Title: When Growth Triggers Old Urges
Tags: [healing, addiction, nervous system, intimacy, self-awareness]
Emotions: [“fear”, “hope”]
Layout: post
excerpt: “After a deep healing moment, an old comfort habit re-emerged—showing me that true integration takes time and curiosity.”

After a moment of deep insight and emotional release—one of those rare sessions where I felt truly seen—I noticed something surprising.

An urge.

A pull toward something I’ve used before as comfort. Something familiar.
For me, it was the urge to watch porn.

And not just out of habit. Not out of boredom.
But as a kind of unconscious balancer—like my system was trying to stabilize the unfamiliar intensity of being cared for, of being witnessed.

That part of me—the one that reaches for instant, controlled intimacy—didn’t disappear just because I’ve grown.
It showed up after the growth.

And that’s what struck me.

Sometimes, even when our deepest unmet needs are finally touched, our body doesn’t know what to do with it.
It’s too new. Too unfamiliar.
So we reach—almost reflexively—for what we’ve always known:
Something fast. Something numbing. Something that gives the illusion of closeness without the vulnerability.

In that moment, I didn’t act on the urge.
But I did notice it.
I messaged someone. I considered it.
But I paused. I reflected. I didn’t shame myself.

That pause—that ability to sit with the urge, to explore its message without obeying it—is where the healing lives.

Growth doesn’t always feel like peace.
Sometimes it feels like discomfort, because your system is trying to rewrite its response to connection.

And it’s okay if old urges resurface after big moments of healing.
It doesn’t mean you’ve regressed.
It means your body is integrating—recalibrating what safety feels like now.

I’m learning that the goal isn’t to erase all my impulses.
It’s to get curious about them.
To ask, “What are you trying to protect? What are you trying to soothe?”
And to offer something better—even if it’s just the choice to pause and notice.