The other day during a therapy session, I said suddenly, “Healing is hard.”

“It is,” my therapist, J, replied. “It can be scary to leave what we know.”

J asked me if I could elaborate on the parts of the healing journey I was finding more difficult. I wanted to say, “Everything,” but in that moment I was feeling a particular strain, the one that comes from the loss of relationships that no longer fit you.

I’m lucky to have many friends located all over the country. I’ve spent years feeling confident in the web of my supporters. They have gotten me through many hard times, especially during the years I was struggling the most. But now, having overcome a lot of bad habits and some pretty dark moments, I have started noticing a change in my connection with many of them.

“My relationships feel different,” I finally managed.

He asked me to further elaborate. Had something specific happened? He knew about some of the changes — I recently asked to take a break from a friend because she wasn’t respecting my boundaries. Another friend and I parted because I didn’t want to deal with her drug use.

“I guess I feel a bit worried,” I told him. “I’m afraid of losing everyone.”

He said he understood, but there was no need to be scared.

I’ve spent most of my life trying to get people to like me. In middle school, I was voted everybody’s buddy, a title I desperately wanted (I got sweaty while they were counting the votes). I hung out with everyone from all types of groups. In high school, I joined intramural sports teams and developed a large group of older friends from a neighboring school.

The same went for undergrad. Grad school was a bit harder to get settled, but when I was in, I was in. After graduation, I was fortunate to move around a bit and take part in lots of different writing programs. I always prided myself on being able to make friends. It made me feel good to be “likeable.” I tried not to shake the boat too much, even if that meant sometimes tolerating things I didn’t like.

After coming out, I moved to the Keys. I didn’t have any friends my age, and most of the people I was close with were through work, which created some power imbalances. When I first met a friend of my boss’s she kept pinching the back of my arms. Jokingly! She claimed. We had both spent time in New Jersey. She was just trying to see if I was tough.

I let her pinch. The next morning, my arm was black and blue.

“Everything feels different,” I told my therapist during another session. “I don’t even feel like the same person anymore.”

I told him how I no longer have romantic feelings for a woman I used to be madly in love with. It’s because I’m starting to realize that the issues I have with her are not going to change, because she isn’t interested in growing.

We are so similar: she is flakey and has poor boundaries. She tries so hard to be liked. She can’t stand criticism and hates feeling like people are mad at her. Sometimes she breaks her own moral compass to ensure everyone is happy with her.

Seeing these similar traits in her ended up becoming a catalyst for my own growth. I still have appreciation for her, but the tie between us is gone now. I am having to adjust to living in a world where I don’t feel like I have a “person” anymore. It’s hard. So much harder than I thought.

“I’m here for myself and I always will be,” I told J. “I know that.”

“But you miss her?”

“I miss her a lot more than I want to,” I replied.

If I had been more secure in the Keys, I would’ve never let some person pinch me black and blue. I would’ve put down my drink, moved out of her grasp, and told her I was uncomfortable with the way she was touching me. Instead, I soldiered, eager to prove I could take it.

For what? To be liked? To feel accepted?

I stayed in a marriage with a man for five years, even though I cried every time we had sex. I was so focused on being the person I thought people would like — a pretty, straight girl with a nice, successful husband. I focused so much on others that I lost myself in the process.

When we lose one thing, we are making room for something greater to arrive.

In the last two years, I’ve lost probably a half a dozen friends. Two were from childhood. I stopped contacting my mother. Then, for the first time in my life, I rejected a vacation invitation from her cousin because that side of my family is deeply homophobic. I don’t feel like dealing with their mean comments and snide remarks anymore.

Each time I’ve lost someone there is that familiar feeling of pain and panic. I worry that I might lose everyone. But, too, there is also a sense of relief. My life has become more peaceful. I notice now how my body reacts to new people in my life. I notice how much less drained I feel. My love and respect for the friends who do connect with me is so much deeper now.

I expected my healing journey to lie on a line. I could move forward or backwards. But like everything else, I’ve found it to be more of a circle. There are times when I look around and am so happy, I barely know what to do with myself. Then, there are times where I feel like I’m on a journey that is so solitary, I don’t know who I’ll be or who will be left around me when I’m done.

A few weeks ago, I spent the morning with a friend. I walked downtown to a bagel shop and sat outside eating and playing with a customer’s Yorkie pup. It was hot outside but cloudy, making it bearable. A breeze snuck through the trees. My friend had gone to the wrong bagel shop and there was a line out the door, but I wasn’t in a rush. It was nice out. There was a puppy to distract me. Everything was good in this very moment.

I am proud of myself for this growth. But while things are better than ever now, I did not expect to heal just to realize that some of my friends cannot come with me on my journey. It’s lonely work, at times. It’s hard to realize how often I’ve chosen people who treated me poorly or who enjoyed being with me during my struggles because it made them feel better about themselves.

“That’s normal,” J told me. “When we feel poorly about ourselves, we choose others who reflect that back to us.”

He is right, as usual.

But still, in all my happiness, there are some nights that I go to sleep wondering who would be there for me if I had a medical emergency. Who would I call if my plane was crashing? Who would I want to spend the last moments of my life with? I wasn’t prepared for this kind of fullness and happiness to be met with this deep sense of loss.