I recently re-shared this post from October 2025: https://buttondown.com/SelfCareBackpack/archive/discomfort-vs-safety/

On tiktok someone left a comment about building resilience, and then we wouldn't need to do this kind of fortune telling and worrying about the future, and while this is true, I wanted to talk more about what this transition looked like for me.

We think of resilience as the ability to withstand things, and that's true, but it's more about how healthily you can withstand things. It's not 'can you withstand things without anyone realising, or asking for help, or taking any moment to breathe'. It's withstanding something without it entirely destroying you long term.

It looks different for everyone, because what's a small thing for one person can be devastating for another, depending on their situation, history, etc. But overall, it's about being about to weather a storm. Sometimes that's as easy as looking out the window and commenting on the weather, sometimes you need to go out in it for work or groceries, so you need waterproof clothing, and to dry off when you get back.Sometimes it means taking shelter in a basement. Then there's the aftermath, which could be nothing, could be fixing a leak, could be dealing with the aftermath of flooding, or worse.

Back to my resilience journey.

I was incredibly resilient growing up, because I had to be. My feelings weren't welcome, and not helpful, so I shoved them away, and got stuff done. I kept moving throughout. I learned that hypervigilance was a way to stay safe and ready. I had to think things through to find possible outcomes and consequences, because my parents didn't and when things went wrong, they often looked to me to rescue them.

We can say that what I had wasn't really resilience, and I'd agree with you. In fact, that's why I have written about resilience, because I've moved from swallowing everything life has thrown at me without it affecting me, and moved to a place where I can still get stuff done, and cope, but I do it with self-compassion and a focus on recovery as well. If I'd been told back then that I wasn't resilient, I'd shut down. I'd never trust you with my feelings again, because it would feel like you discounting all the stuff I had survived. Surely that was resilience?

I prefer to re-frame and talk about what that resilience costs us.

I learned that staying anxious was how I was resilient. I grew comfortable being anxious. If I wasn't anxious, I assumed I'd forgotten something I should be worrying about, because not being anxious growing up had felt like a trap. If I was anxious, when something bad happened I was already in that high adrenaline/cortisol state, so it felt easier to cope. If I wasn't anxious, I was blindsided, and that move into a stressed state felt awful. I was also expected to jump into action immediately, so being blindsided was actively discouraged. I didn't have space to be unprepared, so I tried to always be prepared. I also didn't have space to decompress after something, so I remained in a hypervigilant state, because I couldn't let those feelings wash over me.

It took me a while to realise that it wasn't just the people around me that I didn't trust, it was myself. I was convinced the only way for me to be resilient was for me to be anxious, and if I wasn't then I wouldn't be resilient. If something happened, I pulled that resilience from the anxious part of me, which stepped forward and took over.

That part of me is resilient, but because I never allowed myself to have feelings, or to recover, I was replaying the patterns of my parents, dismissing my feelings, and building internal resentment.

It's only in showing that anxious part of me love and support, and building patterns or recovery, asking for help, and soothing in a healthy way that I started to break down that resentment and build trust.

It's a work in progress, one that requires regular maintenance. When I'm busy, I can feel that anxiety growing, because it's a pattern. So I slow down and check in. What's happening here? What memories or patterns are coming up for me in this moment? Do I need to take a moment to breathe, or make a cup of tea, or something else to break the pattern a bit?

My anxiety gets spiky, I show it love, because it's trying to protect me, and I love that, even if I'd prefer that it not do it in this way.