Where My Wisdom Comes From

What illness, heartbreak, and neurodivergence taught me about resilience, purpose, and the power of going through, not around.

"Every time I talk to you you tell me something life changing" said a client during a recent session.

I mentioned that my suggestions don’t come from textbooks, they come from digging deep into the mud of suffering I’ve lived through, and making use (not excuse) from all of it, the best I can. So I explained a variation of the following for her.

I have a Master’s in Social Work, and I’m proud of that; but it’s the tip of the iceberg. It taught me a lot, but the good stuff. The HOLY CRAP stuff!

THAT, I earned from walking in the fire, over and over.

It began after chemo, when my body said, Enough. I was 18, cracked open by cancer before I had a clue who I even was. That brush with mortality stripped away the illusion of control. It made life painfully honest. I couldn’t keep living on autopilot. That’s when I made a vow: I would stop running from pain and start listening to it.

The real wisdom?

It’s found in the places we’d rather avoid; the deepest hurts and the darkest shadows. That’s where I go within my own experience. And that’s where I’ve found everything worth sharing.

I don’t want to be controlled by pain. I want to mine it for the wisdom that comes from understanding it, working through it, and getting clearer about myself and my life.

And that kind of clarity is only found on the other side of “through.”

Let me know if you'd like this in a stylized blockquote or included in your Substack post.

Years after surviving that, I entered a marriage that would become one of the most emotionally painful chapters of my life. The divorce wasn’t just a separation; it was a reckoning. I had to untangle years of people-pleasing, lost identity, and silent suffering. And I had to do it while raising three boys with autism.

That’s why my first tattoo was a phoenix. Below is an image of it right when it was complete. This was after my divorce (I was 40 yrs old) and determined to come through it reborn, and stronger.

My sons have been some of my greatest teachers. Advocating for them meant learning to advocate for myself. Fighting for their rights in schools, navigating therapies, enduring stares and judgments in public. It shaped me. It woke me up to how systems fail people like us, and how often we’re expected to carry the load without complaint.

Then came the neurological symptoms; tingling in my hands and feet, dizziness, fatigue. I was eventually diagnosed with Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome, a connective tissue disorder that explained the chronic pain I’d normalized for years.

That was followed by a diagnosis of Multiple Sclerosis. I went from standing on stages around the world to working from bed. I lost mobility, energy, and the ability to ignore my own body.

But I also found something else: truth.

I found that the more honest I became about my pain, the more people opened up about theirs. I found that real healing doesn’t come from pretending to be strong; it comes from learning to stay soft in a world that keeps asking you to harden.

The things I share with my clients don’t come from theory. They come from surviving what I did, feeling it all, and choosing to stay awake. Every strategy I teach, every insight I offer, has been tested in the storms I’ve lived through.

This isn’t just a profession for me; it’s a calling.

You’re tired of walking through the fire, you’re carrying more than your fair share, if you’re tired of being the strong one while no one sees your pain, know this:

You’re not alone.

You’re not too much, too broken, or too late.

You’re in the exact right place to begin again.