Avoiding Loneliness and Accidentally Deepening It #traumainformed #innerchildhealing #loneliness

When loneliness feels unbearable, the nervous system doesn’t sit still and reflect. It adapts. Most people don’t ignore loneliness — they work around it. They find ways to dull it. Manage it. Distract from it. Momentarily escape it. Not because they’re dishonest — but because the ache feels too threatening to face directly. From a trauma-informed lens, this makes sense. When connection once came with disappointment, rejection, or emotional cost, the body learns not to stay with the feeling — but to move away from it. So loneliness gets managed through: – constant busyness – productivity – over-socialising without depth – scrolling – numbing – self-sufficiency – emotional detachment These strategies don’t remove loneliness — they contain it. They keep it quiet. Functional. Survivable. But over time, they also reduce the chances of being met. Because when loneliness is avoided rather than acknowledged, connection becomes something to perform — not something to receive. So the very strategies that protect against pain can slowly deepen the isolation underneath. This isn’t self-sabotage. It’s a nervous system doing what it learned to do: stay regulated at all costs. Healing doesn’t begin by stripping these strategies away — it begins by understanding why they were needed in the first place. This is part of my Loneliness & the Nervous System series. 🕊️ 🕊️ Subscribe for trauma-informed healing, inner child work, and nervous system recalibration. 💌 Join Stories with Stella — weekly reflections: https://blue-kiwi-89948.myflodesk.com... 🤝 Book a free Discovery Call: https://calendly.com/stelladove/stell...