How I Learned to Love Myself After Being Broken

I used to believe that being broken made me unworthy — unworthy of love, of peace, of being understood. I wore my pain like an invisible scar, hiding behind laughter and busy days, afraid that if anyone looked too closely, they’d see the mess inside me.

I was good at pretending. Smiling in group photos, saying “I’m fine” even when my chest felt heavy, when nights were filled with questions I didn’t know how to answer. There were days I couldn’t get out of bed, and nights I begged the sky for something—anything—that would help me feel whole again. But wholeness always felt out of reach, like it belonged to people who hadn’t been through what I had.

People said things like “you’ll be okay” or “time heals everything,” but no one saw the way my mind worked against me when I was alone. I didn’t need pity. I needed someone to say, “Even in pieces, you are still enough.”

But I never heard that from anyone. So one day, I decided I would try to say it to myself.

It wasn’t a moment of sudden strength or clarity. It was just exhaustion — a deep, tired ache from carrying shame and self-blame for too long. I looked at myself in the mirror, eyes tired, voice shaking, and whispered, “You don’t have to be perfect to be worthy.”

At first, I didn’t believe it.

But I kept saying it — every day.

“I am allowed to be broken and still be lovable.”

“I am not a burden for feeling deeply.”

“My past does not make me unworthy of a future.”

Slowly, my words began to feel less like lies and more like lifelines.

I stopped hiding my pain in silence. I wrote it down in journals, cried without apologizing for it, and talked to people who listened without trying to fix me. I began to see beauty in the pieces — like how broken glass still catches light, how cracked things can still be strong.

There were days I still crumbled. I still doubted. But I stopped punishing myself for not being okay. I realized healing wasn’t a straight road — it was a messy, winding path with detours, pauses, and setbacks. And that was okay.

Because every time I chose to stay — in the pain, in the discomfort, in the reality of who I was — I was learning how to love myself. Not the version that looked okay on the outside. Not the perfect, unscarred dream of who I thought I should be. But the real me — broken, bruised, beautiful.

I stopped chasing people who made me feel small. I stopped explaining my emotions to those who only wanted the easy parts of me. I started setting boundaries, saying no, choosing rest, choosing myself.

And something magical happened.

In accepting my brokenness, I began to feel whole.

I learned that self-love doesn’t always look like bubble baths or affirmations — sometimes, it looks like holding yourself when you fall apart, choosing not to give up on yourself even when no one else seems to understand. It’s the quiet decision to keep going, to keep believing there’s something better on the other side of this pain.

Now, I look back and I see the girl who thought being broken made her unworthy — and I wish I could hug her. I wish I could tell her, “You are not your pain. You are the courage that keeps rising from it.”

I am still healing. Some days still ache. But I’ve learned that broken doesn’t mean hopeless.

It means human.

And I have never loved my humanity more than I do now.