The Girl Who Learnt To Shrink Herself

Sometimes, the girl who seems quiet today was once the girl who couldn't wait to be heard.

I wasn't always the quiet girl.

In primary school, I was outspoken. I was confident, carefree, and happy. I loved participating in class. I knew my studies, I raised my hand to answer questions, and I wasn't afraid to be in the spotlight. I was that child who was always doing something, always participating, always eager to express herself.

Then, something happened.

It was during a lesson in junior secondary school. The teacher asked a question, and I was confident I knew the answer. I raised my hand, was called upon, and began to answer.

I got it wrong.

What followed was more than a correction. My teacher humiliated me in front of my classmates. I remember the words, the shame, and the laughter that filled the classroom. I remember feeling so small in my seat, wishing I could disappear.

I cannot tell you that I understood everything that happened to me that day. I was a child. But I remember how it made me feel.

And I remember what changed afterwards.

That was the day I started shrinking.

I became afraid of making mistakes. Whenever I had an opinion, I would think about it, rehearse it in my head, and sometimes lose the courage to say it out loud. I became overly conscious of how I sounded, how I came across, and what people might think of me.

The girl who once spoke freely began to second-guess herself.

I started doubting my intelligence. I questioned whether I was as capable as other people. I became afraid of getting things wrong, not because I suddenly stopped having ideas, but because I had learnt to associate expressing myself with the possibility of being embarrassed.

And for years, that experience followed me.

Perhaps the saddest part was that I didn't even realise how much of myself I was holding back. I thought I was simply becoming more reserved. I thought perhaps that was just who I was.

But looking back now, I can see that something had happened to my confidence. I had begun to make myself smaller to protect myself from the possibility of being shamed again.

I had learnt to hide parts of myself.

When shrinking becomes a way of life

Sometimes, we talk about trauma as though it must always be something dramatic or visibly devastating. But certain experiences can leave lasting marks on us, especially when they happen during the years we are still learning who we are.

For a child, the words of a trusted adult can carry enormous weight. An experience that an adult might dismiss as an ordinary classroom incident can become a defining moment in a child's understanding of herself.

I am not saying that one experience explains everything about a person. Human beings are more complex than that. But sometimes, an experience teaches us something about ourselves that we spend years trying to unlearn.

For me, that experience made me question my voice.

Perhaps for another girl, it was being laughed at when she expressed herself. Perhaps it was being compared to her siblings, constantly criticised for making mistakes, or told that she talked too much. Perhaps she grew up in an environment where having an opinion was considered disrespectful, where asking questions was interpreted as defiance, or where being noticed invited unwanted attention.

So she learnt to be quiet.

She learnt to observe rather than participate. To agree rather than disagree. To keep her ideas to herself rather than risk being wrong. To make herself agreeable, unassuming, and easy to accommodate.

And eventually, the behaviour that began as protection became a pattern.

She might now be the woman who has something valuable to contribute in a meeting but waits for someone else to speak first. The woman who knows what she wants to say but struggles to find the courage to say it. The woman who apologises for having an opinion, doubts her abilities despite evidence of her competence, or makes herself smaller around people she considers more intelligent or important than herself.

She may even begin to believe that she has always been this way.

But what if she wasn't always this way?

What if, somewhere along the line, she learnt that being seen was unsafe? What if she learnt that making mistakes meant being ridiculed, that speaking up meant risking rejection, or that the safest thing to do was to make herself as unnoticeable as possible?

These are questions worth asking, not because every quiet woman is wounded or every reserved person needs to become outspoken, but because sometimes our present behaviour carries the imprint of experiences we have never fully examined.

There is a difference between being naturally quiet and being afraid to speak. There is a difference between choosing silence and silencing yourself because you are afraid of what might happen if you speak.

And learning to recognise that difference can change the way you understand yourself.

I am learning to find my way back to myself

Today, I am a woman who is learning to express herself more freely. I am learning to share my thoughts without needing every sentence to be perfect. I am learning that making a mistake does not diminish my intelligence, and that someone disagreeing with me does not mean I should stop having an opinion.

I am learning to be comfortable being seen.

I am learning to be authentic, to stop shrinking myself to make other people comfortable, and to recognise the difference between being considerate of others and abandoning myself to please them.

And no, this journey has not been about becoming the loudest person in every room. It has been about having the freedom to choose.

To speak when I have something to say. To be quiet when I want to be quiet. To ask questions without feeling foolish. To learn without being ashamed of what I do not know. To make mistakes without allowing them to determine how I see myself.

Most importantly, I am learning that I do not have to keep living according to the conclusions I drew about myself as a child.

That girl who sat in the classroom, embarrassed and wounded, did not know that her mistake was not a measure of her intelligence. She did not know that a teacher's humiliating response was not a reliable definition of her worth. She did not know that she could be wrong about an answer and still be a capable, intelligent child.

She only knew that she had been laughed at, and she wanted to protect herself from experiencing that shame again.

I understand her now.

I don't blame her for shrinking. She was a child trying to make sense of an experience she did not have the emotional tools to process.

But I also know that I do not have to keep shrinking to protect that little girl.

I can acknowledge what happened without allowing it to dictate who I become. I can make room for the feelings I carried, challenge the beliefs I formed, and practise new ways of responding to the world around me.

I can give myself permission to grow beyond what hurt me.

And perhaps, in some ways, healing is learning to offer yourself what you needed when you were younger: patience, kindness, safety, and the freedom to be imperfect without losing your sense of worth.

Dear Eve, what parts of yourself have you learnt to hide?

Perhaps you stopped sharing your ideas because someone made you feel unintelligent.

Perhaps you stopped expressing your feelings because you were told you were too sensitive.

Perhaps you became a people-pleaser because you learnt that being loved meant being agreeable.

Perhaps you became fiercely independent because asking for help repeatedly ended in disappointment.

Or perhaps you learnt to make yourself smaller because you discovered that being fully yourself did not always feel safe.

Whatever your story may be, I want you to consider this: the fact that you learnt a way of being does not mean you are condemned to remain that way.

You can examine the beliefs you have carried. You can learn to recognise the situations that trigger old fears. You can practise expressing yourself, setting boundaries, receiving support, and responding differently, one step at a time.

You may need support along the way. You may have days when the old fear returns. That does not mean you are failing. Change often involves practising new responses even when familiar feelings are still present.

And if you are a woman who has always been quiet, please know that this is not a call to become someone else. Your quietness is not a problem to be fixed. You deserve to know whether your silence is a genuine expression of who you are or a restriction you have learnt to live within.

You deserve that freedom.

At Dear Eve, we believe that wholeness begins with awareness. We cannot change everything we do not understand, and we cannot heal honestly while pretending that our experiences have had no effect on us.

Sometimes, the first step is simply recognising the girl you used to be, understanding the woman you became, and giving yourself permission to explore who you are becoming.

You do not have to remain the girl who learnt to shrink herself. You can become the woman who no longer has to.

A moment of reflection

Take a few minutes to sit with these questions:

• What was I like before I became afraid of being seen, heard, or misunderstood?

• Is there an experience that changed the way I express myself?

• What have I come to believe about myself because of that experience?

• Where in my life am I still acting from that old belief?

• What is one small way I can begin to give myself permission to be more fully myself?

You do not have to answer every question today. Start with the one that speaks to you most honestly.

And remember, Dear Eve: you are allowed to grow beyond the things that taught you to hide.

With love,

Oluchi