At first, she said she didn't feel much of anything. Not happy. Not sad. Not even angry. Just...tired.
She described her days in shades of gray - work, home, sleep, repeat. When I asked her about her feelings, she would shrug and say "I don't really do feelings. I just get things done."
Her voice was steady, practiced. Her eyes kind. It wasn't until one afternoon, months later, that something shifted.
She was talking about her daughter - the way her little girl had reached up to tuck a stray hair behind her ear - when her throat caught mid-sentence. She blinked, surprised. Her hand went to her chest.
And then, quietly, tears came.
Not the big, gasping kind - just soft ones, steady and slow, like something that had been waiting a very long time to be seen.
The Return of Feeling
Sometimes, healing begins when numbness starts to thaw. For many adults who've lived in survival mode, not feeling was never a failure - it was protection. It's how they made it through.
In therapy, we don't rush that process. We make room for safety first - for breath, for quiet, for noticing. And eventually, the body begins to whisper what it's been holding: sadness, relief, grief, love - all mixed together.
The Courage to Feel
She told me later, "It scared me - those tears. But it also felt like proof that I'm still in here."
That's what therapy often is: the slow remembering that we are not broken for having gone numb. We are simply learning how to feel again, safely, in a world that once required us not to.
The Gentle Work of Coming Back
Feeling again isn't about being emotional all the time. It's about coming home - to your body, your breath, your heartbeat. To the parts of you that know how to love and grieve and hope.
And sometimes, it begins with something as small as a tear that surprises you mid-sentence.
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