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The Things we do to Survive (and Why They're killing us)

Foto van schrijver: Crea & Body ClarityCrea & Body Clarity

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When a friends mom passed away, and some years later my partner’s mom, I found myself thinking: “Is this really it? Is life just a game of Russian roulette—of who gets sick, gets cancer and dies and who doesn't... yet?”


But then I realized something. It’s not random. It’s not a roulette. We’re self-destructing all the time.

Sometimes we’re the ones pulling the trigger. Sometimes we’re killing ourselves slowly, without even realizing it.


Where It All Begins

As kids - it can actually even start in the womb, but the blogpost would get too long - life feels so full of wonder. We’re joyful, curious, and close to love. But even in that innocence, the seeds of self-destruction are planted.

Trauma, neglect, or even subtle emotional wounds leave marks on us. Maybe we learn early on that our worth is tied to suffering or that our needs don’t matter. Maybe we grow up in environments where unhealthy coping mechanisms—like addiction or toxic relationships—are normalized.

We adapt because we have to. We learn how to behave to feel loved or safe. Some of us stop speaking up or feeling altogether because it’s safer that way. We push our emotions down into our bodies, hide them away just to survive another day.

But here’s the thing: what kept us safe as kids often becomes the very thing that destroys us as adults.


The Illusion of Invincibility

Do you remember being a teenager and at the start of your twenties? That feeling like the world was yours? Like nothing could touch you? You were invincible—or so you thought. - Do you remember the moment when you discovered you weren't?


And then one day, reality hits. You’re in your thirties, and suddenly life feels heavier.

You notice stress lines on your face, random panic attacks creeping in, your body aching in ways it never used to.

That invincibility bubble? It burst a long time ago—you just didn’t notice until now.

And then you realize something else: all those emotions you buried as a kid? They never left. They’ve been sitting there all along, growing and evolving into something harder to ignore— anger, anxiety, sadness, depression, chronic pain, diseases... - diseases? How can you get physical sick from emotions? - Ofcourse, it is all connected. Your ignored emotions are searching a way out, a way to be seen. It can even change your cells and put them up against you. (Read - "When the body says no" - Gabor Maté)


But instead of facing them, we keep pushing them down with distractions: work, alcohol, smoking, over-exercising, toxic relationships, eating —anything to avoid feeling what’s really inside us.


We like to tell ourselves: “This is just who I am.

But is it?

Or is it who you became?


Here’s the paradox: by trying so hard not to feel anything, by numbing ourselves just to survive—we’re actually killing ourselves. Slowly but surely. Our survival mode, became a killing-mode.


Read that again.

And it’s not just our bodies we destroy; it’s our relationships too. We sabotage love without even realizing it—pushing people away because deep down we don’t feel worthy of being loved or because we’re convinced they’ll leave us eventually anyway.

Let that sink in for a moment. What a crazy contradictie, right?


Breaking the Cycle

Dealing with what’s inside us—the pain, the trauma—is hard work. It’s messy and uncomfortable and terrifying at times. But it’s also the most important thing we can do if we want to stop self-destructing and start truly living.

Healing means facing those old wounds head-on instead of running from them. It means acknowledging that the behaviors that once kept us safe are now making us sick—or worse.


It’s a strange kind of freedom when you realize this: what protected you for so long is no longer serving you.


Choosing to Heal

Healing doesn’t happen overnight—it’s a process. But when you start doing the work, something shifts. You begin to see beauty in your struggles because every challenge becomes an opportunity to grow.

You learn to be kinder to yourself—to celebrate small victories instead of beating yourself up over setbacks. You stop attracting toxic people because you no longer tolerate them in your life. Your love language changes; your relationship with yourself changes.

You start living differently—not out of survival mode but from a place of peace and authenticity. You learn how to rest without guilt, how to be present in your own body, how to feel again without fear.

And as you heal, you get this incredible opportunity: the chance to rediscover who you are—not who you became out of necessity—but who you’ve always been underneath it all.


When we choose healing over self-destruction, everything changes. We stop surviving by killing ourselves and start living for real.


It’s not easy—but it’s worth it.


Love,

Hanne


Booktips:

  • "When the body says no" - Gabor Maté

  • "Things no one taught us about love" - Vex King

  • "Loving what is" - Byron Katy


If you don't know where to begin, that is perfectly normal. Book an appointment and I'll help you on this journey.


PS: This behavior, we all have, often hangs together with a feeling we are addicted to. A feeling we once had and lost, and we seek it, in everything and everyone. To feel it, to live it, to merge with it. And we seek it outside of ourselves, while we have to find it within. Working on a blogpost - We are all addicted to feelings.


I'm writing out of my own experiences in this. My own experiences in sabotaging relationships, in triggers, in toxic behavior. I'm also working on a story about the impact of having/being a vanishing twin syndrome.

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