Part II: The Monster Under the Bed

Trigger warning:  Content in this post includes sexual abuse.

If you weren’t with us last week, you can catch up here. 

This week, I promised to share my biggest challenge, a secret I harbored in my body, like a monster under my bed.  I managed to suppress it from my conscious awareness for a very long time, but fear was still present.  When I turned 40, I had developed the emotional skillset to cope with what had lain dormant, and it finally came out. 

It seemed hard to believe at first, that I could harbor a secret from myself for so long, but I gradually came to know the truth of it. 

The uncovering of this secret seemed to start with a body awareness.  I had become increasingly aware of how when others got angry around me, I would automatically freeze, shut down rapidly and my back would ache tremendously for days or more. I found that when this happened, no physical solution to the back pain would work for long.  I was tired of it hurting.  Nothing I did to address it made any difference and I felt instinctually that it was emotionally based.

One day, I was meditating and asked that I clear this pain once and for all.  I didn’t know the pandora’s box I was opening, but this pain turned out to be tied to a traumatic memory of mine. I know it might sound a bit unbelievable, but stay with me.

As I meditated, I began to remember snatches of terrifying moments of sexual abuse from a period when I was just 4-5 years old. I was shocked.  I was unable to observe more than a few pieces of memory in that moment because of the intensity.  But as I sought out help in the coming days and weeks, more and more of the memories and body reactions that I had long suppressed, began to surface. 

I also immediately realized it explained so much of my sexual life that I had never understood. This kicked off a long journey of healing to reclaim my body, memories, sense of safety, identity, and ability to experience pleasure and deeper love.

Around the same time, I discovered I had thyroid cancer.  I had always struggled with issues around voicing my truth and feared speaking up in arguments.  I always felt unsafe in the face of anger.   My initial traumatic memory was the root cause of this.  In my heart, I was sure the cancer was, in part, a physical result of this trauma.  It was now calling for attention like a flashing red light.

Remembering the trauma and finding out I had cancer, felt like a terrible, double blow. I was also preparing to launch my first entrepreneurial venture – one that was very heart-centered to me.  I could not continue it and get treatment at the same time.  I was heartbroken. I really had no choice if I wanted to get better.  I needed surgery, radiation, and time to heal on many levels.  

I chose to use both traditional medicine and non-traditional methods to address my cancer and the emotional scars of my childhood.  It was a lot of tears, frustration, and loss, but I’m grateful to be alive.  In time, I found there were some complex physical consequences of my treatment but, my own healing schooled me in a variety of tools including meditation, breathwork, somatic experiencing, reiki, tantra, ecstatic dance, plant medicine, and shamanism to name a few.

All this healing led to growth and change for me. I’m not sure if it will make sense, but in time I came to know my own needs and wants better and discovered that my marriage didn’t fit the new me as it had before.  This led to some years of struggling to connect with my husband and we even explored things as far-reaching as open marriage in hopes that it would allow space for what was emerging.  In the end, neither of us felt it worked for us.  It did, however, help me untangle many parts of my sexual self. It assisted me in a deep sorting process of what I did and didn’t want and need.

We finally divorced which came with a complex mix of emotions. We had three beautiful children and even built a business together, but it felt to me like my marriage had come to the end of its life. I was being true to myself, but it required me to dismantle all that was familiar and comfortable.  It took more courage than I thought I had in me, to make this change. 

And while it seemed nearly impossible to see, I deeply wanted to create a new family life, post-divorce, that worked well for everyone.  Eventually, we got there, but that’s a story for another time.

If I had known in advance, it would have scared me to know all that I was going to go through. It’s impossible now, to look back and want to change it though. Life responded to my courage in ways I did not expect and met me with love. 

This journey offered me a deepening recovery of my authentic self and powerful learnings about how to heal, love, and connect with others.  I don’t think we always know what we need, but our hearts know the way.  

Stay tuned, and I’ll tell you a few more stories about how healing and love entered my life in the coming weeks- and not just in my romantic relationship, but in all parts of my life.  The divine energy of love is so much bigger than we can sometimes grasp.