Unmasked - Becoming Who I Am

The Cost of Being the Strong One People call you strong. They tell you how resilient you are, how much you can handle, and how they don't know how you do it all. But what happens when being the strong one starts to come at a cost? In this episode, I share my thoughts on the hidden weight that many people carry, the pressure to keep it together, show up for everyone else, solve the problems, an...

At three years old, Lainie was surrendered to foster care. Years later, after experiencing abandonment, neglect, foster care, poverty, and relationships that mirrored the chaos she grew up around, she found herself searching for answers to questions she had carried her entire life: Am I worthy of love? Why do I keep repeating these patterns? Can a person truly break the cycles they were born into?...

Most of us don't see ourselves as we are. We see ourselves through stories. Stories we've been told. Stories we've experienced. Stories we've repeated so many times they've started to feel like facts. "I'm not disciplined." "I'm not confident." "I'm always the one who quits." "I'm too much." "I'm not enough."...

What happens when you grow up feeling different from everyone around you? In this episode, I sit down with Michelle St. Croix for an honest conversation about identity, Treacher Collins syndrome, social anxiety, depression, self discovery, confidence, and what it means to learn how to take up space in a world that constantly makes people feel like they should shrink themselves. Michelle opens up a...

Most people think they need motivation before they can change their life. But honestly, That’s usually the last thing to show up. In this first episode of Season 4, I talk about why getting started feels so uncomfortable, why the first few weeks of any routine are mentally exhausting, and why so many people quit before they ever give themselves a real chance to grow. This episode dives into: fear...

Panic attacks are not the same thing as anxiety. I didn’t fully understand that until this year. In this final episode of Season 3, I talk about what it’s like when your body feels unpredictable, and your brain no longer knows whether to trust a sensation, or fear it. Because panic doesn’t feel mental to me. It feels physical. Dizziness. Sweating. Throat sensations. Feeling like I’m going to pass...

What happens when your body sends a signal… and you can’t tell if it’s danger or fear? In this episode, I talk about what it’s been like navigating panic attacks, food fear, ARFID, and the exhausting reality of not fully trusting my own body. When physical symptoms and panic start overlapping, everything feels uncertain. And once fear gets attached to food, driving, or your own physical sensations...

What happens when your body starts feeling unsafe… even when every test says you’re okay? This episode is different because I’m not talking about something I’ve already healed from. I’m talking about something I’m still actively living through. The panic. The throat sensations. The dizziness. The fear that something is seriously wrong, even when the doctors are telling me I’m fine. When you stop t...

What if the things you’re proud of… are actually survival patterns? Before I understood my brain, my body was already trying to tell me something , through food, control, and the way I related to myself. In this episode, I talk about my history with restriction, bingeing, body image, and the patterns that looked like discipline from the outside… but felt very different on the inside. Not everythin...

The first time, you’re scared. The second time… you realize it can come back. In this episode, I talk about my mom’s breast cancer returning, and why it hit differently than the first diagnosis. Because this time, it wasn’t new. It was proof. Proof that something can be gone… and still come back. And while I was trying to be strong for her, I was also dealing with something else, the quiet fear th...

What happens when loss doesn’t come one at a time… but all at once? In this episode, I talk about a period of my life where death stacked , losing my cousin and my uncle within days of each other while I was pregnant, and how that experience shaped the way my nervous system responds to the world. Grief doesn’t just make you sad. Sometimes it teaches your body something. Something about how quickly...

What if something serious happened in your body… and you didn’t even know it? Before I understood anxiety, my body was already sending signals I didn’t know how to interpret. In this episode, I talk about migraines, vision loss, and the moment I found out I had experienced silent strokes, without ever feeling like something was “wrong.” Because it didn’t feel dramatic. It felt normal. That’s what...

What if your body becomes so unpredictable… your entire life starts to revolve around it? There’s a part of my health story I avoided talking about for a long time, because it was embarrassing. In this episode, I share what it was like to live with severe gut issues in my early twenties, how it affected my daily life, and the way it quietly shaped my relationship with food, control, and safety. Be...

What if calm doesn’t feel safe… because you’ve never lived there before? We talk a lot about diagnosis. We talk about finding the right medication. We talk about relief. But no one talks about what comes after that. In this episode, I talk about what it actually felt like when the noise in my brain quieted , and why calm didn’t feel like relief at first… it felt unfamiliar. Because when your ident...

What if the thing that feels “responsible”… is actually fear? In this episode, I talk about what happened after medication started working, and why I still didn’t trust it. From switching to a “safer” option that didn’t work for my body… to learning how to choose something that did, even when it felt uncomfortable to trust. Not all fear is protective. Sometimes it’s just familiar. This isn’t reall...

What if your brain finally gets quiet… and you don’t trust it? When people talk about ADHD medication, they talk about productivity. That’s not what happened to me. In this episode, I share what it actually felt like to start medication, navigating fear, past addiction, and the moment everything in my head went quiet for the first time. Because the biggest shift wasn’t getting more done. It was fi...

What if nothing is wrong with you… you’ve just been given the wrong explanation? For most of my life, I was told I had anxiety. But nothing ever fully fit. In this episode, I talk about the moment ADHD entered the conversation, not through a diagnosis I was searching for, but through a conversation that felt… familiar. Because it didn’t feel like discovering something new. It felt like finally und...

There’s a word I avoided for a long time. Not because I didn’t believe in it. But because I was afraid of what people would assume about me if I said it. That word is transformation . When we restructured the gym, everything became intentional. Programs. Tracking. Goals. Results. And I had to admit something: I care about outcomes. Physical. Mental. Lifestyle. For a while, I told myself that focus...

This isn’t a grand reveal. It’s not a list of rules. It’s not a perfectly packaged conclusion. It’s where I’ve landed, for now. In this short season finale, I share what healing actually taught me. That anxiety isn’t proof you’re broken, it’s proof you adapted. That control is a strategy, not a flaw. That bodies aren’t problems to solve,  they’re systems to understand. That you can respect yoursel...

People love the story of starting a gym. The passion. The freedom. The dream. What they don’t love is the part where you almost lose everything. I got tagged in a post about a small studio opening in Burford.  They were looking for someone to subcontract. I jumped in. And I gave 110%. Eventually, the owner admitted he didn’t want to keep running it.  He gave me two options: Take it over. Or walk a...

There’s a part of the story people skip. The part after you decide what you want…but before you actually move. That’s where fear pretends to be logic. I was certified. On paper, I was ready. But internally? I was frozen. I had the knowledge. I had the experience. What I didn’t have was permission. The pandemic made it easy to stall. Gyms closed. Rules changed weekly. “It’s not the right time” beca...

For a long time, fitness was personal. It regulated my nervous system. It helped me cope. It made me feel like myself again. But at some point, it stopped being personal. It became responsibility. Getting certified wasn’t the hardest part. The weight came after, when I realized what it means to tell someone what to do with their body. In this episode, I talk about: The gaps in education around wom...

I want to talk about a moment where trust didn’t explode. It shifted. Sometimes it’s not one big betrayal. It’s a series of small moments where your body starts to feel… off. This relationship began during a vulnerable season of my life. I had just chosen myself.  I was still rebuilding. And I opened faster than I normally would. Then something changed. Words and actions didn’t fully align. Nothin...

I didn’t fall in love slowly. What I felt was immediate. Grounding and destabilizing at the same time. And that should have scared me. From the beginning, something felt different. Not fireworks. Not obsession. Recognition. Like my nervous system exhaled before my brain could catch up. In this episode, I talk about what happens when you grow up in chaos, and safety doesn’t feel safe. When regulati...

I didn’t start dating because I was healed. I started dating because I was lonely. After asking for a divorce, nothing got quieter. The house was still full. The tension was still there. The world had shut down. And I had chosen myself… with nowhere to go. Dating apps weren’t about romance. They were about distraction. About adult conversation.  About being reminded I still existed outside of moth...