The Year My Heart Went Numb

Confessions of a Late Bloomer Part 7

There was a time when I couldn’t feel anything.

I don’t mean numb like bored or apathetic.
I mean a kind of emotional frostbite, a dull ache in place of what used to be light.
A blank space where joy, excitement, even sadness used to live.

I went through the motions.
Smiled when I was supposed to.
Answered “I’m good!” when people asked how I was doing.
But inside, I felt… disconnected.

I think this is the part of heartbreak no one talks about.
Not the crying on the bathroom floor.
Not the dramatic playlist phase.
Not even the anger.

But the stillness that comes after.
When your heart, so bruised from trying, quietly decides not to feel anything at all for a while.

There’s a reason it went quiet.

When my marriage ended so suddenly,
so unexpectedly,
I hate the cliché, but it tore the rug right out from under me.

I was young.
Still standing at the beginning of what I thought was a long story.
Still plotting a life I hadn’t even considered an ending.

And when that beginning shattered,
I scrambled to rebuild something that looked like love.
To prove that I was still lovable.
Still wanted.
Still enough.

So I opened my heart again. And again.
I mistook connection for safety.
I mistook attention for care.
I mistook survival for healing.

Each time I opened my heart, thinking this time I was ready,
I was met with dishonesty, betrayal, or arms too broken to hold me.

Some of the men I loved lied.
Some cheated.
Some ran because they weren’t ready.
Some said all the sweet words you want to believe, even when the truth was something harder underneath.

And for a while, I thought that was love.
That love was something you had to earn by hurting.
By staying.
By changing.

It took me a long time to see that I was the common denominator.
Not because I deserved the pain,
but because I was still choosing from the part of me that was hurting.

The part that believed hurt was normal.
The part that thought if I just loved harder, it would finally be enough.

So my heart did what hearts do when they’re trying to survive.
It went into hibernation.
Not because it gave up on love.
But because it needed time.
Time to heal all the parts of me that thought love had to hurt to be real.

I didn’t realize I was grieving.
Not just the loss of a person,
but the loss of a version of me I thought was whole, ready, capable of love.

Turns out, she was still figuring it out.

It was the year I couldn’t write poetry.
Couldn’t listen to certain songs.
Couldn’t imagine wanting someone new.

But that was also the year I learned how to tend to my own heart,
not as a means to fix it, but to hold it.
To let it rest.
To let it heal at its own speed.

Being a late bloomer in love means the lessons come slower, but deeper.
And when the thaw finally comes, it’s not a tidal wave.
It’s the gentle return of feeling:
A sunset that moves you.
A song you hum again.
A heartbeat you can hear without fear.

If your heart has gone quiet, it doesn’t mean it’s broken.
It means it’s resting.
It means it still believes in feeling, just not on demand.

And eventually, when the time is right,
your heart will remember.

It will remember that you are love.
And when you remember this quiet truth,
you will be able to let love in,
not all at once, but crack by crack,
tiny openings made wider by gentleness,
until one day you realize you’re standing in a life that feels like breathing.

Always,
Your Trusted Friend ❤️