You don’t always realize how much you’ve been holding until you finally stop moving.

The moment you sit still (even for a breath) you feel it. The tears you haven’t let fall. The ache that’s been sitting just under the surface. The exhaustion you’ve worked so hard to ignore. For many solo parents, survival becomes a rhythm of forward motion. There’s always something to do, someone to care for, some part of life that won’t pause just because you’re tired.

But what happens when the ache starts to outpace your ability to function? What do you do when the silence feels louder than the noise?

This is where many solo parents find themselves: longing for peace, but terrified of what stillness might bring.

We avoid discomfort with good reason. Stillness can feel like weakness. Or worse, like surrender. But what if the pain you’ve been trying not to feel is actually the doorway to healing?

Pain shows up when we finally stop running

It’s easier than we realize to outrun ourselves. Elizabeth Cole, a Single Parent, describes a time when she felt this way. “Especially early on after my divorce, I was doing everything I could to not feel it,” she said. “I listened to every podcast, read every book, joined every support group. I thought if I stayed busy enough, I could skip the pain part.”

It worked…for a while. Until one day, the emotions broke through.

“I couldn’t stop crying,” she admitted. “But it didn’t feel like I was falling apart. It felt like my body needed to release. So I let it.” For over a day, she gave herself space. No forcing, no fixing, just space.

What followed wasn’t collapse. It was clarity. “I didn’t feel stuck in my emotions. I felt free,” Elizabeth said.

Stillness may feel unfamiliar at first, but there’s a deep kind of stability that comes from letting your body express what it’s been carrying for too long.

You don’t have to fear your own heart

The emotions that rise when we slow down aren’t betrayals. They’re invitations.

Too often, we assume sadness means something’s gone wrong. That anxiety means we’re off track. That grief means we’ve failed to move on. But pain isn’t a malfunction, it’s information. And the only way to access it is to stop running from it.

Marissa Lee, an Author & Single Parent who lost her husband, describes it this way: “Stillness didn’t take away the pain. I feel pain all the time. But it took away my fear of pain. I stopped needing to run from it.”

There’s a quiet strength in staying with yourself when the feelings rise. In not trying to tidy them up or justify them. In allowing space for tears, confusion, and even anger, without believing any of it disqualifies you from healing.

The process doesn’t require perfection. It requires presence. And the more you practice being with yourself in the hard moments, the more you realize, you’re not breaking. You’re transforming.

Healing happens when we let things move through

The fear is often that if we sit still long enough, we’ll unravel. But what actually happens is the opposite. We unravel what isn’t serving us anymore, so we can come back together with more integrity.

Stillness gives your nervous system space to regulate. Your thoughts time to settle. Your spirit room to breathe.

Elizabeth describes how surprising moments of peace would surface in the middle of the pain. “On my walks, when I was finally quiet, I found joy again,” she said. “Not because the sadness was gone, but because I wasn’t resisting it anymore.”

Grief and gratitude can exist in the same breath. Sorrow and silliness can take turns. Stillness doesn’t mean choosing one or the other, it means learning to hold both.

Even a few minutes of silence can shift things. Sitting in your parked car before heading into the house. Taking a breath after you close your child’s bedroom door at night. Letting yourself cry in the shower without rushing to stop.

And when the relief comes (when you feel even a flicker of calm) don’t rush past it. Let it register. Let it become part of your body’s memory.

Elizabeth has found that noticing even a brief moment of lightness, ten seconds of calm, a flicker of joy, is often enough to return to stillness later. Letting those small moments matter helps her trust the quiet again.

There’s no need to rush your restoration

Stillness is not a productivity tool. It’s not something you “achieve.” It’s something you allow.

If your body is still bracing, if your thoughts are racing, it’s okay. You don’t have to push harder. You don’t have to earn rest.

You just have to start paying attention.

Start with five minutes. No headphones. No input. No expectation of what you’ll “get” out of it. Just notice what it feels like to be with yourself.

You might cry. You might get bored. You might want to quit. That’s fine.

But you might also find yourself breathing deeper. Feeling calmer. Remembering that you’re more than what you carry.

Stillness won’t fix your life. But it will help you stop abandoning yourself.

And that, more than anything, is what healing requires.