What It Means to Truly Heal

For a long time, I thought healing meant forgetting. I believed that if I could stop thinking about the painful moments, move past the losses, and become happy again, I would finally be healed. But my journey taught me that true healing is much more complicated—and much more beautiful. Healing doesn’t mean pretending the pain never happened. It doesn’t mean forgetting the people you lost or the dreams that changed. It means learning how to carry your past without allowing it to control your future. It means becoming strong enough to face your emotions, care for yourself, and believe that life can still hold meaning after heartbreak. My understanding of healing began with my journey through infertility. In 2015, I was diagnosed with infertility. Hearing that conceiving naturally would likely never happen was devastating. Becoming a mother had always been one of my greatest dreams. I imagined raising children, celebrating birthdays, creating family traditions, and experiencing all the ordinary moments that make motherhood special. Suddenly, that future felt uncertain. I was heartbroken, but I wasn’t ready to give up. I decided to pursue IVF because I still believed there was hope. I entered fertility treatment with determination, believing that if I continued trying, eventually I would become a mother. What followed was a seven-year journey filled with fertility clinics, blood tests, hormone injections, medications, surgeries, ultrasounds, appointments, waiting, and uncertainty. Every treatment cycle brought hope, while every setback brought another emotional wound. Over time, infertility affected much more than my plans for motherhood. It changed my confidence, my relationship with my body, and the way I imagined my future. I began questioning myself and wondering why something that seemed so natural for other people had become such a difficult journey for me. But I kept going. Then, in 2017, I lost my mother to heart disease. My mother was one of my greatest sources of love and support. Losing her while I was already struggling with infertility made the pain even heavier. I wanted her beside me during fertility appointments. I wanted to call her after disappointing news. I wanted her reassurance when I felt like I couldn’t continue. Her absence left a space in my life that could never be filled. Still, I continued my fertility journey. Then, in 2019, after years of IVF treatments and countless prayers, I finally became pregnant. I was told I was expecting a baby girl. After so much disappointment, I finally allowed myself to dream again. I imagined holding my daughter, watching her grow, celebrating birthdays together, and telling her about the grandmother she would never have the opportunity to meet. For the first time in years, I felt like the future I had been fighting for was finally becoming real. Then came the ultrasound appointment that changed everything. There was no heartbeat. Losing my baby became one of the deepest heartbreaks of my life. I wasn’t only grieving a pregnancy. I was grieving a future I had already started imagining. I was grieving the memories that would never happen and the life I had spent years trying to create. After the loss, I didn’t know how to heal. I continued IVF treatments because I wasn’t ready to let go of my dream. I kept looking toward another treatment, another possibility, another chance. Focusing on what might happen next felt easier than sitting with everything I had already lost. But eventually, the pain began affecting my physical health. Years of stress, hormone medications, grief, and emotional eating contributed to my weight reaching 195 pounds. My confidence disappeared. I looked in the mirror and barely recognized myself. I was carrying years of emotional pain inside a body that was also struggling. Then I experienced a severe allergic reaction to one of my hormone medications and ended up in the emergency room. That moment forced me to stop and reflect on my life. For the first time, I truly asked myself what I was doing to my own life. I realized that I had spent years fighting for a future while neglecting the person living in the present. I had been so focused on becoming a mother that I had forgotten to take care of myself. That realization changed everything. On November 27, 2022, I decided to choose myself. I knew I couldn’t change infertility. I couldn’t bring my mother back. I couldn’t undo the loss of my baby. But I could decide how I would live from that point forward. I could choose health. I could choose self-care. I could choose healing. My recovery began with small steps. I started working with a registered dietitian and completed a medically supervised detox program. I began learning how to make healthier choices and rebuild my relationship with food. I started understanding that taking care of my body wasn’t about punishment. It was about respect. Instead of using food to escape difficult emotions, I learned to nourish myself with greater awareness and compassion. Then, in January 2023, I joined a gym and started working with a personal trainer. At first, fitness was simply about improving my physical health. But I quickly discovered that exercise was helping me emotionally too. Every workout gave me a sense of accomplishment. Every workout reminded me that I could still change. Every workout became a promise that I would not abandon myself again. I didn’t suddenly become healed. I still had difficult days. I still experienced grief. But I was beginning to understand that healing happens through small choices repeated over time. Then I discovered Aquabike classes. Fitness became more than exercise. I found a supportive community that encouraged me and celebrated progress. I began enjoying movement, connecting with people, and looking forward to something positive. That community became an important part of my healing. Eventually, I decided to become a certified Aquabike fitness instructor. Helping others become stronger and healthier gave me a new sense of purpose. My painful experiences had taught me empathy, and my recovery gave me a desire to encourage others. My physical transformation became another important part of my story. On November 27, 2022, I weighed 195 pounds. Three years later, on November 27, 2025, I weighed 125 pounds. Losing 70 pounds was an incredible accomplishment, but true healing wasn’t measured by the number on the scale. It was measured by how I felt inside. I trusted myself again. I respected my body again. I began believing in my ability to create change. I learned discipline and consistency. Most importantly, I learned that healing doesn’t mean becoming the person you were before the pain. It means becoming someone who understands what the pain taught you. Today, I still miss my mother. I will always carry love for the daughter I never had the opportunity to hold. Those losses are part of me, and I don’t need to pretend otherwise. For a long time, I thought healing meant leaving those memories behind. Now I know better. Healing means remembering without being destroyed by the memory. It means grieving without losing yourself. It means accepting what you cannot change while still believing that your future can be meaningful. It means allowing yourself to experience happiness without feeling guilty for moving forward. True healing is not linear. Some days are easier than others. Some memories still hurt. Some moments bring sadness unexpectedly. But that doesn’t mean you are going backward. Healing is learning that a difficult day doesn’t erase all the progress you’ve made. There were moments when I thought my losses had taken away my future. I believed that because my life wasn’t becoming what I had planned, I had somehow failed. Eventually, I realized that a changed dream is not the same as a failed life. My life doesn’t look like the life I imagined when my infertility journey began. But it is still a life filled with purpose. I found purpose through fitness. I found confidence through taking care of my health. I found connection through community. And I found strength through choosing myself. That is what true healing means to me. It means accepting that some things will always be part of your story without allowing them to write every future chapter. It means understanding that you can carry grief and still experience joy. You can remember loss and still create new memories. You can have a broken heart and still build a beautiful life. My journey taught me that healing isn’t about getting back to who I was. It is about becoming someone stronger, wiser, and more compassionate because of everything I’ve experienced. I cannot change my past. I cannot rewrite the years of infertility. I cannot bring my mother back. I cannot change the loss of my baby. But I can choose how I live today. Every day I choose to take care of myself, keep moving, help others, and appreciate the life I still have, I am healing a little more. True healing isn’t forgetting. It is acceptance. It is self-compassion. It is growth. It is learning to live again. And sometimes, the greatest sign that you are healing is not that the pain has disappeared. It’s that the pain no longer prevents you from believing in tomorrow.