What's the update for your life story?

Hi there!

Twenty years ago, I had just turned 18 and my dad hadn’t died yet.

I was preparing to move for my first year of college. I was working as a hostess at a restaurant, eating baguette and butter for dinner most nights I was there. I was in a relationship with a person who was exceptionally intelligent and emotionally manipulative, and I felt like I didn’t deserve anything more than I already had, in that relationship or otherwise. My self-esteem was tanked and I was depressed.

And then twenty years ago, on this day, my father had a brain aneurysm, lost all brain function, and was taken off life support 5 days later.

I started college two weeks later. My partner “tried” to break up with me a few days after school started, claiming that I was too emotional and too much, and he wanted to have fun and experience life (!). I shut down this option completely, begging him to stay with me, saying that I couldn’t do it without him. At the time, I probably couldn’t, but gosh do I wish I could go back to that version of me and warmly hold her shoulders and stroke her face and brush her hair from her eyes and tell her it would all be okay (and so much better) without him.

I moved through my first semester of college in a zombie-like state. I just scraped by where I could, going through the motions of completing my assignments and socializing when people would come to our dorm room, but skipping anything that wasn’t required. I didn’t go to parties and I went home most weekends when I could, needing the comfort of my family and the familiarity of home. By the time winter break came, I was depleted, more depressed, and hopeless.

My mom suggested I go see a local therapist, just for a session or two, to see if that would help. And it did. It really did. Just a few sessions with her while I was home shifted my entire perspective on the loss of my father. The opportunity to share my deep sadness, my overwhelming grief, my anger, with someone who was outside of my family system and my life in general was life-changing. I felt a sense of traction I hadn’t in months. I felt more like myself. I went back to school in January and told my friends how much better I was doing and that I had started seeing a therapist. Her name was Gretchen.

The trajectory of my life was different then.

Unfortunately, I stayed in that shitty relationship for another year and a half, but I eventually figured that out too. Once that happened, I really got clear on what I wanted and how I would get there. I started volunteering for our campus Sexual Assault Prevention and Awareness Center, shifted to a psychology and women’s studies double major, and never looked back.

I share this with you because sometimes we experience circumstances that keep us stuck and insecure and sad. Sometimes grief visits and we have no choice but to face it and welcome it so it will ease up and let us touch joy again. And sometimes, our beliefs about ourselves twist our narratives and our actions in ways that are out of our integrity but in our comfort zone. It might be this way now, but it doesn’t have to stay this way.

I have so much compassion for that version of myself, and I see her eyes through the fog of grief and confusion and insecurity. I see the spark in her that will eventually be cultivated into a long-burning flame, for justice and love and connection and community. She’s not there yet, but she will be.

One of the best parts of this story is the update: that twenty years later, I am a relational therapist and coach, a mother of two beautiful boys, a loving partner to an incredible human who is responsive, caring, and kind, and I make every effort to live my life with clarity and intention.

And now, I get to support people in finding the same thing. It’s by no means an easy journey, or one that is free of mess or struggle, but is it worth it?

YES. A resounding yes.

I am here and ready to do this work with you, if you are also ready and wanting something different. I have coaching openings beginning in September and I trust that our work together is going to be so good. If you are curious, you can schedule a clarity call to see if we are a fit—because that is important.

Thank you for reading, for being here with me, and for taking this journey back in time to honor what has transpired in the past two decades of my life. I feel very lucky, privileged, and grateful.

Warmly,

Elizabeth