I Am Not Who I Was. And I Am Okay With That.

Ya'll. I told you I was coming back to talk about this.

In my summer update I mentioned that I had been paying close attention to healing my nervous system and that I would share more about what that has actually looked like. Well. Chile. Grab something to drink because I have been doing the work and I have some things to tell you.

And I want to start by saying this. I am not the same woman I was even six months ago. Not even close.

And I do not mean that in a dramatic way. I mean it in the quietest, most real way possible. Something has shifted in me. And I think the people who have been around me lately can feel it even if they cannot name it exactly. So before I start showing back up in more spaces, and I will be, slowly, intentionally, on my own terms, I just wanted to sit with you for a minute and bring you all the way in.

Because you have been with me long enough to deserve that.

Here is what I did not fully understand about myself until this year. For all the healing work I have done, and y’all know I have done a lot of it, I was doing most of it while still moving at full speed. Speaking on stages. Writing. Building. Pouring out. Disrupting. Having the hard conversations nobody else wanted to have. And all of that was genuinely me. I am not walking any of it back. But what I did not know while I was doing all of it is that I was also quietly struggling with my mental health. I just did not recognize it because anxiety in survival mode does not feel like anxiety. It just feels like life. It feels like how you have to move to keep everything from falling apart. It feels like your personality.

It was not until I really slowed down that I could see what had been underneath everything the whole time. And what I saw was a woman who needed some actual, intentional, honest care. Not just prayer. Not just pushing through to the next thing. Real care.

So that is what I started giving myself. And let me tell you what that has actually looked like.

In December of 2025 I finally started taking anxiety medication. My doctor had actually tried to give it to me back in 2024. I took that prescription home, looked at it, and flushed it straight down the toilet.

Literally. Gone.

Now before ya'll come for me, let me explain. Both of my biological parents struggled with addiction. My grandmother. My uncle. It runs deep on both sides of my family. And so there has always been this fear sitting in the back of my mind about needing something. About depending on anything outside of myself to function. So I told myself I was fine and let that prescription go.

By December I was done pretending. I went back to my doctor and I said I need help. And this time I actually meant it. We started on a low dose, adjusted it a little, and it has honestly been one of the best decisions I have made for myself in a long time. I say that plainly because I know somebody reading this right now has a prescription sitting in a bag from the pharmacy that they have not touched.

Getting help is not weakness. Flushing the prescription because you are scared is not strength. It is just fear in a really convincing disguise.

Now. Can we talk about side effects for a second? Because nobody puts everything on the label.

My jaw was doing the absolute most. Tight. Clenched. TMJ to a degree I was completely unprepared for. And okay look. I am going to say this and keep it moving. Back in my younger, significantly less wise days, I may have tried an e-pill twice. I know. I already know. But my jaw on this anxiety medication was giving me very similar energy and I needed it to stop. So I researched, because that is what I do, and ya'll, I found something called a buccal massage. A certified specialist who literally works inside your jaw to release the built up tension. I know it sounds intense. It works. I am getting one next week and I will share the content so y’all can see exactly what it is. Because if your jaw is holding tension the way mine was, you need to know this exists.

And then there was the weight loss. Which honestly scared me more than anything else.

I have always been small, floating between 110 and 120 pounds, and I have just accepted that about my body over the years. But this medication took me below 110 for the first time in my forties and I was genuinely scared. I already eat like a bird on a normal day. The medication makes the appetite even quieter. I have to set reminders just to eat. Force myself to sit down and have a real meal. And then one day someone came to me completely out of love and said hey, are you okay? You are looking really thin. And ya'll I did not realize how visible it had gotten. It is one thing to be navigating something privately. It is another thing entirely to have someone hold up a mirror and show you what everyone else has been seeing. I am still working through this one. Still learning how to take care of this body even when it is not asking for it.

Being patient with myself. That is brand new too.

Something else happened once the anxiety got a little quieter that I want to share. Something I genuinely should have seen coming but did not. The medication settled enough of the noise that I could finally see clearly what had been underneath it all along. And what I saw waving back at me was ADHD. Pretty significantly.

My son has it. I know he did not get it from his daddy’s side of the family. So. Yeah. I really should not be surprised. But when you have been in survival mode most of your life the ADHD just becomes part of the background. The fifty thoughts at once, the jumping between tasks, the getting sidetracked from the sidetrack. That does not feel like a condition. It just feels like you. I carried it that way for decades without ever questioning it. Now that things have quieted down enough I can finally see it for what it is. I have a neurological evaluation booked for next week to get a formal assessment. My doctor actually sent me that referral back in June. Did I go in June? I did not. Because, wait for it, I got distracted. But I booked it this week and I am going and I am genuinely excited to finally understand how my brain actually works so I can stop fighting against it and start moving with it instead.

Can I just pause here for a second and speak directly to somebody?

If you are reading this and something is resonating, if you are recognizing yourself in any part of what I just described, I need you to hear me.

You are not broken. You are not dramatic. You are not too sensitive or too much or too needy. You are a person who has been carrying a lot for a long time and your body and your mind are just telling you the truth about it.

You deserve the same care and attention you have been giving to everyone else. And it is never too late to start.

Okay. I just needed to say that. Now let me keep going.

I also want to talk about Pilates because this has been one of the best decisions I have made all year. This is only my second week but I already know it is a long term thing for me.

Now I know some of y’all are already side-eyeing me. And listen, for a long time I avoided it too because the saints had me genuinely scared I was going to accidentally open a portal trying to stretch my hamstrings. I did not want to go to hell over a Tuesday morning class. But I am forty-four years old and I know exactly who my God is. What I needed was to learn how to breathe. Because trauma teaches your body to hold everything in and brace for impact. So many of us are walking around not breathing properly and genuinely have no idea. Six dollars a class at my local community recreation center, a room full of ladies of a certain age, learning breath work and getting still. And it is quietly doing something in me every single week that I did not even know I needed.

In this same season I also had to get honest with the people closest to me about where I actually am. I told my covenant sisters, when I go quiet in our group chat or I send a voice note instead of typing back, please know it is not that I am ignoring anyone. Sometimes my brain gets overstimulated and I just do not have the capacity to engage the way I normally would. And saying that out loud instead of just disappearing or pushing through, that was real growth for me.

The people who love you want to understand you. But you have to be willing to let them in.

So here is what I want you to know as I start showing back up a little more.

You are going to start seeing me out a little more. Some of it will be networking as I build out Rooted. But honestly a lot of it is just me choosing to be in rooms that feel good to my spirit. Women’s events around mental health. Gatherings centered on sisterhood. Spaces where I walk in and my nervous system can actually exhale instead of brace. I have gotten very intentional about only showing up where I actually belong, where something is being poured into me and not just taken from me.

The old me said yes to everything. This version of me reads the room before she even walks in.

The woman you are going to see is slower on purpose. More selective on purpose. More boundaried on purpose. She is not performing her healing for an audience anymore. She has done the work. She is still doing the work. And every single day she is choosing to protect the peace that work produced.

I am not who I was. And I am so deeply okay with that.

Before you go I just want to leave you with one thing to sit with.

When is the last time you actually looked at yourself? Not your schedule, not your output, not what you are producing or providing for everyone around you. Just you. The real you underneath all the roles you play every single day.

What have you been too busy to see? What have you been too scared to sit with?

You do not have to answer that out loud. But I need you to ask it. Because the most important work I have ever done has not been on any stage or in any room. It has been right here in the quiet with myself. Learning to see myself clearly. Learning to care for what I see. Learning that I am worth the same love and intention I have always poured into everyone else.

That has been the whole lesson.

And it has been worth every single hard moment of getting here.