How do you know if someone will "delay your healing"?

Basically, here's my problem: one of the people I hurt very badly recently has decided to forgive me and would like to be friends. She and I have similar mental health struggles and I feel very safe and secure and balanced with her- but everyone in my life wants me to stay away from her because she could "delay my healing".

What does that even mean? Do people think mental health is contagious or when you get two people in the room with one diagnosis the two fight to the death or like...what am I not seeing? How would I know if someone is stopping me from healing/getting better?

Maybe they are hoping that you'll get back together with your wife, so they see her as a threat? Maybe they see anyone with mental health struggles as dangerous?

Unless they can give you a specific reason why she will "delay your healing", it sounds like they don't actually know why they are saying that.

Only the people who said it can tell you what they mean.

For me it would mean something like this: let's say two people need to give up smoking, but when they get together, instead of supporting each other in giving up smoking, they talk all the time about how much they enjoy smoking, their favourite brands of cigarettes, their smoking stories, how difficult giving it up is, and whether they should even bother. Or like when people with anorexia get together online and encourage each other to persist in their anorexia rather than to try to get better.

And they just want it their way Quite selfish of them.

Spending time with others with similar mental health struggles can normalize unhealthy behaviors. You need to be careful about that. I don’t say that lightly or to be mean or from a lack of experience. I had that sort of relationship with the person I loved most.

A lot (most? all?) mental health issues involve coping in ways that feel good or bring relief in the moment but are ultimately maladaptive. Only you know if being friends with her is an example of that.