One day in the dark morning hours I found myself awake, again, overcome with desperation for sleep and some respite from all of the daily doing. Striving for perfection as a woman in midlife, a mother to two girls, a wife, a provider, a homemaker, and a consultant left me depleted, lost, and without a sense of self.

 

I went into the bathroom, laid on the floor, and wept. I wailed. I raged. There were no windows, the light never shown, the hour didn’t change, time was stopped. I had nothing left - not a shred left in me that could go through another day. I was exhausted to my core.

I was swept into a cycle of guilt and shame for not living fully in gratitude, for how I may have behaved toward my daughters, for burning dinner, for forgetting something on the grocery list, for not being an attentive wife or friend, for my inability to please.

I didn’t know my needs or wants, so I never asked. I was always apologizing. I was numb, mechanical, and constantly striving to be “good” while carrying the weight of trauma, abandonment, and insecure attachment since childhood, experiences of which I could recite without feeling as if it were case study.

The physical body will only allow us to hold onto all of this for so long. I lived with several chronic auto- immune diseases, hormone imbalance, pain, depression, anxiety and debilitating insomnia. I’ve experienced several acute health crises resulting in hospital stays and emergency room visits since my early 20’s. But I kept pushing, kept going, kept producing, kept exercising because that has value, because I needed to keep up, and did so in silent suffering and loneliness.

Despite that, I had a successful career in the fashion and entertainment industry in New York City, received a masters in public health, advanced in a new career, and became a group fitness instructor.
 

But I was on autopilot, operating out of numbness punctuated by pain and exhaustion. And by the looks of me, no one would know. I turned to self-harm, abused drugs and alcohol, used relationships as distractions, quit jobs suddenly, moved countless times, and travelled halfway around the world for almost two years – I used every external tool available to run from all the ways in which my body and spirit were crying for help.

The Japanese word for crisis is pronounced kiki. It’s written with two characters translated as “dangerous” and “opportunity.” My final crisis moment was on that bathroom floor, after a culmination of many I had pushed through before that. Finally, at 42 years old as a wife and mother, the need for change became absolute, and danger sat squarely in the center of stagnancy. I needed the life I knew to end. I needed a rebirth.

I opened up to new paths for healing. I have studied feminine embodiment, somatic experiencing, Jungian archetypal journeys and rites of passage, social work and social justice, and emotional freedom technique. I have used these tools to release layers of tension, fear, shame, childhood trauma, and the toxicity of such a fast-paced, productivity-driven way of being.
 

Through this work, I have created space for holistic – physical, emotional, spiritual- healing. I have begun to reconnect with my authentic self, to love, and to the energy of reciprocity and relationship that is the true foundation of the human experience.

This ongoing transformation continues to enrich my life. Bringing this work to other women and the collective is my soul-purpose and my honor.

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Acknowledgements

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I acknowledge the Traditional Custodians of the land upon which I live, the Narragansett Indian Tribe, whose ancestors stewarded these lands with respect, care, and reciprocity, and honor with gratitude their descendants who continue to tend to these lands today.

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I acknowledge my experiences in life would be different if not for the privilege of being a white, able-bodied, cisgender, heterosexual woman. 

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I am committed to holding and honoring these truths in my community and in my work. 

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