Are You Your Pain? How to Recognize—and Release—the Victim Saboteur

When we go through something painful—whether it’s trauma, loss, heartbreak, or years of emotional stress—there’s a part of us that learns how to survive. It steps in to protect us. It’s the part that says, “Just get through this,” or “Don’t trust anyone,” or “This always happens to me.”

In the mental fitness world, we call this part the victim saboteur.

And here’s the hard truth: it may have helped us survive a hard season… but it’s not helping us heal.

What Is the Victim Saboteur?

The victim saboteur isn’t your personality. It’s not your true self. It’s a pattern—something your brain developed to cope with pain or powerlessness. It convinces you that life is happening to you, and that you’re helpless to change anything.

If you’ve been through grief or trauma, you’ve probably heard this voice:

• “No one understands what I’ve been through.”

• “I’m just broken. This is who I am now.”

• “They should know how much they’ve hurt me.”

These thoughts aren’t “bad.” They’re human. But when they become your identity, they keep you stuck.

You're not your grief. You're not your trauma.
You're not the story your saboteur is telling you.

So… Who Are You?

You are someone who experienced pain. But you don’t have to become it.

Through my Perfect Peace counseling work, I’ve seen people reclaim their identity after years of believing they were just anxious, just angry, just too much—or not enough. When we learn to recognize the voice of the victim saboteur, we can start to separate it from the truth.

That’s where healing begins.

How Healing Happens

Your brain was created to heal. And you don’t have to relive every detail of your pain to get there.

That’s why I use tools like EMDR and faith-based mental fitness (if you’re open to it) to help people gently process their pain at the root. We help the brain rewire old patterns—so you can respond to life from clarity and strength instead of fear and reactivity.

This isn’t about pretending your grief or trauma didn’t happen. It’s about learning that your story doesn’t end there.

What You Can Do Next

If this message resonates, I want to invite you to watch a recent webinar I shared on this very topic. I talk about:

• How the victim saboteur forms

• Why it’s common after grief and trauma

• What healing looks like—faith-based or not

• What the next step might look like for you

📺 Watch the full webinar here

You’ve already survived so much. Now it’s time to live—and live well.