m fine.”

I’m letting myself be human — angry, grieving, awakening — without apology.

And maybe that’s the real growth:

Not avoiding the anger, but understanding it.

Not rejecting my reactions, but recognizing where they came from.

Not forcing myself into perfection, but allowing myself to exist exactly as I am — messy, imperfect, and finally honest.

You can explore the tools I have created for my own personal healing journey here:

👉 Stan Store: https://stan.store/Shroompy

Your Turn

Have you ever realized that the reactions you judged yourself for were actually signs of deeper hurt?

Share your experience in the comments — your honesty might help someone recognize their own.