Tribulations and Realizations

Hello lovelies,

I’m constantly overjoyed by the views and I truly hope my stories and experiences help you along the way. I’ve spoke a lot about my future, life, and career goals on this blog. As always, life has not gone as planned. My life is at a pivotal point where I am making a career transition. The last 3 years have been very challenging and life changing at the same time. I thought moving would help me escape my trauma, toxic parents, toxic exes etc. I thought moving would fix me and help me escape from the suffocating grasps of my depression, PTSD, and anxiety. Although, I live in the sunshine state it’s not always sunny for me. I have my highs and lows just like everyone else. I still struggle with my lows and sometimes I just want to sleep the bad days away. But, I try to focus on the good and these tribulations have taught me to appreciate the good days even more.

I’m no longer in OT school and at this time I don’t want to pursue this career anymore. I do however, want to pursue a masters and PHD but, that will have to wait. I have a lot going on mentally, physically, and overall health wise. Graduate school was a toxic environment for me and without much support I couldn’t find the strength to keep putting myself in misery for a career I no longer wanted. It was hard but, necessary as my well being comes first. I’m not sure what the universe has in store for me but, I trust it’s greater than I could ever imagine. I’m staying positive and I’m hopeful that all will work out.

As, I continue on this journey I’m fortunate to be back with my old therapist Betsy. If you’ve been following my journey for some time you know she’s been my therapist since the beginning of this blog. Betsy has helped me overcome so much and she’s actively putting more tools in her therapy toolbox. I recently have been undergoing EMDR with her. This form of therapy is based on the idea that negative thoughts, feelings and behaviors are the result of unprocessed memories. The treatment involves standardized procedures that include focusing simultaneously on a spontaneous associations of traumatic images, thoughts, emotions and bodily sensations while using bilateral stimulation that is most commonly in the form of repeated eye movement or tapping. EMDR has helped my PTSD tremendously and it has felt very freeing. It’s helping rewire my brain to create neuroplasticity that way I have more positive experiences with triggers. I definitely recommend this if you feel like basic CBT is no longer helping or you’ve hit a rut in your journey and realize you need more. Although, sometimes I just need talk therapy with Betsy, EMDR has given me more control over my life. It took me months to get over one trigger and I know there is many more to go through. But, each time I am able to overcome my traumatic experience I feel relieved (with time of course). EMDR can be very emotionally draining if you have some heavy experiences to overcome but, it’s worth it in the long run.

Anyway, I don’t think my healing journey is ever going to end and I’ve come to peace with this. There’s still so much healing for me to do. There’s still so many things I want to work on and overcome. But, I want to end with the good parts of my journey thus far. I have healthier relationships and have maintained them for some time now. I am better at communicating my boundaries to others. I say no more. I allow myself to bask in happiness and love. For the first time in my entire life I truly felt and accepted love for my birthday. I’m surrounded by wonderful, wonderful, wonderful, human beings who love and respect me. I celebrate my entire birthday month not because I’m full of myself but, because I feel like I lost a lot of good birthdays. Not only did I feel these positive emotions I accepted that I was deserving of happiness, love, and support for my birthday and overall life. I thank everyone that has been a part of my journey thus far. Thank you for sticking with me through the dark times, for guiding me, loving me, and simply being kind to me.

I hope you allow yourself to be more accepting of love because you are also deserving of all the great things life has to offer. Til next time, xoxo.

With love,

SN ❤︎