When I filed for divorce, I thought I was the strongest woman I'd ever been.
I'd finally stood up for myself. I'd made an incredibly difficult decision, walked away from the life I'd spent years building, and chosen to believe that something better existed on the other side.
In A Line of Women, I wrote about the remarkable women who came before me. Women who endured unimaginable circumstances, often without the choices or freedoms I have today. Women whose strength runs through my veins.
I remember saying, more times than I could count, that my hope was to someday make it to the other side of my hurt and use my strength to help another woman. Maybe even many women. Women who felt broken, defeated, or like they simply couldn't go on.
I wanted to show them that they could.
I thought I was already on my way.
Turns out, I had absolutely no idea what was coming.
What I believed was the beginning of my healing became the beginning of a freight train of hurt.
One disappointment after another. More betrayal. More silence. More unanswered questions. More blindsiding blows from people and places where I once felt secure.
And somewhere along the way, something shifted.
I stopped simply distrusting the people who had betrayed me.
I started distrusting everyone.
Even myself.
The woman who had felt so strong just months earlier was disappearing beneath layers of anger, sadness, suspicion, and a desperate need to protect herself from whatever might come next.
I became really good at wearing a mask. A perfectly polished, socially acceptable version of myself. I smiled. I showed up. I laughed. I made plans.
And sometimes I was so convincing that even I believed I was okay.
But underneath?
I was drowning.
When the Fight Becomes Exhausting
I'd always been curious about ayahuasca. I've felt connected to nature and spirituality for as long as I can remember. I've believed in the power of energy, intention, and the things we can't necessarily see or explain.
But curiosity is one thing. Committing a considerable amount of money, time, and emotional energy to a retreat in another country is something entirely different.
Then, in late August, I lost my job.
Another blow.
Looking back, I can acknowledge that I hadn't been performing at my best. I was distracted, emotionally exhausted, and struggling to find my footing.
But rather than consistently looking inward at what I could control, I found myself searching for all the ways I'd been wronged.
Again.
It was as though my mind had become programmed to anticipate the next betrayal. I could find disappointment before it even arrived.
I wasn't just carrying betrayal trauma anymore. I was allowing it to dictate how I experienced the world.
Losing my job was rock bottom.
And rock bottom is a particularly lonely place when you've become an expert at convincing everyone, including yourself, that you're fine.
A former employer and mentor sent me two retreat options.
Suddenly, I had something I hadn't had before.
Time.
And the financial ability to do something with it.
I could continue distracting myself, filling my calendar, avoiding my thoughts, and pretending I was okay.
Or I could make what might be the most important investment of my life.
An investment in myself.
I signed up before September 1st.
And then I spiraled.
For nearly a month.
My version of spiraling wasn't necessarily what someone watching from the outside would imagine. It was neglecting myself in subtle ways. Spending time and energy on things that didn't deserve either. Keeping myself busy enough that I didn't have to sit quietly with my own thoughts.
Because when things got quiet, I didn't particularly like the person I was left alone with.
I knew I had an extraordinary amount to be grateful for. An incredible daughter. Family. Friends. Opportunities. A life that, on paper, was pretty damn good.
So why couldn't I just be happy?
Why was I always sad? Or angry? Or waiting for something else to go wrong?
I didn't like who I'd become.
And worse, I couldn't see a way back.
The Fear of Finding Myself
There was another fear tucked beneath my decision to attend the retreat. One I don't think I fully understood until I began preparing.
What if I discovered I was actually the problem?
What if the medicine revealed that I was some evil witch who only thought she'd been betrayed?
What if I had somehow deserved the hand I'd been dealt?
I know how ridiculous that might sound.
Deep down, I think I knew it wasn't true.
But when enough bad things happen, particularly at the hands of people you trusted, you start questioning everything.
Your judgment. Your decisions. Your memories. Your character.
At some point, I had even begun questioning whether the common denominator in all these experiences was me.
And I didn't want to run from that possibility.
I think I actually begged for anything I could do differently to be revealed.
If there was something I needed to own, show me.
If there was something I needed to change, show me.
If I had hurt people or contributed to my own suffering in ways I couldn't recognize, I wanted to know.
I wasn't looking for a free pass.
I was willing to face some uncomfortable truths.
What I didn't know was that the truth waiting for me would be almost the complete opposite of what I feared.
Choosing to Go
By October 1st, something in me had changed.
I was ready.
Not magically better. Not suddenly at peace.
Just ready to do the work.
I began paying closer attention to what I was putting into my body, my mind, and my life.
I read ancient philosophy. I meditated. I focused on nutrition. I began preparing for the retreat, physically and emotionally.
I had conversations with people I trusted. I informed my family about the true nature of my trip. I stepped away from negative influences and removed opportunities for outside noise to interfere with the experience.
For once, I wasn't trying to fix everything around me.
I was trying to take care of the person inside me.
And then, on the day of departure, I missed my flight to Costa Rica.
Of course I did.
Because apparently a journey toward inner peace needed one final opportunity for a complete emotional meltdown.
But I found another way there.
And I cried through the entire final stretch of that journey.
I was scared. I was exhausted. I was emotional.
But I was going.
I had made a commitment to myself, and this time I was going to keep it.
Permission to Be Human
When I arrived at Soltara, I was hardly the picture of a woman embarking on a great spiritual adventure.
I stayed in my room.
I slept. A lot.
I could barely carry on a conversation without tears forming in my eyes. And if someone mentioned Alice, my daughter?
Forget it.
Waterworks.
For months I'd been telling myself, and anyone who would listen, that Alice was my purpose. My reason. My everything.
But somewhere along the way, I'd become so consumed by my own pain that I wasn't always living those words.
I loved my daughter fiercely.
But I needed to learn how to love myself, too.
Not just for her.
For me.
I arrived believing the ayahuasca ceremonies were the reason I was there. And they were certainly central to the experience.
But the seven days gave me something I hadn't anticipated.
Permission to be completely, unapologetically authentic.
No mask.
No performance.
No need to convince anyone that I was strong, happy, or had my shit together.
Just me.
During group sharing, I listened as incredibly brave souls spoke about what had brought them there.
Some were searching for purpose. Some were carrying trauma. Some were living with pain that had physically debilitated them.
Different lives. Different stories. Different wounds.
But we had something in common.
We were all willing to travel into the unknown because something inside us believed life could feel different.
And for someone who had nearly lost faith in humanity, being surrounded by people willing to be that vulnerable was extraordinary.
There was no competition over whose pain was worse.
No pretending.
Just human beings showing up for themselves and, without necessarily realizing it, for one another.
Three Words I Didn't Expect
During my second ceremony, something wild happened.
Well, lots of wild things happened. But we'll save the full ceremony stories for another day.
For now, it started with something incredibly ordinary.
I got my period.
Yep. Right there in the middle of an ayahuasca ceremony.
I called for help, and one of my facilitators came to assist me. She promised she'd find the supplies I needed.
And she did.
Simple, right?
Someone said they would do something.
And then they did it.
Before returning to ceremony, I looked at her and said:
"I trust you."
The words almost startled me.
Not because they were particularly profound.
But because I meant them.
Completely.
And trust had become such a foreign feeling.
For so long, the words playing on repeat in my head had been:
I am angry.
I am sad.
I trust no one.
Yet here I was, in a country far from home, surrounded by people I'd only just met, feeling something I hadn't genuinely felt in a very long time.
Trust.
When I returned to my mat, I sat with what had just happened.
And then, without any grand announcement or dramatic declaration, I made a decision.
"I trust all of this."
I surrendered.
To the experience. To the people caring for me. To whatever truths might be waiting.
For once, I stopped trying to anticipate the next wrong thing.
I stopped trying to control the outcome.
I let myself simply be.
What I Found Instead
I had entered this retreat afraid that somewhere deep inside me was a terrible person who had somehow earned every ounce of suffering she'd experienced.
I'd begged to be shown where I'd gone wrong.
What I experienced was the complete opposite.
Validation.
Not the kind I'd spent years hoping to receive from the people who had betrayed me.
There were no overdue apologies. No perfectly packaged explanations. No one suddenly accepting responsibility for the hurt they'd caused.
It was something entirely different.
I began to believe that I didn't need those things to move forward.
I could acknowledge my own imperfections without accepting responsibility for someone else's choices.
I could recognize the ways I'd reacted poorly to pain without believing I'd deserved that pain in the first place.
I could stop waiting for other people to make sense of my story before allowing myself to write the next chapter.
And I could trust myself again.
I get chills even putting that into words.
Because somewhere beneath all the anger, sadness, and suspicion was still the woman who believed in people. Who believed in goodness. Who wanted to make the world a little better than she found it.
She wasn't gone.
She'd just been buried beneath a whole lot of hurt.
And for the first time in what felt like forever, I could see her.
I could overcome this.
I could still do the great things I'd always dreamed of doing.
And maybe, just maybe, I could return to that hope I'd spoken about when I filed for divorce.
The hope that someday I might help another woman who felt as broken and hopeless as I once had.
Only now, I began to understand that helping someone didn't necessarily mean showing them how strong I was.
Maybe it meant showing them that I had struggled, too.
That I had lost myself.
That I had made mistakes.
That I had been angry, reactive, frightened, and far from the person I wanted to be.
And that none of those things meant my story was over.
I hadn't gone looking for a new purpose.
I went hoping to find peace.
Somehow, I began to rediscover both.
Two Weeks Later
I'm writing this two weeks after returning home.
And the strangest part?
I'm at peace.
Not because life suddenly became perfect.
It hasn't.
There have been challenges. Uncomfortable conversations. Disappointments. Moments that, just a few weeks ago, might have sent me straight back into that familiar cycle of anger, suspicion, and emotional chaos.
But something is different.
I'm different.
I've noticed myself responding instead of reacting.
Slowing down when my body needs rest.
Moving forward when something feels right.
Recognizing when my mind starts inventing scenarios that haven't happened and may never happen.
I've even started setting goals again.
And perhaps most importantly, I've started finding genuine joy in the little things.
The kind of joy that doesn't require an audience.
The kind you don't have to manufacture.
For so long, I'd worn a mask of artificial happiness that I almost forgot what the real thing felt like.
Now I'm remembering.
I know people will have their opinions about my decision to attend an ayahuasca retreat.
Some will be curious. Some will be skeptical. Some may never understand.
That's okay.
I've decided I'm not going to spend my energy trying to convince anyone of what happened to me or how much I've changed.
I don't need to prove my healing through words. I want to live it through my actions.
Will I still make mistakes?
Absolutely.
Will I still have difficult days?
I'm certain of it.
And here's something I wasn't expecting: sometimes I wake up almost waiting for the pain to return.
As if my mind hasn't quite caught up with the peace I'm beginning to feel.
But I'm learning to recognize those moments for what they are.
Old patterns.
Old expectations.
A nervous system that spent so long preparing for disaster that it hasn't quite figured out what to do with calm.
And when those moments come, I remind myself of something remarkably simple.
The past is no more.
The future isn't promised.
And this moment, right here, is the only one I actually have.
I spent so much of my life fighting to hold things together.
Then I spent months wanting to flee from the pain of everything that had fallen apart.
And somewhere in choosing to walk into the unknown, I discovered that freedom wasn't necessarily about escaping any of it.
It was about no longer allowing it to control me.
I'm not claiming to have life figured out.
I'm not even claiming to have myself figured out.
But I no longer feel the need to.
I have a daughter to love. People to connect with. Kindness to give. Things to learn. Mistakes to make. Dreams to chase.
And a whole lot of life left to live.
That woman who wanted to someday help others?
She's still here.
Only now, instead of waiting until she's perfectly healed to begin, she's learning that maybe the journey itself is worth sharing.
I don't know exactly where this next chapter will take me.
For the first time in a very long time, I'm okay with that.
Because the past is no more, the future isn't promised, and right now?
I'm better than okay.
