🌿 I Didn't Grow Up— I Grew Old

On Healing, Identity, and Becoming Myself Again

In the past three years, I didn’t just grow up.                                             Photo by Alfonso Scarpa on Unsplash
I got old — not in the way the body does, but in spirit.

I poured myself into healing. I focused on my mental health, peeled away layers of fear, shame, and survival. And somewhere in that sacred unraveling, I found someone who truly loved me. Someone who saw me — not my looks, not my effort, not my performance.

And for the first time, I let go.

I stopped trying so hard.
I stopped dressing up, putting on makeup, shaping myself for the world.
I stopped performing “beauty.”                                                              
I stopped chasing something I didn’t believe I needed anymore.

And it felt good.                                                                                    
It felt safe.                                                                                            

It was the kind of rest I had never allowed myself to feel before.
The kind of surrender that said:
You don’t have to pretend anymore.

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But as the months passed, something curious began to stir in me.

A longing.
A flicker.
A small ache for parts of myself I had quietly let die in the name of healing.

It wasn’t about appearance. It wasn’t about pleasing anyone.
It was something deeper:
I missed me.

I had deconstructed my identity so completely in the name of recovery and growth, that I forgot I was allowed to keep the parts that were truly mine — the ones that never needed to go away. The way I used to play with color. The way I moved through the world with intention. The way I used to express my character through clothes, energy, and ritual.

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🌒 Transformation Is a Kind of Death

Psychologists call this an identity integration crisis.
It often happens after periods of deep healing or emotional growth — when we shed old roles and patterns, but haven’t yet learned how to embody the new ones. We know what we’re not anymore, but we’re unsure what we are becoming.

Carl Jung spoke of this as part of the process of individuation — a necessary passage where the mask (persona) falls away and we meet ourselves in our rawest, most honest form. It’s not a breakdown. It’s a becoming.

But that doesn’t make it easy.

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🌺 I Love My Life. But I Miss Parts of Me.

The truth is — I love my life now.
I feel more grounded. More connected. More authentic.                           Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash

But I would be lying if I said I didn’t miss some parts of my old self.
Not the pressure. Not the performance.
Just the presence — of feeling alive in my body,   expressive in my soul.                                                                                                    And maybe I don’t have to choose.

Maybe I can reintroduce the old me to the new me.                                                                                                                                                Maybe I can merge them — gently, lovingly — into a version of Elli that feels whole, soft, and safe.

Maybe healing doesn’t mean throwing everything away.
Maybe it means remembering what was always mine, and bringing it forward with intention.

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🕊️ Is It Just Me? Or Does This Happen After 30?

No, it’s not just me. Or just you.

Many people feel this shift in their early thirties.
Psychologist Erik Erikson described it as a time of realignment — moving from performance and image toward purpose and meaning.

The body may change.
The pace of life may soften.
And suddenly, we’re faced with questions like:

Who am I, now that I’m not pretending?
What of my past self do I want to keep?
And how can I love myself in this stage — not as a project, but as a person?

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💛 Returning to Myself, Gently

So here I am.
Accomplishing things slowly.
Moving forward in my own rhythm.
Sometimes feeling optimistic, sometimes feeling stuck — like I’ve paused mid-transition.

But now I know:
This pause is sacred.
It is not failure.
It is gestation.

And I want to meet myself again — not with urgency, but with curiosity.
Not to go back, but to reclaim.

To wear color again.
To dress with joy.
To dance with myself in the mirror.
To put on lipstick for no one but me.

To become the version of Elli who feels safe, expressive, and alive.

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🌷 To Anyone Else Feeling This

If you’ve let go of parts of yourself in order to survive —
If you feel older not in years, but in the tiredness of your soul —
If you’ve paused the performance, and now you’re wondering who’s left —

Please know:
You are not broken.
You are in transformation.

This is not a void. It is a return.
This is not regression. It is integration.
You didn’t lose yourself. You are simply meeting yourself again — slowly, honestly, deeply.

And that, my friend, is the most beautiful kind of becoming.

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📝 Further Reading for Fellow Travelers
If this resonates, you might enjoy exploring:

🔹 Clarissa Pinkola Estés, Women Who Run With the Wolves
🔹 Brené Brown, The Gifts of Imperfection
🔹 Tara Brach, Radical Acceptance
🔹 Esther Perel on the evolution of identity in relationships
🔹 Glennon Doyle, Untamed
🔹 Carl Jung on individuation
🔹 Erik Erikson on psychosocial development in adulthood

With Elli