~ For others, who are navigating in the unknown
~ For myself, to remember my journey and the miracle of today

My husband and I, our work together breaks through barriers and assumptions, and it comes from an opening of stories and experiences, exposing light to hidden topics.

There is a piece of my story that has been unspeakable, steeped in shame and guilt, identity, and shifting cultural definitions of acceptance.

I have created my own path of living and thriving.

It is why I started this space, for me to come back to remember the core of who I am, when life gets messy. Raw experiences shape who we are, and in the fray, we find radiant pieces of ourselves that we didn’t even know existed.

This topic is not for the faint of heart.

Barton and I always thought we would have children.
We dreamed them.
We named them.

So when we found that we could not have children naturally, such began the painful journey of childless not my choice. At that time, I had no support, and was steeped in the learning that a woman’s identity was only fulfilled if she had a child. There was so much shame in not being “fertile.” Barton and I spent years working through the impacts of not having children.

I was faced with a heart wrenching decision, one that is so taboo that most women won’t even speak of it out loud. I had fibroids that were not shrinking with alternative methods, and came to accept that hysterectomy surgery was the best treatment.

For me, and for many women, this is the finality that if physical body parts are removed, so is our identity as a woman and the dream of having children naturally.

In addition, for Barton and I, it meant of year of figuring out the finances, timing, logistics as I would not be able to pick him up for 8 weeks, and we needed a lot of support each of us needed during this time.

Even deeper, it meant there was boatloads of self-care that I would need to accept and surrender to this experience. My mom had died from a reaction to a pain medication, later recalled by the FDA, and is still somehow out on the market. I question every possible reaction to a medication before taking it. So, a procedure of this magnitude would take a force of nature.

With an amazing husband, I spent eight months creating a healing cocoon with music, poetry, yoga, walks outdoors, written mantras taped to the bedroom ceiling, and breath work to move through the fear of having surgery. I wrote scripts that my doctor read during my surgery. I healed on the back porch under the huge oak and maple leaves turning brilliant hues of yellow and orange. Thankful.

Yes, I lived through my greatest fear… AND…

Three months after surgery, I kept having clear fluid, and an out of balance bacterial infection, and no one could figure out why. Test after test revealed the same result.

Now, here’s where life gets crazy.

The medical community only sees patients through their particular lens. If you see a urologist, a physical therapist, even a functional therapist or naturopath, they are only going to test, provide results, and see through their particular lens. There is no truly holistic medical practitioner.

And yes, you guessed it, for over a year, I dove down all the rabbit holes, each with darker layers hidden beneath them. Horrid invasive test for this and for that with gut wrenching treatment plans to follow.

And with my sensitivity to the medical community, each step was walking through hell. Even a simple CT with contrast meant hours of fear and self-torture to force myself into drinking colored liquid dye.

The Internet is a system of internal torture. In the middle of the night, hours spent Googling treatments and outcomes. The balance between knowledge for self-care and falling into other stories that were not my own.

What are we looking for when we Google something? All I really wanted was for someone to tell me I would be okay.

That there was a defined tangible solution.

Yet, into the unknown I walked.

Thinking I was taking care of myself, I returned throwing everything I had at experts in their particular field, with lifetimes of research and experience, who in the end, had never seen this before.

I hated every piece of my body.

My husband witnessed the self-hatred, fear, and darkness he had gone through as a child with Cerebral Palsy.

In the end, I was clinically diagnosed with a peritoneal inclusion cyst with fistula, with an unusual presentation. Yep, I leak abdominal fluid all of time time. And because it’s systemic, if I’m sick, stressed, exercise, or it’s a humid summer, it’s worse.

Many women with an inclusion cyst have to have it drained. I spent three months in paralyzing fear because of those findings and a few scant stories spread on Hyster-sisters. There are few things I can’t handle, but if I had to have surgery every few months, if I had to have a pocket of fluid drained consistently. If couldn’t pick Barton up long term, or work, our family would not survive.

Paralyzed in fear.

But because the fluid leaks due to what we think is a fistula, there is no cyst build up; it’s just something I live with.

My body betrayed me and saved me all at the same time.
My body knew how to save me.

This was the physical cost, yet something poked its head out that was even more detrimental. Intertwined in the invasive physical tests was fear and shame. How could I say anything to anyone? If someone asked how I was doing after surgery, I would just say I was fine. And underneath that fine was a whole iceberg of not fine.

I had to face the source of deep seeded shame stemming from childhood and body image. The how I thought about myself that shaped how I treated myself. The source of the ‘never good enough’ loop.

I spoke with someone I had trusted, about the continual fluid leak. I was met with a response of, “Well, get over it. You know, I’m taking care of my mother. She has to use Pampers. So just put one on and get over it.”

Now if you know me, I’ve got a lot of grit.

Bring it on, I can take it.

And – there are times in the world of grit, where we can be pretty crappy to each other. Shame is not always a motivator. I’m really hard on myself. There is pretty much no one harder on me – than me.

So in a time when I needed compassion, I was met with – pull up your bootstraps.

Get over it.

Women who are childless not by choice hear this a lot, but for me, with an unknown complication to surgery, it was even more damaging.

And the last straw was spending $500 of my family’s money to hear that well, someone must have this in other countries, but there is nothing to do unless I wanted to have another surgery; we just don’t know.

So in this situation, with the strange less than 1% of 1% complication, what I had needed was compassion.

It was up to me to learn what self-compassion meant.

Enough!!!!
This is my life, on my terms.
And damn, I’m gonna live it!

The first taste of returning was a once in a lifetime chance to travel out to Durango, Colorado, right at the four corners for a workshop around childlessness. This was the most sacred special space for me, as in many years ago in ceremony, my mother’s ashes flew in the green evergreens.

And here, after all of this, losing my mother, losing the chance at having a child, losing my femininity, I was returning.

Reconnection.As I drove in snow dripped mountains, I inhaled the crisp air.
Breath. Breathe.
Space.

I danced in the snow with arms out wide and connected with the creator.

I am ALIVE.
I am HERE.

I stepped into a winter wonderland. I stepped into living again.
When I returned home, I started exploring – what brings joy?
What was it that I believed?

I found my voice – and I didn’t always get it right. Even still, I don’t know where my service in this experience lies. I only know that right now, my story needs to be told.

I needed to learn to live. And I did discover what I loved.

Loving and being passionate about what I do for work, moving my body with dance and yoga, writing – words from God flowing from wings through fingertips creating stories, poetry, sharing God’s integrity, hands gliding through water swimming, steeping in the love of nature – the shape of bark, deep conversations with my husband, coffee and bagels on a Saturday morning, walk in afternoon sunlight holding hands, Kona Kai laying her head upside down on my lap. Doing something small and unseen for others.

Traveling with Barton – being the airport, the anticipation of an adventure ahead. Blasting music in the van and singing at the top of my lungs. Driving with the windows down. Laughing at a silly joke. Light in the bedroom window on a sunny Sunday afternoon.

This is what makes up a good life.

My work with a coach shifted to discover how self-compassion and loving kindness practices could support me. And I found voices such as Tara Branch, Brené Brown, Elizabeth Gilbert, and Kristen Neff to reinforce these practices.

Last year, Barton and I were hit by a truck that was speeding and lost control on the highway. It didn’t hit me until a family member told me the skid was longer than a football field. There were no trees, no road signs, no mile markers. And we did not roll or turn over even though the T-bone impact was so hard that the truck’s imprint was in the side of our car.

We should have died that day.
And we walked away.

After the shock, everything felt, smelled, and looked brighter. Each day is a miracle. Being here, is a miracle. We are walking, living, breathing, moving miracles. All of us.

In complete reverent awe of life.
I am HERE.
I am ALIVE.

This moment changed the framework of living. I never want to lose that feeling. How thankful am I to be in the physical vessel that supports me in living this amazing adventurous, miraculous life.

Why am I sharing this crazy medical mystery that I live with and am still completely embarrassed about?
Because likely, we all have our own version.

We have our unspeakable complications to life; we have things that we don’t speak to anyone about; we have moments of devastation and reverent awe; we return.

And it’s in the surrender that we find acceptance.

What makes up your best life?
No matter what is going on around you –

Step into that space!

Need a bit of Empowerment today?