healing is isolating af

When the hardest breakup isn’t with a partner or a friend, but an outdated version of yourself.

Editor’s Note: Musical Musings is my original Substack series highlighting when music is less background noise and more revelation. Here’s to the subtle soundtracks that show up to quietly narrate the bigger stories of our lives.

Right now I’m sitting in my living room, staring at an empty Barbie-pink suitcase I should be packing. This weekend I’m driving to Dallas—my first real solo road trip. On paper, it’s nothing out of the ordinary. But for me, it feels like the biggest thing in the world.

In the midst of choosing myself by walking away from a connection that couldn’t hold me the way I needed, I planned an impromptu trip to re-center. A not-so-subtle reminder that I’m really that bitch. I’m calling back to the version of me that once found fullness in solo trips.

But I’m also stepping in front of someone I barely recognize: the woman who relinquished her fear of driving in her 30s and bought her first car that she loves. Now she finally trusts her discernment, knows she’ll be okay, and understands that she got us.

It’s a perplexing feeling to be both between and becoming.

Throughout my healing journey, I’ve felt myself returning to core pieces of who I am, while also meeting a self that feels foreign. And while that’s mostly beautiful, choosing myself can feel isolating because no one else can truly understand what this path looks or feels like. Not to mention the obvious tension of losing people, places, habits, beliefs, and parts of my identity that no longer fit the person I’m shaping myself to be.

There’s a stranger in my house. And unlike Tamia’s 2000 hit, I’m the stranger. I had half a mind to check into a padded room instead of a king suite, but I’ve come to accept that these disorienting feelings are part of the healing process, not psychosis. At least not today.

Real talk: why does something meant to connect us back to ourselves feel like social exile?

Self-Confrontation

Issa Rae was really onto something with mirror bitch in Insecure. Confrontation is step 1.5 of healing (immediately after recognizing the problem). It’s one thing to know that something needs to change but to be brutally honest with yourself and constantly remind you that you’re the one getting in the way of becoming you…the confrontation feels like self love tougher than a well-done steak at a cheap steakhouse.

Very much needed but also, bitch can you calm down a bit?

With healing, it’s just you—no closure conversations, no friend group debrief, no mirror bitch pep talk. Just silence with your own thoughts and the grief of realizing you can’t go back to who you used to be. You can’t accept what once felt “great” when you didn’t honor your own greatness.

The isolation may make you want to put your healing in reverse like Beyonce in the Me, Myself and I video but truth is going backwards only takes you back to the fucked up spot you started in. That’s not an option. At least not if you want to truly heal and not just pretend you have.

Default Settings vs. Authentic Self

When you see people doing the same toxic shit, getting the same dumb-ass results, it’s easy to judge them for repeating cycles of trauma and destruction that aren’t getting them anywhere. But truthfully, no matter how bad the repeated behavior is, it’s the familiarity-based comfort that makes it hard to shake.

You know McDonald’s isn’t quality food, but on a late night the comfort of knowing exactly what you’re gonna get has you pulling up to the window for a 6-piece nugget, medium fries, and an extra spicy Sprite. That’s your default settings—the autopilot version of you that is hardwired by unmet needs, trauma responses, and survival mode.

Your authentic self is different. She doesn’t order out of habit or fear. She chooses what nourishes her. She’s okay with self-discovery being a lifelong process if needed. She trusts herself enough to try something different, even if it’s uncomfortable at first.

Pour One Out for my Dead Personas

Healing always comes with grief. Not just for people or places, but for the outdated versions of yourself you once found comfort in. Even if she was fueled by survival mode, she was still yours. And letting her go feels like mourning a best friend you know you can’t bring back.

I touched on this in Dear Brother Shaquille Sunflower—the way healing can unravel you until you’re unrecognizable. Mourning yourself through the transition is just what comes with the emotional territory. I’ve had to learn that grieving my old self isn’t a betrayal, it’s proof I’m finally becoming someone I’ve always deserved to be.

Dear Brother Shaquille Sunflower

So…Does This Shit Get Easier?

I wish I could give you a definite answer. But what I can say is the isolation isn’t abnormal—it’s part of the process. Over time, the intensity lessens (less “gut punch,” more “background noise”). The isolation starts to feel like clarity that pushes you to the people, spaces and true peace you need.

Really, healing is a win no matter how you look at it. Because if the alternative is being the stagnant, unmet needs version of myself that never felt whole…heal me for $500, Alex.

I’ve learned a lot along the way. I know that I will never disappoint myself (again). I can see the sun shine. I got me, myself and I.

astoldbymika

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