Thirty Years of Pain I Didn’t Know I Was In

For thirty years, I lived inside pain without knowing it had a name.

When I was twelve, I used to sit at the top of the stairs at night, listening to my parents argue. I couldn’t hear the words—only the tone. Raised voices. Tension. Anger vibrating through the walls. When it stopped, I would run back to bed and pretend I was asleep, as if stillness could keep me safe.

That feeling—unsafe, uncertain, afraid—became the background noise of my childhood. It lasted until they divorced when I was seventeen.

I didn’t know how to talk about what I felt. I didn’t even know what I felt. I didn’t speak properly until I was three. I had dyslexia and dyspraxia. Inside me grew a quiet belief: I’m not enough. I’m not capable. I’m behind.

So I found another language.

Movement.

By the age of twelve, I had built a gym in my bedroom. Training became my refuge, my release, my control. I trained to burn off feelings I couldn’t name. To stay strong enough not to feel weak. To build armor around a nervous system that never felt safe.

Fight. Flight. Freeze.

I lived in all three—depending on the day.

That armor worked… until it didn’t.

What began as protection slowly became punishment. Training harder. Pushing further. Ignoring signals. Proving worth through endurance. The same beliefs—not good enough, not lovable—followed me into my career and my relationships.

In 2012, my body finally spoke louder than my mind ever had. I herniated my spine—L2 and S1. Years of overtraining layered on top of decades of unexpressed pain. The lesson I refused to learn kept repeating.

For ten more years, I moved in and out of pain—physically, emotionally, mentally—still clinging to the same coping mechanisms that once saved me.

Until I stopped.

Yoga slowed me down. Reflection softened me. Stillness showed me what effort had been hiding. I realized something confronting and freeing at the same time:

I wasn’t broken.

I was protecting myself in the only way I knew how.

And it was hurting me.

When I finally let go—of old identities, old defenses, old ways of proving myself—everything changed.

Today, I am pain-free.

Not just in my body—but in my heart and mind.

I breathe fully.

My heart feels full.

I am at peace.

And for the first time, I’m not surviving life—I’m living it.

After thirty years, I finally get to live my dream life.

Questions for You

• What coping mechanisms have you built into your life without even realizing it?

• How might they be holding you back—from love, health, connection, or fulfillment?

• Which beliefs are they reinforcing: I’m unlovable, incapable, not enough, not important?

• Are you ready to thank that part of you for protecting you—and finally let it go?

Because sometimes, the very thing that once kept us alive…

is the thing that’s quietly keeping us from truly living.