The Love I Never Knew I Needed

“Have you had trauma in your life? Either as a child or later in your life?”
The doctor asked me gently after completing my exam.

She was the first physician—actually, the first human—who had ever asked me that question.

I looked down at my hands, fiddling with the scratchy paper gown covering my legs. 

“Um. Yes, I have.”

I briefly told her about some of what I’d lived through:
The abuse and eventual suicide of my ex-husband.
Birth trauma with several of my babies.
Painful family dynamics.
A high-control religion I had once been immersed in.

“I’m not surprised,” she said softly. “Do you see how your nervous system responded as you told me your story?”

Her voice was kind and affirming—no hint of condescension. No rushing me along—as so many physicians had done before.

My entire body was trembling. My breath was shallow. My voice didn’t even sound like my own.

“You still have a great deal of pain trapped in your body,” she continued. “And what I feel you need more than anything… is to give yourself a whole lot of compassion.”

If I could have cried, I would have.
But the wall inside me—the one that had been holding back this deep, unspoken longing to be seen—felt as big as the Hoover Dam.
It was like the tears had been waiting for this exact moment.

“Thank you,” I choked, nodding.
She took my hand and gave it a gentle squeeze before leaving the room.
As the door clicked shut behind her, the dam cracked—and the tears came.

I had never even considered extending compassion to myself.

That was something I gave freely to everyone else. But to me?

When my ex-husband took his life, I focused solely on supporting my children through their grief.
After each traumatic delivery, I pushed my body to recover as quickly as possible.
When I left religion, I threw myself into exploring new spiritual paths.

In the culture I was raised in, self-compassion as an expression of love wasn’t modeled.
I didn’t learn to hold reverence for my human experience.
I didn’t know I had permission to see this life—this wild, physical, emotional, mental labyrinth—as deeply hard. CRAZY hard.

Navigating life in a physical body, with a mind full of memories and longings, while trying to make sense of it all in a world of eight billion other souls—no one had ever told me that this, just being here, is worthy of compassion.

Instead of being normalized, I felt judged and “too much.”
I learned to criticize myself for any mistake, flaw, or difference.
I believed it was normal to live in constant fixing, denying, hiding, or escaping—just to survive the chaos inside.

But that day changed me.
Driving home from the appointment, I felt a soft curiosity arise.
What would it look like to love myself with compassion? Not the kind sold to me as “self-love”—bubble baths and spa days—but something deeper.

Something sacred.

Obviously, my body had been trying to get my attention. So I started there.

In the days that followed, I began to speak to my body as if she were her own being.
Curious.
Open.
Like meeting a stranger I was finally ready to know.

The first thing she introduced me to… was my breath.

She showed me how it revealed the state of my nervous system—and how I could respond to it.
Slow inhales and exhales when I felt anxious.
Active, energizing breaths when I needed a boost.

This simple act of breathing with awareness became more than a tool.
It became a prayer.
A silent “thank you, I love you” whispered to myself, to the divine, and to life itself.

These daily pauses began opening space inside me. Space where I could finally notice how unkind my inner world had become.

Self-compassion began teaching me that my humanity wasn’t something to fix—
But something to honor.

In a world obsessed with love outside of ourselves—romantic love, divine love—my body was asking me to bring that love inward.

To love myself by:

• Breathing slowly when I was scared
• Slowing down when I was in pain
• Resting when I was tired
• Eating when I was hungry
• Listening to my emotions
• Speaking kindly to myself
• Honoring every single thing I experienced

These weren’t the things I had ever associated with love.
But these were the things I had needed most to finally come home to myself.

Within weeks of that appointment, my symptoms began to ease.
I started sleeping through the night. Pain-free.

It turned out—my symptoms had been my teachers.
They came forward to speak for my body.
To show me what needed tending.
To teach me compassion—not just for my journey, but for every human journey.

And now…

As I live each day with more softness, kindness, and lightness toward myself—
I find this is the love I now have to offer others. 

No matter how hard, unkind, or heavy the world may seem…

Maybe this is how the Divine loves the world through me—
By beginning with compassion for me.

TAKE ACTION: If this story resonates, begin where Trish began — with your breath. Slow down. Place a hand on your heart. Offer yourself the compassion you’ve so freely given others. To explore embodied self-compassion and nervous system healing more deeply, connect with Trish Leichty.