The community that was built for me. The grace that comes with faith brings a village that leads to insight and healing.
Those words tumbled out of me this week during a moment of reflection, and I realized they carried the weight of a lifetime's worth of learning. But getting to this place of gratitude for community hasn't been a straight path. In fact, for most of my life, I believed I was destined to walk alone.
The Lonely Child
Growing up, I was that kid who never quite fit in. Between undiagnosed ADHD and what I now understand as implicit trauma, I felt like I was watching social interactions through thick glass—able to see what was happening, but never quite able to participate authentically. While other children seemed to instinctively understand the unspoken rules of friendship and belonging, I was constantly trying to decode a language I didn't speak.
The playground felt like a foreign country where everyone had a passport except me. I'd watch groups of kids laugh together and wonder what secret knowledge they possessed that I lacked. This wasn't just shyness—it was a profound disconnection from the social fabric that seemed to bind everyone else together.
What I didn't understand then was that my nervous system was already learning to protect itself in ways that would shape my relationships for decades to come.
The Hidden Ways Trauma Isolates Us
Years later, through therapy and self-discovery, I began to understand how implicit trauma—those subtle, often unrecognized wounds—creates patterns that keep us isolated even when we desperately want connection. Here are four shocking ways trauma makes us feel alone, even in a room full of people:
1. We Perform Instead of Connect
When we don't feel safe being ourselves, we create elaborate performances of who we think we should be. We become chameleons, shifting and changing to match what we think others want to see. But performing is exhausting, and it keeps people from knowing the real us. We end up feeling lonely even when we're surrounded by people who think they know us.
2. We Reject Before We Can Be Rejected
Our nervous system learns to scan for danger, including the danger of rejection. So we push people away before they can leave us. We pick fights, create drama, or simply withdraw when relationships get too close. It's a twisted form of self-protection that guarantees the very outcome we fear most.
3. We Hypervigilance Our Way Out of Presence
When your nervous system is constantly scanning for threats, you can't fully show up in relationships. You're there physically, but mentally you're three steps ahead, analyzing every facial expression, cataloging every tone of voice, preparing for the moment things go wrong. This leaves little room for the spontaneous joy and vulnerability that real connection requires.
4. We Mistake Intensity for Intimacy
Trauma survivors often confuse drama with depth. We create intense, chaotic relationships that feel meaningful because they're familiar. But intensity isn't the same as intimacy. Real connection happens in quiet moments, in consistency, in the mundane beauty of being known and accepted.
The Resistance to My Own Story
This week, as I prepared to share about community and connection, I found myself wrestling with an unexpected resistance. Writing about my journey felt dangerous, like I might jinx the beautiful support system I've built. There was a superstitious part of me that whispered, "Don't celebrate it too loudly, or it might disappear."
I also found myself wanting to skip over the painful parts of my story—the years of social anxiety, the friendships that ended badly, the times I isolated myself out of fear. It's easier to share the victory without the struggle, the transformation without the mess that came before.
But in avoiding those difficult memories, I realized I was also avoiding taking responsibility for my part in past relationship failures. It's humbling to acknowledge that my trauma responses hurt others, that my inability to trust or be vulnerable contributed to the very isolation I complained about.
Finding Beauty in the Chaos
Yet as I shared last week, there is so much beauty in the chaos. Growth isn't linear, and healing doesn't happen in isolation. Sometimes the most profound transformation comes not from grand gestures, but from showing up imperfectly and allowing ourselves to be seen.
This truth became crystal clear recently when life threw us an unexpected test.
When Community Shows Up
My husband was doing home repairs—because that's what husbands do, apparently, climb on things and fix things and occasionally break things in the process. This time, what broke was his ankle. Completely shattered, surgery required, months of recovery ahead.
In the past, this kind of situation would have sent me into a tailspin of anxiety. As someone with avoidant attachment, accepting help has always felt like admitting failure. I used to believe that needing support was a sign of weakness, that truly strong people handled everything alone.
But something different happened this time. Instead of retreating into isolation, I found myself surrounded by a community I didn't even realize I had built. Friends showed up without being asked. Meals appeared on our doorstep. Offers of help poured in from people who had somehow become family without me noticing.
Our neighbor immediately offered to help with our dogs. A friend from church organized a meal train. Another friend insisted on driving him to appointments when I was too overwhelmed to think straight. People we've only known for a few years stepped up like we'd been family for decades.
The Trust That Changes Everything
What struck me most wasn't just their generosity—it was my ability to receive it. The trust I've built through my own growth journey allowed me to embrace this support instead of pushing it away. I could feel my nervous system settling into acceptance rather than hypervigilance.
This is what community actually looks like: not perfect people who never need help, but imperfect people who show up for each other anyway. It's messy and vulnerable and sometimes inconvenient, but it's also profoundly healing.
Watching my husband navigate his recovery with grace and humor, surrounded by people who genuinely care about our family, I realized that the community I'd always longed for hadn't been built in spite of our struggles—it had been built through them.
The Village That Chose Me
I used to think I was broken because connection felt so hard. I believed that some people were just naturally good at relationships while others, like me, were destined to figure it out alone. But what I've learned is that my sensitivity, my heightened awareness, my deep capacity for empathy—all the things that felt like curses in childhood—these are actually gifts that help me show up for others in meaningful ways.
The community that was built for me isn't perfect. It's not huge or Instagram-worthy or always available. But it's real. It's made up of people who have seen me at my worst and chosen to stay. People who understand that healing happens in relationship, not in isolation.
The grace that comes with faith—whether that's faith in God, in humanity, or simply in the possibility that we're not meant to do life alone—creates space for the kind of village that leads to insight and healing. Not because we're all fixed and whole, but because we're all still becoming.
And sometimes, when your husband shatters his ankle and your friends show up with casseroles and dog-walking schedules, you realize that the very thing you spent your childhood believing was impossible has somehow, quietly, become the foundation of your life.
The village I never knew I needed was there all along, waiting for me to trust enough to let them in.
What does community look like in your life? I'd love to hear your stories of unexpected support or moments when you realized you weren't as alone as you thought.
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