Reflection 56: You Don’t Have to Earn Help

I have always been someone with a really big, open heart.

And I have noticed that people like that — people who love deeply, who feel deeply — tend to attract others who are hurting. People who are wounded. People who need someone to listen, to care, to just sit with them.

I have always said I am empathetic to a fault.

I feel things deeply. Sometimes too deeply. Someone can tell me a story, and I can almost feel it with them. Not exactly — I would never claim that — but I feel what I imagine their pain or their emotions must be like. And sometimes that feeling sits heavy on my chest.

It’s why I can’t binge certain TV shows. I get too attached. I feel it too much.

I remember watching Outlander and having to stop for a long time because something happened in the show and I was genuinely mourning… like I knew them. Like I lost something real. And I know that sounds dramatic, but it’s just how my heart works.

That’s not me trying to say, “Oh look how emotional I am.”
It’s just to show you the depth of how I feel things.

And because of that, I’ve had to learn boundaries. I’ve had to learn what I can and cannot carry.

But sometimes… things still find their way in.

Recently, someone in my life came to me and shared something very heavy. I won’t share names or details, but they told me that someone they had been with in the past had hurt them physically — to the point where the police were involved.

They had separated, and then later got back together. Things were okay for a while… until they weren’t.

Over spring break, it escalated again.

And this time, that person put their hands on them again.

I’m tearing up even writing this because it means so much to me that they trusted me enough to share it. But at the same time, it hurts knowing there is only so much I can do.

They had to call the police. The police came. But because nothing was actively happening in that exact moment, there was very little that could be done beyond a report.

And that broke my heart.

I have offered what I can. A place to stay. Support. Whatever I am able to give.

But something I have come to realize — not just from this situation, but from my own past — is that sometimes people don’t reach out for help… not because it isn’t available, but because they don’t feel like they deserve it.

There is this quiet belief that “someone else has it worse.”
That “my situation isn’t bad enough.”
That “I shouldn’t take resources from someone who needs it more.”

I used to think that way too.

And I remember my therapist asking me something that completely shifted my perspective.

She said, “Who decides what is bad enough?”

And I said, “Well… people who are physically hurt. They’re the ones who deserve the help.”

And she gently challenged that.

She asked me, “If someone walked up to you and told you your exact story — everything you’ve been through — could you look them in the face and tell them they don’t deserve help?”

And the answer was immediate.

No. I couldn’t.

Because the truth is, most of the time it’s not about whether the situation is “bad enough.”
It’s about whether we believe we are worthy of being helped.

And I just want to say this clearly, in case anyone reading this needs to hear it:

You are worthy of help.

No matter how big or small you think your situation is.
No matter if someone else “has it worse.”
No matter how you got there.

You are worthy of being safe.
You are worthy of being cared for.
You are worthy of being supported.

The Lord tells us that we are precious. That we are known. That we are loved.

And that does not come with conditions.

So if you are hurting… please do not convince yourself that you have to carry it alone.

You don’t.

And you were never meant to.