There is an inherent tension between sickness and wellness. How can I accept myself if I label myself as “sick,” but if I haven’t fully healed yet, how can I consider myself “well?” There is a long-standing belief I hold that sickness = brokenness. And how do you fix brokenness?
How do you accept it?
In some ways, I have progressed so far. I started down this path last November. At that point, I was simply tired all of the time, restless, and felt general unease. When we went to London in January, I chalked up the malaise to jet lag or a lingering cold. No matter what I did, though, I couldn’t shake it.
What a scary place — to be in a world of unknown unknowns! I was blind to what was happening and was about to be blindsided — well, me and everyone else, as it turns out.
I’ve never really written about the actual breakdown. I don’t even know if that’s the word. Brene Brown went through a breakthrough spiritual awakening, and she always calls (and marks) it such. For me it wasn’t a particularly spiritual experience, but it jolted me awake.
At the end of February I was lucky enough to go to Vancouver, B.C. for the first 2.5-day program of my coaching certification. In many ways it was anxiety provoking because it was so unknown — I was going into a room with 23 peers (and many instructors) and everyone told me that I should expect to be shaken. Gently, compassionately shaken — but shaken.
Holy shit. It shook me like I was astride the San Andreas fault line.
We returned to Seattle that Sunday and then I got on a plane for California the next day. I was excited to be attending an MBTI certification. Except I completely broke down and had a series of panic attacks as soon as I arrived. I remember staring at the ceiling in the Hotel Avante and wondering what was happening and what was wrong and in tears I called Sergio and my parents and told them I didn’t know what was happening or what to do.
Why then? Why that moment?
I hadn’t been living a sustainable life for some time. I was overcommitted to work. I assumed that the sabbatical would help me adjust my work-life balance and remind me of all of the things in life that were really important. Instead it was just a temporary blip on a life lived too much, too fast, too intensely. I trained to hard, slept too little, crammed too much into each our, and had a mind constantly swirling with thought.
Given an opportunity to slow down and to reflect, it was the coaching course that brought this to consciousness for me. During one exercise on the last day, the coach trainees are split into three groups, each with a facilitator. Each coach trainee has a chance to sit in the middle of this tight circle, everyone shoulder to shoulder. There are three simple questions that the group will answer for you. “All you have to do,” the facilitator assured us, “is breathe.”
Breathe? Ha! What a simple exercise.
“What qualities have you seen in Sarah that you appreciate?” Slowly, calmly, beat after beat, the words come. “Kind.” “Thoughtful.” “Intense.” “Brilliant.” Breathe in, breathe out.
“What qualities have you seen glimpses or glimmers of in Sarah that you want to see even more of?” And again the words flow. “Playfulness.” “Fun.” “Spirit.” And on and on. Breathe in, breathe out. The tears pool because how is it that these strangers, in two days, can see you like this?
“And if we were to come up with an archetype for these words, what would that be?”
And that’s how I became Tinkerbell. I can assure you that embodying that the rest of the day was a challenge. I have never coached while skipping and flitting. It was freeing.
Nothing broke that day, but something broke open. There was some sort of release, some sort of unexplored, unstated, hidden deep sort of thing that suddenly was on the surface and in the front of consciousness.
I had shoved these fears and feelings so deep they hadn’t seen the light. And all at once — they were there.
That wasn’t the experience at the time.
I was tired. I slept. I ate everything. I ate nothing. I felt sick. I felt normal. It was like a stoplight flashing all of its colors simultaneously. “Are you seeing this?” I would ask. “What wrong with me?”
It’s been more than a year. It’s been a lot of work — hours of doctors appointments, tests, therapy sessions, book study. It’s been a fight to sleep, to eat (actually, more to stop eating), and even to breathe. The new patterns are slowly emerging. I’m learning. I’m flying alone again. I’m getting up in front of the room to facilitate. I’m waking up and moving through the day.
Until I can’t or won’t or get tripped up again. That happened to me yesterday and it left me crying in my rental car. Despite focusing on belly breaths and on the sensations beneath my fingers and toes, I couldn’t stop the tears.
As I explained what had happened to S, I ended with, “I just wanna be normal! Why can’t I just be normal again?”
That’s it. I’m not normal — no one, really, is “normal.” Even if I was, that is a place I can’t go back to. I have the awareness now — I see what has happened. I can’t numb myself the way that I did.
There will be days with bad workouts, with chocolate binges, and with not enough sleep. There will be days where I am sliding backwards. But I guess that is normal. That's what binds it all.
xo,
Sarah
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