What We Don't Wish On Others - and Still Need Them to Understand

As Anissa sat across from me for breakfast yesterday, there was a cloud around her. Not angry, not sad... but genuinely heavy.

We dove right into a conversation I thought we would get to later. Instead, it met us immediately... complicated, messy, and something our society so desperately needs to acknowledge before we can even begin to find solutions.

Earlier in the week, she had shared an essay. One written with honesty, vulnerability, and a willingness to speak to lived experience. The kind of writing that doesn’t just describe something, but comes from it.

She had asked for my feedback. And despite reading it multiple times and reflecting for days, I still hadn’t found the words to describe the complex feelings it stirred in me.

When she told me about the responses she received, I could see that something had shifted.

Not because people disagreed, but because many of the responses... particularly from men... were trying to be supportive, and still didn’t quite land.

That’s a difficult space to sit in.

Because these weren’t dismissive reactions. They were thoughtful. Engaged. Coming from a place of wanting to do better.

And yet, something was missing.

Throughout our breakfast, we talked about why.

I found myself reflecting on a moment in my own life.

Recently, my husband said something to me; something well-intentioned, something meant to show understanding. He was trying to meet me in an experience that has shaped who I am. A woman who has lived through trauma and is doing the long, often quiet work of finding strength within it; despite systems and patterns that made it easier to ignore than to heal.

And he got it wrong.

Not in a small way. In a way that felt disconnected from what I’ve lived through.

In that moment, I felt it immediately: defensiveness, frustration, the instinct to protect something that felt misunderstood. From across thee table I guessed that he immediately detected the thundercloud that crossed my face.

For a brief moment, he wasn’t my partner.

He was the person who didn’t get it.

And that mattered, because this is also the person who has given me more love, safety, and acceptance than I have ever known.

And still, there it was.

But instead of reacting, I paused. Not perfectly. Not without effort. But enough to see something more clearly.

I don’t want him to understand by having lived what I’ve lived.

I wouldn’t wish that on him. On anyone.

So then the question becomes:

What does understanding look like, if it can’t come from shared experience?

I think this is where we struggle.

Because when someone tries to relate... to mirror, to interpret, to explain... it can feel like something deeply complex is being simplified into something more comfortable, more familiar, and ultimately less true.

This is where the disconnection occurs.

Not because the effort isn’t appreciated, but because the experience doesn’t translate that way.

It’s like seeing the Mona Lisa in black and white.

What I’m beginning to understand is that what we need isn’t for others to fully understand.

It’s for them to respect that they can’t. To listen without trying to solve. To support without trying to reframe. To stay present without needing to bridge the gap too quickly.

Because the gap is real.

And acknowledging it, without trying to close it, is, in itself, a form of care.

Trauma changes you.

It shapes how you respond, how you trust, how you move through the world. And while we do the work to rebuild, to find ourselves again, that impact doesn’t disappear.

It lives alongside us.

So when we speak from that place... when we write, when we share... we’re not asking to be fixed.

We’re asking to be seen.

I think that’s what Anissa’s essay was doing.

And I think the responses it received are part of a larger conversation we’re still learning how to have.

How do we show up for experiences we haven’t lived?

How do we offer support without unintentionally minimizing what someone carries?

How do we allow people to remain fully themselves—especially when parts of who they are were shaped by things we can’t truly understand?

I don’t have perfect answers. Neither does Anissa. We are both finding our way through lived experience.

But I know this:

Some experiences are not meant to be shared in the sense of being replicated or fully understood.

They are meant to be witnessed with care.

Maybe that’s where real empathy begins.

And in that space, I’m also deeply aware of something else: that this kind of reflection, this kind of growth, doesn’t happen in isolation.

It’s work that so many are carrying... women, indigenous and culturally diverse communities, LGBTQ+ individuals, and others whose lived experiences have required them to navigate and hold complex truths.

It happens because there are people in our lives who are willing to stay. To listen. To try; even when they don’t fully understand.

I’m profoundly grateful for the partners and communities who create space for this exploration to exist in safety, acceptance, and care... allowing us to become more fully who we are, without needing to simplify the truth of what we’ve lived.

Image created using AI (ChatGTP-5.3 Plus model; reflecting grief and shows in a twilight sky).