There is a specific, hollow ache in realizing you missed the very thing that was breaking you. It’s not just grief; it’s the terrifying question of whether your own heart has a broken compass.

I want to start by naming something that rarely gets spoken aloud, even in the quietest corners of our therapy offices or late-night journal entries. It’s this heavy, suffocating shame that settles in when you look back at a relationship that was objectively harmful, maybe even abusive, and realize with a jolt of horror that you liked it. You liked the intensity. You liked the way they made you feel seen, even if that seeing was distorted. You liked the chase, the drama, the sheer adrenaline of trying to earn love from someone who held all the cards.

Let’s sit with that for a second. I know how dangerous that admission feels. We are taught, from a very young age, that love should be safe. That it should be steady. That it should feel like coming home, not like walking into a minefield where every step requires hyper-vigilance. So when we find ourselves missing the chaos, when we find ourselves scrolling through old texts and feeling a pang of longing instead of relief, we don’t just feel sad. We feel defective. We feel like we chose wrong. Like there’s something fundamentally broken in our wiring that allowed us to enjoy being hurt.

But here is the truth, and I need you to hear it clearly: you did not choose to be hurt. Your nervous system chose survival. And sometimes, survival looks a lot like attachment. When you grow up in an environment where love is inconsistent, where affection is tied to performance, where silence is punishment, your brain learns to equate anxiety with intimacy. The calm becomes boring. The predictable becomes suspicious. But the storm? The storm feels familiar. It feels like home. So when you miss the toxicity, you aren’t missing the pain itself. You are missing the only language of love you ever knew how to speak.

This brings us to one of the most difficult transitions in healing: learning to trust peace. If your early years were loud, chaotic, and unpredictable, as they were for me in my own childhood, then quiet can feel threatening. Silence isn’t peaceful; it’s empty. It’s the pause before the explosion. So, when you enter a healthy relationship, one where the partner is consistent, kind, and emotionally available, your body doesn’t relax. It panics.

Your nervous system scans for the threat. It waits for the other shoe to drop. It interprets the lack of drama as a lack of passion. You might find yourself unconsciously sabotaging good moments because they feel too good to be true. Or worse, you might find yourself comparing the gentle hand of a new partner to the sharp grip of an old one, and finding the gentle hand wanting. This isn’t because you prefer cruelty. It’s because you are grieving the loss of the high-stakes emotional rollercoaster that defined your understanding of connection.

It’s okay to outgrow people, but it’s much harder to outgrow the physiological state they created in you. For months, perhaps years, your cortisol levels were spiked by conflict. Your dopamine was released in bursts during make-up phases. You were chemically addicted to the cycle of rupture and repair. When that stops, the withdrawal is real. It feels like boredom. It feels like emptiness. But it’s actually your system recalibrating. It’s learning that safety doesn’t require you to be on guard. It’s learning that you can breathe without holding your breath. This phase is messy. It’s uncomfortable. And it is absolutely necessary.

Another layer of this shame comes from projection. In toxic dynamics, we often project our own unmet needs onto the other person. We believe that if we can just fix them, if we can just understand them better, if we can just love them enough, they will finally give us what we’ve always wanted. And when we succeed in getting that fleeting moment of validation, we feel powerful. We feel chosen. We feel like we’ve conquered the impossible.

So when you look back, you don’t just miss the person. You miss the version of yourself that was capable of loving so fiercely. You miss the hope. You miss the belief that you could change someone’s heart. Letting go of that relationship feels like letting go of your own potential. It feels like admitting defeat. But it’s not defeat. It’s clarity.

Your feelings are data, not directives. Just because you felt a spark of joy in the midst of pain doesn’t mean the pain was justified. It means you are a human being capable of finding light in dark places. That is a strength, not a flaw. But it’s a strength that was misapplied. Now, you get to redirect that fierce capacity for love toward yourself. Toward relationships that don’t require you to shrink or perform. Toward connections that don’t demand you carry the weight of someone else’s unresolved trauma.

This realization is painful because it strips away the narrative we built to protect ourselves. We told ourselves stories about why it worked, why it mattered, why it was special. Stripping those away leaves us raw. But it also leaves us free. Free to see the relationship for what it was: a lesson, not a life sentence. A chapter, not the whole book.

One of the most profound shifts happens when we stop mourning the actual person and start mourning the fantasy. The real you didn’t miss the insults, the gaslighting, the walking on eggshells. The real you misses the idea that you would be loved completely. You miss the promise that this time, it would be different. You miss the hope that you would finally be enough.

That grief is valid. It is deep. And it is lonely. Because no one else sees the fantasy you’re grieving. They only see the reality you endured. They might say, ‘But he was terrible for you!’ and you nod, but inside, you’re crying for the boy who promised to stay, the girl who swore she’d never leave, the versions of them that existed in your head during the good days.

You have to grieve that. You have to honor that part of you that believed in the magic. It wasn’t stupid. It was hopeful. And hope is a beautiful, fragile thing. Don’t beat yourself up for having it. Instead, thank it. Thank it for keeping you going when things were hard. And then, gently, let it rest. Tell it that you’re taking over now. That you’re the one who gets to decide what love looks like. That you’re the one who gets to set the pace.

This process takes time. There will be days when the fantasy feels more real than the present. Days when you reach for your phone to text them, not because you want their toxicity, but because you want their attention. That’s okay. Notice it. Feel the urge. Then put the phone down. Sit with the discomfort. Let it wash over you like a wave. You are building new neural pathways. You are teaching your heart that you can survive without the crisis. That you can exist in the stillness.

As you move forward, you’ll start to notice subtle shifts. The boredom of calm will begin to feel like rest. The predictability will start to feel like security. You’ll catch yourself enjoying a quiet dinner without scanning the room for tension. You’ll laugh at a joke without analyzing the subtext. These moments are revolutionary. They are small acts of rebellion against the conditioning that told you love must be hard.

You are reclaiming your narrative. You are rewriting the story from ‘I was trapped’ to ‘I am free.’ From ‘I was unlucky’ to ‘I am learning.’ This isn’t about blaming the past or vilifying the people who hurt you. It’s about taking ownership of your future. It’s about deciding that you deserve a love that doesn’t cost you your peace.

It’s okay to have setbacks. It’s okay to miss them. It’s okay to feel confused. Healing isn’t linear. It’s a spiral. You might circle back to the same questions, the same doubts, the same longings. But each time you do, you’re higher up. You see more. You understand more. You are stronger.

Be patient with yourself. Be tender with your heart. You are doing the hardest work there is: learning to love yourself in a world that taught you otherwise. And you are doing it beautifully, messily, imperfectly. That is enough. That is always enough.

Thank you for trusting me with your heart today. I’m Tia Monroe, and I’ll be right here whenever you need a reminder that you are worthy of gentle, steady love. A gentle reminder: this show is for reflection and support, not a substitute for professional care. If you're struggling, please reach out to a qualified mental-health professional.