This Is What Healing Actually Looks Like Part 2

What Regulation Actually Feels Like

One of the hardest parts about this?

You often don’t realize you’re dysregulated… until you’re not anymore.

It’s the contrast that shows you.

For me, regulation feels like a shift.

Like a weight comes off my shoulders.

My breathing deepens without me trying.
I can sink into the chair instead of holding myself up.
My eyes soften—I’m not straining to take everything in.

There’s a sense of openness.
Spaciousness.

Almost like being in a quiet, sunlit room.

My body relaxes.
It softens.

There’s no urgency.
No underlying guilt pushing me forward.

Just enough steadiness to be present.

Dysregulation feels different.

Heavier.

It’s harder to take a deep breath.
There’s a low-level anxiety humming in the background—even if I’m not panicking.

My body tells the story before my thoughts do:

• My shoulders hunch inward

• My jaw clenches

• I feel tension in my neck, sometimes headaches

• My posture loses confidence

• I feel sluggish, tired, weighed down

There’s a kind of internal pressure.

Not always loud—but constant.

And cognitively, things follow:

• It’s harder to focus

• I feel more scattered

• I can’t organize my thoughts as clearly

But I’ve learned something over time:

If I can catch it in my body first,
I don’t have to wait for everything else to unravel.

This awareness doesn’t happen overnight.

It’s practice.

It’s noticing after the fact…
then a little sooner next time…
then a little sooner than that.

A lot of “missing it” before you start catching it.

But even realizing it after is progress.

That awareness is what moves you closer to change.

Over time, you start to intervene earlier.

You take space.
You breathe.
You journal.
You set a boundary.
You recognize: I’ve taken on too much or I didn’t get enough rest.

You adjust before it becomes a full spiral.

Before everything snowballs.

This is what healing actually looks like.

Not perfection.

But earlier awareness.

Earlier response.

Maybe it looks like:

• Saying something hurt your feelings the first or second time… instead of the tenth

• Taking a break before burnout instead of after

• Listening to your body instead of pushing through it

And here’s the part that often gets misunderstood:

Sometimes, when you start healing, it can feel like you’re getting worse.

“Why am I dysregulated all the time now?”

But you’re not.

You’re just noticing it.

Before, you may have been chronically dysregulated—it just felt normal.

Now, you’re learning to move in and out of it.

And that ability to shift?

That’s regulation.

We are not meant to be regulated all the time.

If we were, we wouldn’t survive real danger.

Your nervous system is designed to activate when needed—and then settle again.

That movement is healthy.

Even triggers aren’t the enemy.

They’re information.

They’re opportunities to notice:
Something in me doesn’t feel safe right now.

And then respond with care instead of shame.

Because the goal isn’t to never be dysregulated.

The goal is to recognize it, understand it, and know how to come back.

Till next time, 

Eva