Allowing Yourself to Be Changed

The human body has always fascinated me. The way each system works in its own beautiful complexity. My heart beats without me telling it to. My brain takes in and categorizes information, trying to make sense of a world that often makes very little sense at all. The miraculous wonder of conception and childbirth, a process so precise and complex that it’s hard not to acknowledge the magic in it.

So much is happening within us without our conscious direction. Our bodies are constantly responding, adapting, growing, aging and changing right alongside us. And yet, we spend so much of our lives trying to remain unchanged.

Maybe you survived something. Maybe you raised babies. Maybe you built the career. Maybe you held the family together. Maybe you people-pleased because belonging mattered. Maybe you stayed because you needed stability. Maybe you were ambitious because you needed to prove something. Maybe you were softer, harder, louder, quieter, more accommodating, more reckless, more afraid.

Life expects things from us, maybe too much sometimes, and after everything we find ourselves thinking, I just want to feel like myself again. Or, even worse, we are told we should “bounce back,” “age gracefully,” or live up to some other nonsensical expectation that asks us to experience life without appearing too changed by it.

But what is “self,” and why is our instinct to get back there?

I think the answer varies for everyone, but for me, the instinct to get back to my “old self” came from fear of the unknown.

Sure, maybe I was too tired. I found myself moodier than normal. I tolerated things I didn’t want to tolerate. I accepted invitations from people even though I would have much rather stayed home. Maybe I drank too much wine to drown out and numb myself from all the things I hated.

BUT… at least I knew that version of me.

There were no surprises that came with the compliant, people-pleasing, small version of me. If I could find my way back to her, nothing really had to change that much. I didn’t have to change. Being unhappy or unfulfilled somehow felt far less scary than stepping into the unknown.

Chasing my former self turned out to be a lot like chasing perfection. It was unattainable.

At some point, I had to accept that the old version of me I was chasing no longer existed. That realization was profoundly heartbreaking because allowing yourself to change contains grief. I had to accept that the old version of me did everything she needed to do, and it was my job to thank her, say goodbye to her, and let her go.

She got me here, to this place, writing this very piece.

The burdens, the fear, the love, the resentments, she carried them silently. She hid her pain and her grief for the sake of everyone around her. She did it for her family. She did it for her daughter. She did it all by herself because she didn’t know how to do it any other way.

She was messy. She was scared. But my GOD, she was resilient, and I owe my life to her.

It doesn’t matter that she was dripping in wine and hangovers. She fucking survived, and I love her for it.

But I know I can’t go back to her, despite how much I love her. I can admire her tenacity and know that my life is meant to move forward differently. Letting her go doesn’t mean forgetting her. I can love who I was without trying to become her again.

I was never meant to remain who I have always been.

It can be difficult to grieve a version of yourself you never intended to let go of, especially when you aren’t sure who the new version is. We become desperate to return to who we used to be even though our lives have fundamentally changed us in ways we may still be discovering.

When we don’t recognize who we’ve become, we reach backward because the old version is familiar.

Motherhood might be one of the clearest examples of this.

Imagine undergoing an enormous physical, hormonal, psychological, relational and identity transition, only to be surrounded by language asking when you are going to get back to yourself. Back to your body. Back to work. Back to your routine. Back to sex. Back to exercise. Back to productivity. Back to normal.

What exactly are we being asked to get back to?

A woman just went through something enormous. She grew and birthed a human being. Her body changed. Her relationships may have changed. Her priorities may have changed. The way she understands herself may have changed. Why do we assume the successful outcome is restoration of the woman who existed before any of it happened?

Maybe she isn’t supposed to “bounce back.”

Maybe she needs time to grieve who she used to be while nurturing, nourishing and getting to know the woman who exists now.

Motherhood is only one example. Across our lives, women encounter transitions capable of changing us in profound ways. Puberty. Relationships. Grief. Motherhood for some. Career changes. Aging. Perimenopause and menopause. Some arrive gradually and others split life into a distinct before and after.

And still, there is often an expectation that we remain recognizable through all of it.

I was once, unfortunately, in close proximity to a conversation between two men in their fifties talking about an old high school classmate. This woman was now also in her fifties, a wife and mother of three grown children, with more than thirty years of life between who she was then and who she was now.

And these men were shocked by how different she looked.

You mean she lived an entire life for thirty years, birthed three children, experienced things you know absolutely nothing about, underwent decades of ordinary human aging and GASP she doesn’t look like the 18-year-old you remember?

How bizarre.

The truth is, allowing ourselves to change might cost us something.

When we change, it affects our environment. It can change our relationships and shine a light on harder questions we may have been avoiding. Sometimes it requires us to take accountability for the part we played in building a life we no longer fit inside.

And then comes the terrifying part: we may have to build one that fits us now.

Some people will grow with us. Others may not. Some will celebrate the person we are becoming, while others may be more comfortable with the person we used to be. We may find ourselves saying goodbye not only to former versions of ourselves, but to expectations, roles, relationships and ways of living that belonged to them.

That is heavy. I know because some of this was heartbreaking for me to even write.

But it isn’t all bad.

There are parts of the woman I am becoming that I genuinely like. She is happier. She is healthier. She is more peaceful. She knows things about herself that the woman before her couldn’t have known yet. Not because this is the final, perfected version of me, but because I finally stopped demanding that she become someone who no longer exists.

Maybe that is the opportunity hidden inside all of this.

Instead of spending so much of our energy trying to resurrect who we used to be, we can turn toward the person who is actually here. We can get curious about her. We can listen to her. We can give her the nourishment, relationships, boundaries, rest, adventure, love, or whatever else she needs now, rather than continuing to build a life around the needs of someone we used to be.

I still don’t know exactly who this version of me is or where she is headed. The not knowing is still terrifying sometimes.

But maybe I don’t need to know yet.

Maybe I just need to allow myself to be changed.

XOXO

Brittany Rucka