When Healing Is Slower Than Expected
It’s 7:15 a.m., and somehow my mind still drifts to my ex. Not because I miss him—I don’t. What lingers isn’t love or longing. It’s disgust. Resentment. The kind of emotional residue that doesn’t leave quietly.
I keep asking myself why it’s taking me so long to move on. I’ve already accepted that the relationship is over. I don’t want him back. But I can’t get past how it ended, and more importantly, who he showed himself to be when I was at my most vulnerable.
What hurts the most is the deception. He lied to me about his spirituality—or maybe he abandoned it altogether. Sometimes I wonder if someone was whispering in his ear, filling his head with fear or judgment about the spiritual community. Either way, the betrayal cut deep, because spirituality wasn’t a surface-level topic for me. It was part of my core.
The breaking point was my mental breakdown—my psychosis. That was a moment where compassion, protection, and care should have shown up. Instead, he exploited it. While I was unraveling, he asked me for a blessing. That moment still makes my stomach turn. When someone takes advantage of your spiritual authority while you’re mentally fractured, it leaves a scar that isn’t easy to name, let alone heal.
People like to say, “Forgive and move on,” as if forgiveness is a switch you flip. But forgiveness, real forgiveness, costs something. It takes energy. It takes grace. It takes a level of inner stability that I’m still rebuilding.
I know forgiveness will eventually come. I trust that with the help of God, the universe, source—whatever name you give the higher power that holds us—it will arrive when I’m ready. But right now, I’m not there. And I’m choosing to be honest about that.
At this moment, I choose not to forgive him. Not out of bitterness, but out of self-respect. I’m still gathering the pieces of myself that were scattered during that season. I’m still learning how to protect what’s sacred in me.
Healing isn’t linear. Letting go doesn’t mean forgetting. And forgiveness doesn’t mean bypassing the truth.
For now, I allow myself to feel exactly where I am—awake at 7:15 a.m., clear enough to know I deserve better, and strong enough to admit that some wounds take time.