Have you ever wanted to just press the reset button and start over again? All your mistakes and wrong turns and clutter would just disappear, and you’d be able to start from a totally clean slate. Using all your gathered knowledge you’d start your dream life and get rid of anything excess! Well, as someone who’ve been wanting this exact scenario for years – and now has been thrown into it without a say in the world: I would 5/5 not recommend.
Scroll down to continue reading about my story and how I plan to actually build my dream – so you can do it too (but hopefully without all the struggling)!
Background story
After leaving one (out of a series of) toxic relationship, I finally had the realization that I was worth so much more. I started experimenting with what actually made me happy, was testing out new hobbies I’ve been wanting to try out for years, moved to a newly renovated apartment and was more than eager to find my own true style with little belongings and nothing to hold me back.
A few months later I met the love of my life, and we quickly moved in together. Everything was perfect, but very shortly thereafter both my body and mind started failing me. I became sick, I developed more allergies, I was constantly in a stressed state but couldn’t feel it until I inevitably crashed… Apparently this is what trauma healing can look like in reality.
Physical symptoms of trauma healing:
When we get stuck in situations of prolonged stress, the body goes into survival mode and, for as long as it can, scoots away everything imaginable that’d be troublesome for that survival. Then, when we finally find ourselves in a safe environment after years and years of distress, the body starts dealing with everything it didn’t have capacity for before. It can seem like the body is cracking and breaking down, while in reality it’s actually the process of getting rid of shit in order to heal properly.
To not bore you with my life story – we were ready to build our Dream together, and with a strong vision we bought a small farm with huge renovation needs far away from the city. It was my biggest dream coming to life!
Two weeks later after signing the contract on the farm, we discovered that I was pregnant. That was all fun for about 3 more days – until I completely crashed. I couldn’t do anything anymore. It was like my body had finally had enough. I couldn’t go to work anymore, and by the time we were to move I was almost entirely apathetic with only a few moments of consciousness each week. This wasn’t the famous first trimester lethargy, it was a full blown burnout.
The starting point
It’s now been 8 months. For the last 1-2 months I’ve been experiencing a slight increase in my energy levels, but only to the point of managing to take care of the most basic needs, like making sure I eat when I’m alone, and going outside to sit in the garden instead of being inside. It’s insane how much energy the simplest tasks will take! Some days, I freeze while I prepare breakfast and can’t get going again for another 30 mins. Or what about the complete overwhelm when I want to take the trash out but can’t grasp how to do it because then I need to grab a jacket and what shoes am I going to take and what if it’s a slight wind and the jacket is too cold and somebody drives by and sees me wearing these pants and… Yeah.
It’s like my neurodivergence is done being managed, and is throwing the loudest party ever in my brain.
So that’s my starting point. Hopefully you’re not on my level of exhaustion, but I hope I can provide you with some inspiration and motivation to start building your own dream life as you follow along on my journey to recovery.
The truth about recovery & how to get there
I realize now (after having months to deal with accepting the fact of my lack of capacity) that recovery doesn’t look like my life before. Actually, I’ll never have that life back and that’s also something that’s taken me a long long time to come to terms with.
Recovery is something completely new. It’s a way of living that makes me proud over and satisfied by my accomplishments, while not pushing myself over the limit as I’ve repetetively done for all my life up until this point.
My body pressed the reset button for me, and while doing so some of the files got corrupted and can’t be used again. This is the hard truth of reality when you’ve pushed yourself too hard for too long, probably without even realizing you had a problem. On a positive note; the reset button worked as intended. After these months of barely living, and having a lot of time to think and hear my own thoughts loud and clear all day long (imagine being an A-type, overly-ambitious, people-pleasing person, buying a renovation project with your partner and having to watch him do everything by himself as well as take care of you…), I have for the first time in my life experienced what no stress feels like!
It’s amazing. What’s even more amazing is that I’m noticing how stupidly fast I get overstimulated by the smallest of things. The stress response is just around the corner, waiting to make a grand entrance like a narcissistic prick.
This newly found stress-free life is what I’m grounding my recovery journey on. I won’t let this feeling go, and I WILL still make sure that I achieve my dreams and goals. Just in a more… balanced way. Doing this journey while being a first time mom will be a ride for sure, but I can’t skip this one.
The way I plan to achieve this is by using all of my accumulated psychology knowledge after years of studying, and consciously design a life that’s manageable and aspirational. Why haven’t I done this before, you might ask? Like all of us, I’ve desperately tried over and over again with different techniques and approaches. I believe the difference lies in actually knowing my base level now, along with having cultivated a greater respect for myself by removing myself from mentally abusing environments and people.
So here we are. I don’t have a job anymore, no energy to find a new one, no money to buy clothes that fit my current body (yes, I constantly wear my partners old t-shirts and sweatpants because that’s all that fits), all of our belongings shoved in the barn for indefinite time storage, and let’s not forget the impending doom of becoming a parent which in and of itself is a really big change for all of us! We have a lot to conquer my friends, but for the first time in my life, I look forward to the journey into the future!
