In the Awkward In-Between

There’s something strange that happens when the chaos goes quiet.

When you’ve cut off your mother. Walked away from draining relationships. Stepped out of dynamics that kept you over-giving, over-explaining, or over-compensating just to feel like you mattered.

And then you’re left with this… space.

You think it’ll feel peaceful. Maybe even free. But what creeps in instead is a kind of discomfort. The silence is loud. The stillness is suspicious. The nervous system, long trained to survive storms, starts whispering:

“Something’s wrong. Something’s missing.”

So you start searching — not for joy, but for fear.

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Lately, I’ve found myself watching videos I wouldn’t normally seek out. Radical commentary. Stories of grooming gangs. Economic collapse. The rise of inequality. Heavy, fear-inducing narratives. They masquerade as curiosity or education. But if I’m honest, sometimes it feels like I’m just trying to feel something. To make the stillness more familiar by injecting a bit of intensity. A hit of chaos.

Sometimes I wonder if I’m just uncomfortable feeling safe.

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I’ve also noticed this strange loyalty to a past version of myself. The one who always needed fixing. The one who used self-help as a mirror and a weapon. I’ve been watching loads of therapy content lately, telling myself it’s for my future career — and it is, partly — but there’s also something else beneath it:

A hunger to find another thing wrong with me. Another reason I feel alone. Another diagnosis, another identity, another layer of shame dressed up as insight.

But maybe there’s nothing wrong with me.

Maybe I’m not broken. Maybe I’m just adjusting to a new way of living. And that adjustment is fucking hard.

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It’s showing up in my choices, too.

I’ve been holding onto an extra car I don’t need, one that makes no rational sense to keep. Maybe it symbolises freedom, or an old identity. Maybe it gave me the illusion that something was still moving. That I could escape.

I’ve noticed how easy it would be to slide back into old patterns — like flirting with the massage woman. That attention felt good. Familiar. Exciting. But it was a pull toward something I know isn’t right for me anymore. A dynamic I’ve outgrown. A shortcut to intimacy that leaves me emptier every time.

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The truth is, I’m not self-sabotaging like I used to. My mistakes are smaller, more conscious. My spending has slowed. My choices are more grounded. And yet, this in-between phase — this detox from chaos — feels like a grief no one warned me about.

No one tells you that peace can feel like loss.

That when your body has lived in survival for so long, calm can feel like numbness, or like danger. That when you finally let go of those who drained you, part of you still aches for the noise — because at least the noise proved you were alive.

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So what do you do in the silence?

You listen to it.

Not to punish yourself. Not to dissect every feeling. But to just be with it. To let the hollow feeling speak. To trust that what’s rising isn’t a sign you’re failing — it’s a sign you’re healing.

Because when you don’t run to fill the void, something new emerges.

Maybe not right away. Maybe not loudly. But eventually, your true self begins to whisper. Not the version shaped by chaos or validation or survival — but the version that can actually live. And love. And rest.

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I’m learning to sit with that version.

He’s still unsure of himself. Still tempted to go backwards. But he’s watching. And waiting. And slowly — quietly — becoming someone new.

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