I spent twenty years over-performing in corporate. Never missed a quota. I needed to see my name in the lights like I needed air. I would have died before I let anyone down.
I was diagnosed with extreme adrenal fatigue at 32. Back in those days, I couldn’t get through dinner without having to step out for a call or leave the dinner to deal with an emergency. I slept all weekend, but it was never enough.
Addicted to adrenaline and validation. I’d drop $10k on a luxury retreat just so I could feel what it was like to relax…twice a year.
But hey, I was successful. And I wore that title like a badge of honor as if my life depended on it. Because it did.
It started long before corporate. In college. Twenty-two credit hours a semester. Doing whatever it took to be a size four. Abusing Adderall just to get an edge…because I had to get straight A’s. Be perfect.
Push a little harder. Suffer a little more. And they’ll love you for it.
And they did.
Somewhere along the way, I learned that I had to suffer to achieve and I had to achieve to be loved.
And that worked. Until it didn’t. Until my body started to revolt.
I learned the hard way –that we can’t outrun these patterns forever.
As women get older…the cracks start to show.
High cortisol wreaks havoc on our bodies. The chronic exhaustion becomes impossible to ignore…and we are finally forced to reckon with the hypervigilance, the perfectionism, the terrifying fear of failure.
It's then that we realize--that all the patterns that made us so successful…
Are quite literally destroying us.
At that point, we have two choices– continue down this road and miss out on this precious life that we’ve been given.
Or learn a whole new way of being with ourselves.
And then the unwinding. The hard realizations. The coming home.
Liberating ourselves…from ourselves…is messy. And freeing. And so, so worth it.
But we aren’t meant to do it alone.
If you’re ready for support, let’s exhale together. Book a call and let’s talk.
*Not written by AI, you’re welcome.