09/03/2026
For a period of my life, the sound of an email notification could send my body straight into panic.
Not because of work.
Because it was usually my lawyer.
This was during my divorce.
My daughter was only two, and the thought of being apart from her felt unbearable. The idea of shared care and not knowing what life would look like was overwhelming.
We were stuck living in a house that had become completely unbearable.
My husband wouldn’t agree to selling.
But he also wouldn’t move out.
So we existed in this horrible limbo under the same roof, barely functioning.
Lawyers got involved.
Emails went back and forth.
Advice was given.
But nothing actually moved forward.
Until one day I noticed the impact it was having on my daughter.
And in that moment something shifted.
It didn’t matter what the lawyer said anymore.
It didn’t matter what the financial consequences were.
I wasn’t keeping my daughter in that environment.
So I got a rental and moved out.
The next day… he moved out too.
And the house sat empty for over a year and a half while the legal process dragged on.
During that time I was juggling rent, a mortgage, raising a toddler, running a business, studying, and a legal battle that eventually drained more than $70,000 in legal fees.
Every email made my heart race.
Every phone call tightened my chest.
My nervous system was completely shot.
Looking back now, if I had understood my nervous system back then, the legal process probably would have been the same.
But my internal experience of it would have been very different.
Because when your body is stuck in survival mode, everything feels overwhelming.
But when the nervous system begins to regulate, life’s hardest moments don’t have to break you in the same way.
And honestly, this is a big part of why I do the work I do now.
Because I know what it feels like when your body is constantly in survival mode.
And I also know how different life feels when your body finally learns that it’s safe again.