I am married to the most incredible man. He is the epitome of strength, courage, and steadfastness. He takes care of us, ties up loose ends, and gets things done. (Definitely an Enneagram 1 if you’re familiar with that.)

But aside from all the normal husband‑type things…

He’s steady – the calm voice that grounds me when my emotions are loud and erupting everywhere.

He’s the quiet strength beside me when my world feels like it’s crumbling.

He’s the one who can read my silence in two seconds flat.

He’s the one who makes hard days feel a little less heavy.

He’s my safe space.

He has seen every side of me – the good, the bad, and the ugly – and he still chooses me. Why he still chooses me, I’ll never fully understand. I’m thankful every day that he does.

But when we were first married – actually, I’d probably say our first 15 years (mind you… we’ve been married for 16.5) – things got a little shaky.

Back in our younger years, we had a hard time understanding each other.

I am someone who has BIG emotions.

And naturally, BIG emotions and unprocessed childhood trauma don’t really work well together.

Then pair that with someone whose mindset was basically, “Yeah… that’s not great…” and that was it. No spiraling. No overthinking. Just a quick, logical resolve: “This isn’t working, so let’s try something different.”

Early in our marriage, I would have big feelings and try to talk to him about them. And his response would be something like, “Oh… that sucks. Just don’t feel that way.”

(Maybe not verbatim, but close enough.)

And of course, when he’d say that… my eye would twitch from the even bigger emotions building inside me. My big emotions would get even bigger – usually ending in tears. Not because I was hurt, but because of intense anger stacked on top of whatever I was already feeling. And I’m sure in his head it became a countdown to the explosion.

Because inevitably, it would happen. Whether it was the same day or the next week, I was silently keeping score.

Eventually, I started keeping my big emotions to myself.

And what do you think happened then?

I stewed.

Something else would happen – a tone, an argument, a moment that needed honesty but got swept under the rug – and in my mind, I was adding tally marks.

Brian and I have talked about these moments, and looking back, I can see now that he wasn’t trying to be dismissive. He was trying to help in the best way he knew how. This was his attempt to speak truth into my reality. But my perception of his reaction (or lack of reaction) brushed up against something much older – something tender- something I didn’t realize was still bleeding.

(Funny thing is… I didn’t actually realize this until we were in a marriage group recently.)

When I was a teenager trying to process the grief of losing my mom, moving to a new state, and navigating all the normal emotions of being a teenage girl, I didn’t have much guidance.

My dad would walk into my room and find me crying. I had so much going on that I couldn’t always verbalize what I was feeling. But somehow, he would turn my grieving process into an opportunity to make me feel bad for being sad. Sometimes he’d make it about him. He would cry. He would get angry. All because I was trying to process my grief.

I didn’t have others to talk to. He had cut off my access to people from my past – even my mother’s side of the family. So really, Dad was the only one I had.

I had friendships over the years, but they didn’t last long because I didn’t know how to be a friend. And when I did make friendships, he made sure I wasn’t sharing anything about my past.

So my default became hiding – because hiding felt safer.

Fast forward to my marriage: I didn’t know how to share things in a healthy way.

I didn’t know what healthy conflict resolution looked like.

So when I tried to communicate and what I got felt like dismissal or belittling…

I hid.

Hiding became my safe space.

Looking back now, I can see that the problem wasn’t just the clash between my husband’s steady logic and my big emotions. The real issue was that I was reacting from a wound that was still fresh – a wound I had never named, never processed, never allowed myself to feel.

Every time I felt dismissed, unheard, or “too much,” it brushed up against something much older. Something tender. Something buried so deep I didn’t realize it was still bleeding.

And that’s where unforgiveness hides…

in the places we’ve learned to survive instead of heal.

Which brings me to the next part of this journey.

Fresh Wounds Need Care, Not Pressure

When a wound is still fresh, everything feels bigger.

Not because we’re dramatic.

Not because we’re “too emotional.”

But because the pain hasn’t had time to settle.

When the hurt is new – or newly uncovered – your whole being reacts:

Your emotions are unprocessed.  

You haven’t had the space to make sense of what happened or how it shaped you.

The story isn’t settled.  

You’re still trying to understand the “why,” the “how,” and the “what now.”

Your body is still in protective mode.  

Your nervous system is bracing, scanning, remembering.

Your heart hasn’t had time to breathe.  

You’re still carrying the shock, the confusion, the ache.

And yet, in Christian circles, we often feel this unspoken pressure to “forgive quickly,” “move on,” or “be the bigger person.”

As if forgiveness is a race.

As if healing has a deadline.

As if God is standing over us with a stopwatch.

But that’s not the heart of God.

“The Lord is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit.”

Psalm 34:18

God draws near to the brokenhearted. He doesn’t demand from them.

He doesn’t rush their healing.

He doesn’t shame their process.

He sits with them in the ache.

Fresh wounds need gentleness.

Fresh wounds need space.

Fresh wounds need God’s nearness, not our performance.

Naming What Hurts: The First Step Toward Healing

Before forgiveness can happen, the wound has to be named.

Not minimized.

Not spiritualized.

Not brushed aside with “it wasn’t that bad” or “other people have it worse.”

Named.

Ask yourself:

What actually happened?  

Not the version you told yourself to survive – the real version.

What did it cost you emotionally?  

Did it steal your sense of safety? Your confidence? Your childhood? Your voice?

What did it change in your relationships, identity, or trust?  

Did it make you guarded? Hyper‑independent? Afraid of conflict? Afraid of being seen?

What part of you feels violated, dismissed, or unseen?  

The little girl inside you?

The teenager who needed comfort?

The woman who needed support?

Naming the wound is not weakness.

It’s not dishonoring.

It’s not bitterness.

It’s honesty – and honesty is the doorway to healing.

When we tell the truth about what hurt us, we finally give God access to the places we’ve been protecting.

The Myth: “If I Forgive Now, I’ll Heal Faster”

Somewhere along the way, many of us learned the myth that forgiveness is a shortcut – that if we forgive quickly, we’ll heal quickly.

But premature forgiveness doesn’t heal us.

It silences us.

It suppresses the wound.

It pushes the pain underground where it grows roots – and sometimes those roots turn into unhealthy coping mechanisms.

Sometimes it just feeds the bitterness and resentment already growing inside your heart.

And when the right pressure hits, all the feelings come flooding back.

So how do we forgive… truly forgive… when we’ve been hurt?

In my experience, it starts with a simple but genuine prayer:

“God, this is too big for me. I’m releasing it into Your hands, and I’m making the decision now not to pick it up again.”

Because here’s the thing… we can only control what we can control.

I read a book last year called The Cost of Control by Sharon Hodde Miller. It was such a good read – highly recommend if this is something you struggle with.

One thing that stuck with me is how small the realm of our actual control really is.

I can only control myself.

I can’t always control how I feel, but I can control how I respond to my feelings.

I can’t always control the thoughts that pop into my head, but I can control how long I let them sit and marinate.

I’m in control of my own actions and reactions… not anyone else’s.

When I look back now, I can see that the journey wasn’t really about fixing my emotions or changing my husband or pretending the past didn’t shape me. It was about finally letting God touch the places I had spent years trying to hide.

Healing didn’t start the moment I forgave.

Healing started the moment I told the truth.

The moment I stopped shaming myself for feeling deeply.

The moment I stopped expecting my husband to fill the gaps created long before he ever knew me.

The moment I let God sit with me in the places I had avoided for so long.

Forgiveness isn’t a shortcut.

It’s not a performance.

It’s not a spiritual badge.

Forgiveness is a process that begins with honesty, continues with surrender, and grows with time.

And maybe that’s the point:

God isn’t asking us to rush.

He’s asking us to trust.

To trust that He can handle the parts of our story we’ve been afraid to name.

To trust that He can heal what we’ve spent years trying to manage.

To trust that He can make something whole out of the places we thought were permanently fractured.

I’m still learning.

I’m still unlearning.

I’m still healing.

But I’m not hiding anymore.

And that alone feels like a miracle.

Because healing doesn’t begin when the pain disappears –  it begins when we decide we’re worth healing.