There is something about turning 50, and there is also something about having a nervous breakdown. It shifted me. It gutted me. I lost a beloved career. I lost friends/family. I lost community connection.
However, it also brought me more clarity, calm, and unconditional love. It also brought me the experience of surrendering, joy, thriving.
Unpacking decades of suffering and my own hand in allowing the suffering has been a big pill to swallow. (no pun intended) Being conditioned to accept abuse especially in the workplace is a huge sign just how toxic systems can be. Someday......I'll right the book.....someday. :-)
The hardest part of healing is coming to terms with our own acceptance in the abuse. I thought I was excelling, doing a great job, until I got slapped with a code of misconduct. In that instant, the band that kept my nervous system "together", snapped and I went into an extreme dysregulated state. No longer in a fight/flight freeze response (as that is the "norm" for society), or "fawning" (people pleasing) is full of people who fawn in the system I was in.
I was now in a form of extreme trauma response of freeze. I had now entered hell. Dark night of the soul. Nervous breakdown.
For me, as a perfectionist, workaholic, people pleaser, protector, low self worth/self esteem, aiming to climb some corporate ladder thinking my experience/expertise actually mattered. When presented with a code of misconduct, I immediately had a nervous breakdown.
This was the beginning of my tower moment in Fall of 2020 due to years of "acceptable" workplace violence, none of what I had accomplished mattered.
What mattered was my will to survive, my will to live, my will to continue. The realization how dysregulated my nervous system had become, the endless amounts of pills I took to be able to go to work:
- 175mg of Zoloft (max is 200),
- Ativan to sleep,
- cocktail of RX/OTC muscle relaxers for a work back injury, work place concussions, work place neck injury.
As well as the increase of "escaping". Escape in forms of work, alcohol, weed, exercise, isolation, wellness appointments, hyper independence, eating.... The constant "escape" of GOING/DOING/GIVING.
Over time, I now am in more of a receiving state. Allowing life to be more in flow and with ease. This took a lot of therapy and inner work to feel worth of acceptance.
Tomorrow I celebrate 22 months sober from Rx/OTC pills. There is a time and a place for RX/OTC pills, yet in my own story those pills were an addiction to keep me in that workaholic mode. Keep me going. Keep me "fawning" for a system, continuing to do more to keep up with the demands of my career.
I continue to heal, but one thing I have come to realize is I am the author of my own story. I allowed too many other voices own the pen to write my story. The endless "naysayers", judgements, fears, shame. Their voices took over.
Next time you say something negative about yourself, pause, and listen to whose voice is it really? yours? I'd bet that it isn't. It's a current or former teacher, lover, friend, co-worker, family member. I can almost 100% guarantee that voice is not your own. It's a conditioned voice that you have heard on repeat from someone.
Today, I continue to write my own story. I own the pen.
What story do you wish to write?
Much love,
Lori Anne
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