What Brought Me Here

When I say
this is only the beginning,
what I really mean is —
there’s a lot behind me, too.

I didn’t just wake up one day and decide to become the healer I needed.
That decision was born from years of unraveling.
Years of survival.
Years of asking:
Why do I feel this way?
And why won’t anyone listen?

The truth is, I’ve lived through a lot.

I was just a little girl when my rare skin condition appeared —
Anetoderma.
From that moment forward,
I never fit inside the medical box.

I wasn’t a person.
Not even a story.
Just a specimen.
Something to observe.

After my first child, postpartum depression crept in —
and like so many women, I was brushed off.

”You’re just tired.”
”Just hormonal. “
”Just overwhelmed.”

But I wasn’t just anything.
I was unraveling.

I became a mother before I became a woman.
Navigated marriage, then divorce.
Raised two kids through a high-conflict co-parenting storm.
Faced poverty.
Moved back in with my parents.
Rebuilt from scratch.

Then came the blow I never saw coming:
My father’s sudden, tragic death in 2009.
It left a hole I still feel today —
not just grief,
but a kind of spiritual rupture.

A question I couldn’t un-ask:
How do I move forward now?

Through it all, I kept showing up.
For my kids.
For work.
For everyone else.

But somewhere along the way,
I stopped showing up for myself.

I ignored the signs.
I normalized the pain.
I kept telling myself:

“This is just what life feels like after a certain age.”

Until the pretending became unbearable.

The truth is,
I’ve spent most of my life in some version of survival mode.
But here’s what I know now:

Survival may have gotten me here.
But healing is what will carry me forward.

I’m no longer asking what’s wrong with me.
I’m asking what happened.
And even more than that —
what’s possible now?

We’ll get into all of it —
the symptoms,
the system,
and the solutions I’ve found through functional medicine
and deep self-respect.

But first, I just needed you to know:

I didn’t land here because I had a smooth path.
I landed here because I didn’t give up on finding a better one.

With heart,
Rebecca