When someone finally sees your value after years of missing it, there is a strong pull to treat their recognition as the moment it became true. It was true before. Their late arrival is a fact about their attention, not about you, and letting it feel like a verdict hands them a power over the earlier years they did not earn.

If someone is coming back around now that things have gone well, you can receive it warmly without reorganising your history around it. Notice whether you are tempted to feel vindicated, and hold that lightly. What you did while nobody was looking already counted.