Healing the Little Girl Inside the Grown Woman

There is a little girl inside every grown woman.

She remembers things the grown woman tries to forget.

She remembers what was said.

She remembers what wasn't said.

She remembers who showed up.

She remembers who didn't.

She remembers when she first felt rejected, overlooked, abandoned, afraid, not good enough, or like she had

to earn love.

And whether we realize it or not, sometimes that little girl grows up and starts making grown woman

decisions.

I know because I've had to meet the little girl inside of me.

The one who learned how to survive before she understood what survival was.

The one who didn't always have the words to explain what she was feeling.

The one who experienced things she couldn't process at the time.

The one who carried certain experiences into adulthood without realizing how much they had shaped her.

For years, I thought growing up meant you simply moved on.

You get older.

You become a mother.

You get married.

You build a career.

You start businesses.

You serve in ministry.

You take care of everybody else.

You become responsible.

You become productive.

You become the woman people depend on.

And because you're functioning, you assume you're healed.

But functioning and healing are not the same thing.

You can be successful and still be wounded.

You can be strong and still be hurting.

You can be a great mother and still be carrying pain from being a little girl.

You can love God and still have places in your heart that need His healing.

You can pray for everybody else and still have tears you haven't cried for yourself.

Sometimes we become so good at being the grown woman that nobody knows there is still a little girl inside

of us asking questions.

Why wasn't I enough?

Why did they leave?

Why didn't anybody protect me?

Why didn't they choose me?

Why didn't they tell me they were proud of me?

Why did I have to grow up so fast?

Why did I have to figure everything out on my own?

Why did that happen to me?

And sometimes we never answer those questions.

We just grow up around them.

But wounds don't disappear just because birthdays keep coming.

Unhealed pain grows up too.

And if we're not careful, the little girl who was rejected becomes the woman terrified of rejection.

The little girl who was abandoned becomes the woman who holds onto people she should release.

The little girl who never felt seen becomes the woman who constantly needs validation.

The little girl who had to keep everybody happy becomes the woman who struggles to say no.

The little girl who grew up in chaos can become the woman who mistakes dysfunction for normal.

The little girl who had to be strong becomes the woman who doesn't know how to receive help.

And sometimes we're blaming the grown woman for behaviors that started as protection for the little girl.

That doesn't mean we excuse unhealthy behavior.

It means we become curious about where it came from so God can heal it.

Psalm 147:3 says, “He healeth the broken in heart, and bindeth up their wounds.”

I love that Scripture because it tells me something important.

God doesn't shame us for having wounds.

He heals them.

But healing requires honesty.

There came a point when I had to stop asking only, “What's wrong with me?” and start asking, “What

happened to me, and what did I learn from it?”

What did that little girl learn about love?

What did she learn about trust?

What did she learn about herself?

What did she learn about relationships?

What did she decide she had to become in order to survive?

Because some of the things we call personality are actually protection.

“I don't need anybody.”

Protection.

“I don't trust people.”

Protection.

“I'll do it myself.”

Protection.

“I don't care what anybody thinks.”

Sometimes, protection.

“I have to be in control.”

Protection.

And maybe those things helped you survive a season.

But just like I had to recognize that the woman I used to be could not lead me where God was taking me, I

also had to recognize that some of the survival mechanisms I developed as a little girl could not lead the

grown woman I am becoming.

At some point, you have to tell that little girl:

Thank you for surviving. But you don't have to protect me anymore.

You're safe enough to heal now.

You're allowed to feel now.

You're allowed to cry now.

You're allowed to admit that it hurt.

You're allowed to acknowledge that something was missing.

You're allowed to grieve what you didn't receive.

And you're allowed to heal without dishonoring the people connected to your story.

That part is important.

Healing does not require hatred.

You don't have to hate your mother to acknowledge what you needed from her.

You don't have to hate your father to acknowledge what his absence did to you.

You don't have to condemn your family to recognize unhealthy patterns.

You don't have to expose everybody who hurt you in order to heal from what happened.

Sometimes healing simply means being honest with God, honest with yourself, and when necessary, honest with the people who are safe enough to help you process it.

Healing is not about assigning blame for the rest of your life.

Healing is about refusing to allow what happened to control the rest of your life.

Isaiah 61:1 says that God sent Him “to bind up the brokenhearted.”

That means there is no version of me that God is afraid to meet.

Not the accomplished woman.

Not the wife.

Not the mother.

Not the businesswoman.

Not the woman serving in ministry.

Not the woman everybody thinks is strong.

And not the little girl who still has some questions.

God wants all of her.

And I am learning to give Him all of me.

Healing the little girl inside of me means giving myself permission to acknowledge what hurt without

allowing hurt to become my identity.

It means forgiving where forgiveness is needed.

It means establishing boundaries where boundaries are necessary.

It means apologizing when my unhealed places have hurt other people.

It means recognizing triggers instead of allowing them to control my reactions.

It means learning healthier ways to communicate.

It means allowing people to love me without constantly expecting them to leave.

It means understanding that I don't have to earn what God has already declared I am worthy to receive.

And perhaps one of the hardest parts of healing is recognizing how our wounds affected people we love.

Especially our children.

Sometimes we parent from places we haven't healed.

Sometimes we overprotect because nobody protected us.

Sometimes we're too hard because somebody was too hard on us.

Sometimes we struggle to show affection because affection wasn't modeled for us.

Sometimes we expect our children to understand a version of us that we haven't even taken the time to

understand ourselves.

But healing gives us an opportunity to interrupt the cycle.

I cannot change what happened to the little girl I was.

But I can decide what happens through the grown woman I've become.

I can heal.

I can learn.

I can apologize.

I can forgive.

I can choose differently.

I can create healthier patterns.

And with God's help, I can make sure that pain doesn't keep traveling through generations simply because

nobody stopped long enough to confront it.

That's part of becoming too.

Becoming isn't only about discovering your purpose.

Sometimes becoming is going back and allowing God to heal the places you thought you had to leave

behind.

Because the little girl inside of you doesn't need you to be ashamed of her.

She needs you to understand her.

She needs you to give her the grace she didn't always receive.

She needs you to stop criticizing her for the ways she learned to survive.

She needs you to remind her that what happened wasn't the end of her story.

And most importantly, she needs to know that God never lost sight of her.

So today, I honor the little girl inside of me.

I honor what she survived.

I acknowledge what she needed.

I forgive her for the ways she tried to protect herself.

I give myself permission to grieve what hurt.

But I also give myself permission to heal.

Because I don't want to spend the rest of my life being controlled by something that happened in an earlier

chapter.

That little girl will always be part of my story.

I'll remember her when I encounter another woman who is struggling.

I'll remember her when I see a woman whose reactions don't seem to match the situation.

I'll remember her when a woman keeps choosing the wrong relationships.

I'll remember her when a woman says, “I'm fine,” but I can see the pain behind her strength.

And instead of immediately judging her, I'll remember that sometimes you're looking at a grown woman

while talking to a wounded little girl.

That's why grace matters.

That's why healing matters.

That's why becoming matters.

I am no longer asking the little girl inside of me to carry the grown woman I've become.

I'm allowing God to heal her so the woman I'm becoming can walk freely into everything He has for her.

I survived as the little girl, Mica.

I'm healing as the woman, Mica.

And I'm becoming who God created me to be.

By any means necessary.