When Pain Speaks: How My Body Forced Me to Wake Up
Yesterday, while reorganizing my closet, I found something I hadn’t seen in years.
A notebook.
Not just any notebook, the notebook I wrote in when my life was at its lowest point.
Reading it felt like flipping through the pages of a different version of me.
A version that was drowning.
A version that didn’t know if she would survive another day.
This is the story of how my body screamed for help when my mind had nothing left.
And how I finally started listening.
Rock Bottom — October 2022
I had just lost everything.
My job at Coolblue was gone.
My children were staying with their father.
And I was alone. Completely.
I was in such a deep depression that being alive felt like a punishment.
The week without my kids was dangerous, every day felt like a chance to end it all.
Jorge, someone who knew what that darkness looked like, started coming over every day. He had lost someone to suicide before, and he didn’t want to go through that again.
His presence may have saved my life that time.
But I still didn’t know how to help myself.
The Symptom Log. A Body in Crisis
I had made a doctor’s appointment and was referred to a specialist.
Before I went, I kept a 3-day log of my symptoms so I wouldn’t forget what to say.
Here’s a glimpse of what I wrote:
-
Shaky after dancing for one song
-
Sharp pain in lower back, stiffness, sensitive skin
-
Sudden pressure under my ribs
-
Shooting pain in my wrist, left leg, collarbone
-
Numbness on my left side — panic attack, ER visit
-
Full-body exhaustion, constant dizziness
-
Feeling like something was crawling under my ribs
-
Intense pressure in hips, spine, shoulder blades
-
Vomiting from the pain. Unable to walk upright.
My body was shutting down.
And no one could explain why.
The Diagnosis That Changed Everything
I saw a specialist.
No muscular disease.
They sent me to the pain center.
There, after an intake conversation, the woman closed her book, looked me in the eyes, and said:
“We can’t treat this here. Your pain is psychological. It’s trauma, stored in the body.”
She immediately referred me to the ER for psychiatric emergency care.
And just like that, I was admitted to the PAAZ (Psychiatric Unit).
It was the first time anyone said it out loud:
“You’re not sick. You’re in survival mode.”
What My Body Was Really Saying (Looking Back)
When I found that notebook again yesterday, I asked ChatGPT to help me analyse what was happening back then and what it told me blew my mind.
Here’s what was really going on beneath the surface:
1. Chronic Nervous System Overload
I was stuck in fight-or-flight.
The stress of losing my kids, my job, my safety, and all previous traumas had pushed me into pure survival mode.
My body was screaming: “I can’t carry this anymore.”
2. Functional Neurological Symptoms (FNS)
The numbness, weakness, and “paralysis” on my left side weren’t imaginary, but they had no physical cause.
It was my nervous system shutting down to protect me.
A disconnect, not a disease.
3. Pain as a Messenger
Every ache had a message:
-
Lower back pain → no support, overburdened
-
Rib and chest pain → restricted breathing, trapped grief
-
Left-side shutdown → blocked feminine energy, vulnerability, receiving
My body wasn’t attacking me.
It was begging me to come home.
What Has Changed Now?
Everything.
I’m not on medication.
I didn’t get “fixed” by a doctor.
No miracle pill saved me.
What healed me was:
-
bodywork, Shakti mat, foam rolling, deep stretching
-
Journaling & breathwork
-
Pure, clean nutrition
-
Learning to speak to myself with love
-
Daily rituals that anchored me into safety
-
Mindset tools that reprogrammed my story
-
Facing the truth, instead of running from it
And above all:
I stopped seeing pain as the enemy.
The One Truth I Now Live By:
Pain is not punishment.
It’s a message. A compass. A doorway.
And when you finally stop fighting it,
you can finally hear what it’s trying to say.
My healing wasn’t linear.
Some days I fell back.
But every time I chose to breathe through it instead of push it down, I got stronger.
And now?
That girl in the notebook…
She’s gone.
Not because I erased her
but because I held her.
And gave her what she needed all along:
Love. Safety. Permission to feel.
Final Words
You are not broken.
You’re not weak for feeling too much.
You’re not dramatic or lazy or failing.
Your body is wise.
Your soul is tired of running.
And your healing is waiting for you to say:
“Okay. I’m ready to listen.”
And if you're here, reading this —
that means you already started.
Welcome home, love.
You’re safe now.
Reactie plaatsen
Reacties