Some people enter our lives and ease our loneliness before we even realize how desperately we need them. Research explains why these connections feel so life-changing: the strength and quality of our relationships directly impact both mental and physical well-being. Furthermore, according to PubMed Central, strong social support provides critical “protective effects” when individuals are coping with distress or trauma.
pain
There is a darkness inside all of us that can wound others as well as ourselves. And, there is a light that we are afraid to show because we fear more pain. We let certain people only see one side of us because it feels safer than being whole. Whether we are a professional, family member, friend, or stranger, there are only parts of our hearts we feel we can show. We are not only afraid of our pride, envy, wrath, greed, lust, gluttony, or sloth, but we can equally be afraid of our tenderness, accountability, sincerity, and our ability to love with a full and honest heart.
This article explores self-directed harm not as pathology, but as the internalized echo of abuse. Only through listening to this echo closely can we understand why healing is not about ‘fixing’ something broken, but about learning to speak in a different tongue rather than the language of pain that has been handed over to us.
What We Wish They Saw – The Pain That Should be Clear as Glass
For us, it’s always the loudest pain carried with the front of a silent serenity on our shoulders. However, as the glass child, we are often overlooked, yet expected to be the strong ones, the caregivers, or the glue holding everything together. However, when we let our pain show, we are often deemed to be “too much”.