Why Did I Take A Break?

I know I disappeared. I am so sorry for ghosting you. I want to be flat and honest: I took a mental health break. There were other reasons, but this was the most important one. I want to normalize stepping back without having to justify it, because honestly, I couldn’t show up.

The weight of low self-esteem

My self-esteem was at one of the lowest points it has ever been. I didn’t like the way I looked. I didn’t like the way I spoke. I had zero confidence. When you’re already in that fragile place and something triggers an old trauma, you just want to hide in a hole. I didn’t want to be the one talking or the one people were looking at. That same feeling applied online. I didn’t want anyone watching my videos or hearing me talk because I just wasn’t confident about who I was.

The guilt of stepping back as a leader

Taking that time off was difficult in a way that made everything worse. I have a team that runs the show behind the scenes. For them, this is their work. Telling them I couldn’t do it felt like a lot of pressure. I had to explain that I wasn’t ready, and that was embarrassing. When you’re the boss, everyone expects you to be the confident one making decisions. I felt like I was failing at being a leader. I would think, “I’m such a loser.” I had no confidence in my thoughts, and I couldn’t convey them. I felt like a total failure and that everyone could see it.

When life hits again: a friend’s loss

I was finally ready to come back. I was sitting at the office, waiting to record, when I got a phone call. A very dear friend, 39 weeks pregnant, lost her baby. I burst into tears and left for the hospital. It shook me from the core. I’ve been close to her throughout her pregnancy, and this hit different. I felt devastated. I don’t think there is anything worse than this kind of loss. I don’t know how you ever recover from it. Most probably you just learn to live with it.

Sitting with helplessness

Watching your dear friend go through a pain so big is painful too. You feel broken, helpless, and honestly, guilty. Guilty for having everything okay in your life. People say you should be grateful, but that feeling of wanting to be grateful also feels wrong. You don’t feel grateful. You just feel awful. Even saying these things feels selfish. The best I can do is be there, exist, be the one she can talk to, listen to, or just be a distraction for. I think it’s important to let the person lead the way and how they want to deal with this, rather than imposing how you feel they should.

What I’m learning about showing up

I don’t have it sorted. I don’t know the right words. I’m smack in the middle of this, still trying to understand. But I wanted to be raw and real with you. Maybe someone who can relate will have someone to listen to. Life is unpredictable. What you have to do, what you want to do, and what you end up doing, it’s just something else. I hope that by sharing this, I can normalize the breaks we all need, and the messy, heavy feelings that come with them.