In March 2005 I experienced a dark night of the soul. I was 25, had broken up with my boyfriend 4 months previously and had started my first business 6 months prior to that. I was struggling in every area of life. I was gripped by fear, my thoughts a repetitive swirl of how I was intrinsically flawed and so there was no point in trying to do anything about it, how I would never be happy, or a success or anything else. I didn’t know how to run a business or how to actually take care of myself. I was popular, pretty and social and yet I often felt very lonely; I was dying inside.

One miserable Friday I got my period and a chest infection, I felt absolutely hopeless and desperate and I decided that it was time to end it all, that it would be better for everyone around me and definitely better for me. I just wanted the emotional pain to stop. I lay in bed and took a bottle of Valium, closed my eyes and waited for it to kick in. I have no idea what happened between then and 2 days later when I woke up in hospital. I must have called my ex because he took me to the hospital, but I have no idea what the details are because he said it was too traumatic for him to ever talk about. To this day, I don’t know.

At that time in my life, although I had wonderful friends around me, I didn’t have any path walkers, way showers, people who’d been there before me and knew that this type of absolute despair can be a powerful doorway to transformation. I didn’t understand what was happening to me, how to process it or how to get out, I just knew I needed help and it wasn’t coming. I was released from hospital quickly because I didn’t have a mental illness i.e. I wasn’t schizophrenic, paranoid, narcissistic, borderline, anti-social or fit into any of the other ‘personality disorder’ boxes, but still I knew something was very wrong and I didn’t know what to do about it, only that I couldn’t go on the way I was. A year or so later, I was diagnosed with Complex Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (C-PTSD) and basically told that there wasn’t much that could be done about that apart from managing it (turns out that certainly isn’t true for me or for many others I have worked with and/or know)

The next 10 years were a rocky road of self-discovery and navigating really in the dark. You name it, I tried it! I spent well over 6 figures and countless days and nights in therapy, learning different healing modalities, healing my trauma and looking at what was really ‘me’ and what was a learned coping mechanism all in the name of soothing my soul, getting intimate with my interior world (like how do I actually ‘work’??!!!!) and finding happiness. On the outside, I was ‘Doing All The Things’ building a successful business, buying property, traveling to the world’s most luxurious and beautiful places, having deep relationships with interesting men (albeit men who wanted to marry me or have a baby with me but not both – more on that story another time) Nothing quite ‘did’ it. My life was full of relentless and uncomfortable change – relationships ended, I moved countries (a few times) and I felt exhausted by it all – I was trying to find a bit of steady ground to stand on – catch my breath... if only I could get married, live in one house for a little while etc etc. I was still looking for fulfilment in external circumstances and looking for someone else to fix and save me (whether that was a therapist or boyfriend). My mantra was “I will be happy ‘when’…” of course that ‘when’ never came. Would never come until I really made the decision to get into a great relationship with…. Myself!

I started having coaching in 2014, at the same time I entered into a path of sexual healing. I was 10 years into my journey and still didn’t have a clue how to self-regulate my emotions or my nervous system; I didn’t really get why it was so important to move my nervous system from fight or flight to rest and digest (even though stress is the biggest cause of disease – the gravity of the fact that I was constantly living in fight or flight aka fear really hadn’t landed with me). I still didn’t really understand why I felt so fucked all the time or that I could get un-fucked. 

How I related to myself, the world, men and everything in it changed radically within 6 months of receiving coaching. It was like seeing behind the curtain in the Wizard of Oz. The coach helped me understand how I worked – she shone a really bright light on things that I believed that didn’t serve me and the many behaviour patterns I had that were defensive and disconnecting. I finally started to understand myself and prioritise my relationship to myself - self-love and acceptance flowed from there, I didn’t have to try at them. It was suddenly clear why I behaved the way I did, why others behaved the way they did and how to shift my experience. It was so revelatory I decided to train as a coach.

‘Coaching’ doesn’t do justice to the transformation I underwent when I entered into my first coaching container or what I do with clients today, however it’s the best word I have to describe what in essence a highly effective method by which to navigate through the terrain of the psyche.

I learned that the power to heal is within me (within all of us) and that with the right help and support I could self-heal. I discovered that I could balance my own frazzled nervous system (stress is the single biggest cause of both disease and dis-ease) and made it a priority.

Where once I’d felt victimised and powerless over my life, I discovered I truly was the creator. I couldn’t change what happened in the past, but I could turn the lead into gold by using what I had learned to support others.

By focusing on my insides my experience of life has radically shifted. I don’t have all the things I want, I am not (yet) married or have children of my own (even though I have a phenomenal track record of helping other women clear the blocks to receiving those things) however I am deeply happy and contented. If it doesn’t happen, I still love my life. I never believed it would be possible to feel like that a few years ago. People ask me why I haven’t frozen my eggs, but the truth is I am surrendered to the process. If it happens… awesome! If it doesn’t… awesome! I’m rarely self-conscious (hello, I even posed a clip of me dancing to insta the other day) I’m connected to my sexual energy, to my feminine powers and I feel radiantly beautiful. I look in the mirror and I love the woman I am. This is unfathomable to that desperate 25-year-old girl who thought that the only way out was death.

I know you want all the things and I believe you can totally have them too! And, I must say, what my experience of over half a decade of coaching people with privilege beyond imagining has shown me is that it won’t make you feel good long term. Only getting into a healthy, loving, empowered relationship with yourself can ever do that. Focus on the insides and the outside will take care of itself.

Now you know the whole me, I hope I get to know you.