I Don’t Want to Be Strong Anymore—I Want to Feel Safe

There’s a kind of tired that sleep doesn’t fix.

It’s not the “I stayed up too late” kind of tired. It’s the kind that settles into your bones after spending too long surviving things you never should’ve had to survive in the first place.

I’m tired of being the strong one.

I’m tired of hearing, “You always get through it,” like surviving everything thrown at me is some kind of superpower.

Sometimes I don’t want to get through it gracefully.

Sometimes I want to fall apart.

Sometimes I want someone else to look at the mess and say, “I’ve got this. You don’t have to carry it right now.”

Because being strong all the time is fucking exhausting.

People see the version of you that still shows up.

They see you laughing.

Working.

Taking care of everyone else.

Making jokes about the things that nearly destroyed you.

Posting something sarcastic online five minutes after crying so hard your chest hurt.

And because you’re still functioning, they assume you’re okay.

But surviving and being okay are two completely different things.

I’ve gotten really good at surviving.

Maybe too good.

I know how to wipe my face and answer the phone like nothing happened.

I know how to comfort someone else while my own life feels like it’s burning to the ground.

I know how to say, “I’m fine,” without even thinking about it anymore.

I know how to keep moving when every part of me wants to disappear underneath the blankets and shut the entire world out.

That doesn’t mean I’m strong.

Sometimes it just means I never learned that stopping was an option.

I spent so much of my life in fight-or-flight mode that peace still feels suspicious.

When things are quiet, part of me starts waiting for the next disaster.

When someone treats me well, I wonder when they’re going to change their mind.

When I’m happy, there’s this tiny voice in the back of my head reminding me not to get too comfortable.

Because historically?

Comfort never lasted.

People left.

Things fell apart.

Bodies failed.

Hearts broke.

Plans changed overnight.

And life taught me over and over again that just because something feels safe today doesn’t mean it’ll still be there tomorrow.

So yeah, sometimes I overthink.

Sometimes I need reassurance.

Sometimes I pull away when what I actually want is for someone to come closer.

Sometimes I act like I don’t care because admitting how much I care gives someone the ability to hurt me.

Sometimes I’m difficult to love because I’m still unlearning the idea that love always comes with pain attached to it.

But I’m trying.

God, I’m trying.

I’m trying to stop treating every silence like abandonment.

I’m trying to stop expecting everyone to eventually hurt me.

I’m trying to believe that I don’t have to earn love by destroying myself for other people.

I’m trying to rest without feeling guilty.

I’m trying to understand that I’m allowed to need people too.

That last one might be the hardest.

Because somewhere along the way, I became the person everybody could call.

The fixer.

The listener.

The one who would show up at 2 a.m.

The one who would carry someone else while bleeding internally.

And I loved being that person.

Part of me still does.

But I forgot something important:

The strong friend needs a strong friend too.

The caretaker needs to be cared for.

The person saying, “Call me if you need anything,” sometimes desperately wishes someone would say it back—and actually mean it.

I don’t want to be admired for how much pain I can survive anymore.

I don’t want resilience to be the only beautiful thing people see in me.

I want softness.

I want peace.

I want mornings where my first thought isn’t everything I need to fix.

I want love that doesn’t make me question where I stand.

I want friendships that don’t require me to shrink myself to keep them.

I want to stop confusing chaos with familiarity and familiarity with home.

More than anything, I want to learn what it feels like to live instead of constantly recovering.

Maybe healing isn’t becoming the strongest version of yourself.

Maybe healing is finally becoming soft enough to admit:

“I can’t carry this today.”

Maybe it’s letting somebody else help.

Maybe it’s leaving the dishes in the sink.

Turning your phone off.

Crying without immediately apologizing for crying.

Saying no without writing a paragraph explaining why.

Walking away from people who only seem to love you when you’re useful to them.

Maybe healing is realizing that being loved should not feel like an emergency.

I’m still figuring it out.

I’m still messy.

Still emotional.

Still complicated.

Still learning which parts of me were actually personality and which parts were survival mechanisms wearing my face.

But for the first time, I don’t want to spend the rest of my life proving how much I can endure.

I’ve already proven that.

I survived.

Now I want something different.

I want to fucking live.

— The Girl Behind the Chaos