Discovering the Courage to Share Life's Deepest Scars

Embracing vulnerability can be a daunting prospect, especially under the unforgiving lens of social media. But what happens when you peel back the layers for all to see? This episode traces my own unfiltered journey through the highs and lows of public openness, from confronting the sting of online backlash to discovering the unexpected solidarity it can bring. As I lay bare the emotional cost and the eventual empowerment of sharing personal traumas, I invite you to reflect on the resilience we all possess and the healing that comes from staying true to our stories, even amidst the noise of negativity.

Venturing further into the healing process, we navigate the turbulent waters of past traumas and self-discovery. Writing becomes a vessel for navigating the seas of emotional turmoil, as I recount the transformative power of putting pen to paper. It's here that I confront my own narrative of seeking validation and the patterns that once held me captive. This chapter in my life's tale illustrates the potential for change and growth, an opportunity that awaits each of us. By sharing the path to my personal renaissance, I hope to light the way for others to step out of their own shadows and into the warmth of healing and self-acceptance.

As we wrap up, the spotlight turns to the sanctity of safe spaces and the pivotal role they play in our emotional and spiritual evolution. I discuss the varied landscape of healing, from the indispensable guidance of therapists and coaches to the transformative realms of quantum healing and alternative therapies. My approach to aiding clients is laid out as a testament to the courage it takes to heal and share one's truth, underscoring the responsibility we all have to forge our own paths to wholeness. As we part ways this week, carry with you the empowering message that despite the challenges, our stories hold the key to unlocking a future rife with possibility and hope.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:36

Hello everyone and welcome back to the Amanda Quick Show. I'm your host, amanda Quick, today's episode. I was originally going to share another crazy story of mine, but I decided to save that one for another day and instead share with you something else, because I've had some really interesting conversations lately and I feel like what may be supportive to others out there right now is to respond more publicly. So some of the questions I've been getting lately about what healing looks like Now I won't say this is the same for everyone. I mean, part of the framework that I'm developing is exactly that it is not the same for everyone and how and why that is. But what there are as we are all humans some similarities and a lot of what we need to do when it comes to healing is the same sets of things, just in potentially different orders or in slightly different ways of looking at things. Let me explain here because some of the questions I got. I actually got an email from somebody who found me on TikTok asking if I had ever experienced threats of lawsuits or defamation suits or people coming at me publicly for sharing my story, and while I hadn't had that exact experience from a legal standpoint, I have had a lot of backlash when I first came out with my story publicly and when I first took my story to social media, I did it in one to three minute increments on TikTok, and then I discovered you can't put three minute videos on Facebook, so I chopped them up even further and there was a 13 video series of the first, probably year after my ex-husband's arrest, and what that looked like. And those 13 videos became 13 times three in the Facebook land, and so people were getting one to three minute snippets where I see things like I bonded him out, where I see things like I aborted a child, where I see things like I chose to believe him. And the comments on those videos were atrocious, they were horrific, they were threatening, they were, you know, accusing, they were. I'm the problem. All of these things, these horrible things that people came at said to me, and so I've experienced all kinds of versions of that and the way that I wanted to respond to this person who sent me, you know, a question basically in how do you, how do you go about sharing your story when that's the response you get, and how do you go about sharing your story and actually getting help and feeling healed when, as you're trying to help and as you're trying to share, that's the response you get, and I don't think she's the only one. And so I think it's really important that we talk about this, because I'm a huge advocate for others to share their stories and to inspire other people to share their stories.

Speaker 1: 3:48

But if you start to and you get that kind of reaction, well, it's not going to feel very safe to continue. It's not going to feel, if anything, it's going to feel like you are being re traumatized and re victimized because other people are misunderstanding your words or other people are accusing you of things that aren't true, or they're not seeing the full perspective, or they're taking, you know, the one minute snippet and making assumptions. And what I want to say to everybody who's in that situation whether you're this particular person or you're anybody out there who's experiencing that kind of backlash is, first of all, you're not alone and, second of all, there is a way through this, and there is a way through that isn't just taking the videos down and deleting them, because there was a time where that would have been my response. My response would have been screw this, I'm taking it down, I'm hiding, I'm isolating, I'm not doing it, but that's not who I am today. That's who I was back in 2016, 2017, when I deleted all social media accounts and I refused to talk to pretty much anybody because I was terrified that somebody was going to come at me or somebody was going to tag me in a newspaper article post or somebody was going to message me horrible things. I was absolutely terrified of it, so much so that I deleted, deactivated everything so that they couldn't.

Speaker 1: 5:12

But today I'm a very different person. You're now, eight years later. I'm doing the opposite. I don't even delete those posts, I don't delete those comments, I don't even react to response anymore. And let me tell you why. And at first I was a little taken aback by it. I won't lie there. That's absolutely you're like, excuse me. And the human instinct is to defend yourself, right, you're to defend yourself and you don't have the whole picture. You don't know all the things, or how dare you say that to me, or whatever.

Speaker 1: 5:46

But after sitting with it, I realized that if I didn't do anything and if I just let them make an ass of themselves which is really what they're doing when they're, you know, throwing their shame and judgment at me on social media, but I didn't do anything. Pretty quickly, the next person to read that comment would come to my defense. Whether this person had also been an abusive relationship or had, you know, seen more of my videos or whatever, would immediately come to my defense. And all of a sudden, this comment thread would be is back and forth between these two other people and and the Facebook or the TikTok algorithm really likes that. They really like it when people engage and comment on your videos. And all of a sudden what I have a seeing is my videos just blowing up because of people arguing in my comments. I didn't have to do anything, I just put them out there and let the world handle it.

Speaker 1: 6:45

And what I realized is that all of that commentary as long as I didn't let it affect my emotional state, as long as I didn't take any of it to heart and take it as truth, and if I felt any truth in anything anybody said, that was an opportunity for me to go. Okay, that hurts. Why does it hurt? Is there some part of me that still holds guilt here? Do I still have shame about those choices? Do I still feel like I was a bad mom or I did the bad thing or whatever it is, and if I feel any, even a minuscule amount of it, this is an opportunity for it to be lifted up and out of my system. And if that's gone from my system, then I really can just let the Facebook land take care of it and use this to actually get more people to see my videos and see my story and get my message out there. And when I shifted it like that, it was a fascinating change because I also got a whole lot less hate comments and if I did, those videos just got more attention and more support.

Speaker 1: 7:57

I mean, I got ridiculous comments like I was recording videos first thing in the morning and people were like you never wash your hair and it's like that's not actually true. I just hadn't yet this morning, you know, and they're having judgment about my appearance and all kinds of silly things like that. And I have curly hair. I'm sorry I don't wash my hair every day and I'm actually supposed to. But you know, I don't need to defend myself, I don't need to explain why I'm showing up the way I'm showing up. It worked for me to record the videos first thing in the morning, when today is. That was my, that was the guidance I got from myself about how to create this series, and I wasn't going to worry about what I look like or the rest of it, because I wanted it to be raw and real and true to my experience. That's what I, that's what I wanted and that's what I did.

Speaker 1: 8:47

And so when people are saying you know how do you share your story, when you get that kind of backlash, my reaction and response to them is if that backlash is causing you emotional or mental suffering, then it's time for you to do some more healing work. And that's not always an easy response because you know this. This particular person who responds back to me was well, the mental health system is not supporting me, it's not helping and I don't know where else to go. And that's actually an even harder hurdle for most people is who do I actually turn to for help? Now, I've been in traditional therapy many various times. I've been in traditional therapy in my teenage years and all through my divorce. I've done all kinds of version of talk therapy, emdr therapy, all of that.

Speaker 1: 9:40

And in the midst of active PTSD, in the midst of being in my situation, therapy was needed. I needed a place to just vomit it all out. I just needed a place to talk out my feelings, share what was going on. Just, it was really a dumping ground. That's what I needed and that's what talk therapy does do well. But after it was over and I was no longer in direct threat and I was no longer in constant fight or flight, it's not what I needed anymore and it didn't actually support me.

Speaker 1: 10:12

I had both therapists that I was going to during my divorce and then shortly after, basically say I was graduated, I was done. They did all they could do for me and, as a patient, on one hand, you're like okay, so it means I've done the work, I'm doing good. On the other hand, well, what do I do now? Because healing is not a linear finished, you're just, you're fixed. It's not a bone that's now no longer broken. It's much more complex than that, and so I knew that there was more more to it.

Speaker 1: 10:44

I knew that, on some level, I created this experience for a reason and I needed to understand it. It had to hold a purpose for me, and that, I think, is something that's true for so many of us who go through big traumas or big situations. It's you get out, you get out and you go what? What the heck was that about? Why? Why did I have to go through that? What was the point? And I needed there to be a point that was more than just so you don't do it again or so you get to safety. I needed there to be a bigger, a bigger picture. I needed it to matter, and I needed to be able to use my story in a way that was not just about me and my kids. I needed it to be about the overall bigger picture system to the problems in the world in a bigger way. I needed it to be able to help inspire other people too. I needed that for me, and I truly believed that by going through something as big as I did, that I was given this gift, this opportunity to use this horrible, horrible, shocking thing that happened to get people's attention and to use it to share how, even when it really really, really sucks, there is a way through on the other end. And so I really wanted waits until I had done some work before I actually wrote my book, and that I was writing my book not from a place of need to have more talk therapy.

Speaker 1: 12:22

My book wasn't written in a way that was about dumping it out. It wasn't just a word vomit of things in my head. I wrote my book, literally taking the reader through everything that happened in my mind, chronologically as it happened, taking you through my every thought process, my every fear, my every feeling and everything that happened to me. And so I got to relive in detail everything that happened from the other side. And so not only am I taking the reader down the journey with me, I'm also taking them through and out the other end, and I'm doing it knowing that I may get through, because I'm writing it from. You know the future where I have made it through.

Speaker 1: 13:09

But I also get to use it as a healing process in itself, because reliving in detail as I'm writing is causing those experiences to have an emotional reaction in my body. I'm having pain show up in various places. I'm re-experiencing the emotional traumas. I'm re-experiencing all the thoughts that went on, all of the what if and supposed to's and have to's and how bad can it, does it have to be, and all the things. All the mind spins everything.

Speaker 1: 13:39

I'm re-experiencing them as I'm putting them out on paper, and then I'm also re-experiencing what I did to come out of that situation and what I did to shift and change so that we did come to safety. And I get to do so in a way that now is this doorway of invitation, because I get back in the hole with you. It's like I climb back in there and say, wow, it really sucks. This is what I went through and this is everything that I felt and everything that I thought and everything that happened. And then I say, but I found this door over here, this other tunnel, and I found a light and I turned it on and I said you know, I think this is the way to go and I take you down that journey. And I find myself out of that hole and I say do you want to come with me? And so I get to share my story from this perspective of I see you, I get it, but you don't have to stay here. It's okay that it's currently all you know, but you don't have to stay there anymore and you can come out through this other way if you want to, and it's okay if you're not ready right now, but there is this other opportunity and I will be here when you are.

Speaker 1: 14:52

That's how I wrote my book, and so what I want people to know is, when you go through a deeper healing process, when you go through a process that isn't just getting it out and talking about it, but actually looking and reflecting back on what created this situation to begin with, what installations and beliefs about relationships, about yourself, about the world, still exist that in some ways caused this situation? No, you're not to blame 100%. Not You're not to blame for other people's choices, but on some level there is a pattern in yourself that has invited that experience to be part of your reality and that's not easy to look at. You know for me and myself and looking at my teenage years and everywhere that I sought to have male attention because of my dad leaving my life, where I sought to be validated by my peers and the only ones who would do so were the way to older males in my periphery and I got a lot of inappropriate attention very, very early, teaching me that that's where my validation came from, that's where my worthiness came from, and so those patterns got deeply ingrained in me, and so when I received male attention from other inappropriate people, it excited me because that's the pattern that I knew and that's the belief that I held about myself and I refused to see any red flags that negated that, because I didn't want to. I didn't wanna see what was in front of my face, because I was so focused on feeling appreciated and loved by somebody who was inappropriate that I didn't wanna see all the ways that that was not okay.

Speaker 1: 16:45

You know, when I first met my now ex-husband, he was married to somebody else and we were dating in secret for over a year. Massive red flag right, and yet I didn't wanna see it. I was 18, 19 years old. It was different with me. I had all these stories built up in my head that I was special and different and it was true love and blah, blah, blah, blah blah. But you can say, yes, I was young and naive, that is true. And yet I also was young and naive and had this pattern built up already, believing that my validation and worthiness came from the physical attention that I received from inappropriate men. And so then, when he did eventually leave his ex-wife and we started our more public relationship, I jumped head first in and said I was right. I was right, he did leave. It took a year, but he did, and now we're gonna live happily ever after.

Speaker 1: 17:36

I built this whole thing in my head, but it was a pattern of beliefs that wasn't even based in reality, because I was choosing not to see so many things and all of the red flags that continued through our relationship. I had all of the explanations for and all of the reasons that that wasn't true. And well, now we're living together, or now I'm pregnant, or now we're married, or all of these things. So this is what it is and I'm gonna choose to say I'm grateful that he financially provided for our family and I'm not gonna never mind that he never, hardly, is home and doesn't talk to us and doesn't give me the time, attention or anything that I need, because I have this wonderful family and I have three children and I'm so grateful for my life.

Speaker 1: 18:19

And I just put the blinders on. I literally had tunnel vision. I only allowed myself to see what I wanted to see, because for me, that's how I stayed safe. It's how I stayed safe in my body and in my world by not seeing all the potentials and possibilities around me. And so when it was smacked in front of my face, I still didn't wanna see it. I still said no, that can't possibly be true. My tunnel vision is even stronger. I'm gonna hold to it and I stayed in my marriage and I bailed him out and I focused on all of the reasons that no, my faith in him has proven true thus far right, I mean obviously hindsight.

Speaker 1: 19:01

And yet when you're in it, you can't see what you don't want to see. You can't shift out of this because it would be so incredibly unsafe in your body. You don't let yourself and the thing that's the hardest to release and to heal from is the shame and the judgment that you hold on to for those moments when all you desperately want to do is to hold on to that safety, the safety and the known and the beliefs that you have and what has worked thus far. And you hold so tightly to those beliefs and this identity that you've created for yourself of who you are, who the world around you is and your place in it, when you eventually can't anymore because the world shakes it too far and the blinders have to come off. The amount of shame and judgment that we hold on to us for ourselves, for the choices that we made with the information we had and our blinders on, that's what really, that's the hard work, that's the deeper stuff, and those things don't always come out in traditional talk therapy. I certainly never did in mind they don't come out in, you know, talking to a regular mental health counselor. I haven't experienced that. I'm sure there's wonderful ones out there and I'm not going to say that if your therapist is amazing, great, I'm so happy, because the ones that I have experienced that's not their goals. Their goals are just to be a place to receive and to help you work through today's stuff, not to necessarily reflect on everything else, because that's just at least how I have experienced said things.

Speaker 1: 20:52

Now, instead, my focus after all of this was to do the deeper work, is to find the whys and the understandings and to shift my own beliefs about who I am and my place in the world and why I am here and all the things that matter to me as a person who's now overcome and can reflect and look back on my story in a new light. And I needed to get to that point to be able to feel safe enough to share my story with the world truthfully. And coming to the place of safety within myself means that people can say whatever the hell they want about the choices I made eight years ago. That's great. You are definitely not going to say something that I didn't say to myself many, many times. I'm not worried about that because I know now that I've worked through those pieces and I'm not going to say 100% because, honestly, it's not. New.

Speaker 1: 21:51

Stuff comes up all the time, but for the moment, as things have come up, I found those opportunities and I say, ooh, that one stinks. Okay, I've got some more stuff there, let's go look. And instead of hiding from my triggers and hiding from the trauma, I just I go searching for those gifts underneath it, because they give me more data, more information, more that I can share with other people, and instead I want to use every lesson and learning as an opportunity to share with more people. And so the journey that I went on, instead of traditional therapy, I went down a spiritual journey, and I've talked about it on this show before, but I went on a spiritual journey. I entered spiritual communities, online healing communities.

Speaker 1: 22:40

I took classes on quantum healing, which, to me, my definition of quantum healing, just to share with here, is when I look at healing on a not just linear level, when I look at it on a physical, mental, emotional and spiritual level, and I look at it from a past and future self perspective, so it's outside of linear time and it's on multiple dimensions of self and quantum. Healing encompasses all of that, because I believe that the universe is not a linear thing, that we are currently experiencing it in a linear way through this reality, but everything actually is happening at the same time in this now moment and the more I can bring it all together, the more I can work on healing what has happened in the past and make sure that those things don't happen again in the future, because the beliefs are changed now, in this moment, not back then. They are what they are back then, but today I can change them and I can look at what happened back then in a new light and I can look at the things that I experienced in a different way and I almost changed the past experience by doing that, and that allows me to be in a place where I don't have PTSD. I have healed that. I don't get trauma triggered on a regular basis Not at all. I generally go through my day fairly, even, you know, emotionally, and yeah, I have my good days and bad days we all do but I have so many tools to help myself come back out of emotional situations or mental mind spins, and I have a different level of people in my periphery that speak a language about healing in a different way, and I value and appreciate every single person who hears me out as I'm processing things or who gives me a perspective that maybe I didn't see, because ultimately, at the end of the day, every version of my experience, everything I currently experience in my reality, is a reflection of those beliefs, of the things I'm still holding. So if there are things I don't like in that experience, it's on me to dig into why that's happening and on what part of me thinks that this is what I'm worth or this is my value or this is how it has to be, for whatever reason I've decided.

Speaker 1: 25:04

And so you know, today the spiritual and healing communities are different. You know, when COVID hit, so many things went online and there was a huge influx of healing communities and they don't not exist anymore. But the one I was in does not exist anymore and there were their own issues with them. To be totally honest, I wouldn't recommend most people go down that path today, because there are other options available today and, what is most important for anybody really wanting to explore deeper healing or anybody really wanting to dig in, is finding somebody whether it is a therapist, a counselor, a coach, a spiritual teacher, whatever. Whatever it is, finding somebody that you feel safe with Not kind of safe, but you feel safe to tell your deepest, darkest, really yucky stuff too.

Speaker 1: 26:00

Somebody that you can feel like they can see you, they can see you and they can hold what you have to say and what you've experienced. And not get emotionally triggered back Is one of my complaints about talk therapy, one of my complaints about the mental health system is the vast majority of people on the other end of the chair listening to you have their own traumas and triggers and they haven't been taught or they haven't been really released those traumas and triggers, in a sense, to not react. They don't, they can't help it, truthfully. But when you say something that's happened to you and you can feel their response of judgment, even if it's about their own experience, that just re-traumatizes you, that just re-triggers you and makes you feel like shit, I am a bad person, I did do it wrong, I'm not worth it. And even if that's not the words that come out of your mouth, every single human on this planet can feel somebody else's response and you can feel it in the unsaid things are almost even worse than the things that they do say.

Speaker 1: 27:10

And so finding somebody that you feel safe and you know, no matter what you say, they can hold it and they're not gonna judge you for it Non-judgmental, safe space to unwind in the process, and a good therapist, a good coach. Mostly they ask questions, they help you come to those deeper understandings for yourself, but they ask the pointed questions that might point out a pattern, that might ask a question of how this relates to your childhood or other relationships you've had, or how this relates to the way you currently are making an income and the beliefs you have about yourself there, or whatever version of things that they see as parallel. They're gonna ask those questions and they're gonna allow you to reflect and say is this connected? How is it connected? What is the belief I'm holding onto? What is? What emotions are coming up when you ask me these questions? Where is it in my body and how do they need to be expressed and moved and shifted? All of that is this deeper quantum healing work. It's the deeper work that brings up what's happened in the past, that brings up the potential and the fears in the future and instead takes a look at who you are today and allows you to feel safe and seen and not judged for any any part of your experience so that it can start to come out and start to be moved and that be held onto, to be further triggered and traumatized in the future. That's what I think is the thing that most people actually need to heal, and finding someone who you feel safe with, who you feel supported by and can hold that.

Speaker 1: 28:53

Now I take a very, very small amount of one-on-one clients. I don't have the time or capacity to have a full caseload. No, I truly want to, because my goal is to do more one to many and more sharing and bigger stages and all that's currently my trajectory. But if you are looking for that and you feel like I might have that space for you, please do reach out. You can send me an email, amanda, at amandacquikealingcom. It will be in the show notes and I will send you a link and we can chat and see if it is aligned. But I'm not the only person out there offering such service and I'm not the only person out there who's been through horrible things that can hold safe space, but I am the only person out there that I know of that can hold space for certain deeper, deeper, horrific traumas without an emotional reaction response. I'm sure there's others out there. I have just not met one that I feel that I could honestly recommend.

Speaker 1: 29:52

Now, that said, sometimes, if things are not quite that deep or that bad, there is other people you feel safe with and there is potentially a counselor or therapist that could work for you, and there may be other opportunities and other avenues. But the first step is to recognize that there is deeper work to be done and to then start to say, hey, I'm looking for this, I'm looking for support, what's available? Maybe it's I want somebody in my specific area that I can go to and feel safe in their physical presence. Maybe it's even a body worker, massage person that can help you move through physical unsafety and feeling safe to be touched in various parts of your body, because people who've been through physical traumas don't relax around physical presence, and somebody you felt safe with might be a step in that direction. Maybe it's somebody who you can feel safe to cry around. Maybe it's somebody you go on a hikes with and help move the emotions and you just scream and cry and get it out. Or maybe it's somebody more like a coach or a therapist that can help you work through the mental beliefs and processes. There's so many versions of support out there and it's not. It doesn't have to look like the traditional therapist or religious support. There's other opportunities if you're willing to open the door and ask the universe for help and guidance and be open to things. Looking maybe differently than you thought.

Speaker 1: 31:15

There's also lots and lots and lots of books out there today about healing and changing your beliefs. I, early on, I read the power of now trying to focus on being present in myself and listening to my body. I've talked before. I've read the nature of our personal reality one of the Seth books and that really helped me understand how our beliefs create our reality. But there are many, many, many books about healing yourself and our ability to do so. You know we've got Joe Dispenza and his Becoming Supernatural book and he talks a lot about healing. You know cancer and other really bigger physical ailments and there's so much out there, so much content, so much free content, whether it's YouTube's or podcasts or whatever books, and there's also the one-on-one support that, if you're really ready to do the deeper work can be completely invaluable in unpacking and feeling seen and safe, maybe for the first time ever, so that you then can feel safe to share your story and just feel safe to co-out.

Speaker 1: 32:17

And whether it's stages or books or social media or a podcast or whatever it is, your dream is Feeling safe, that, no matter what the reaction or response is, no matter whether it's a defamation lawsuit or it's accusations or it's social media trolls, that you don't feel shaken, that you don't feel pushed back, that you don't feel like somebody is coming at you and now you're re-traumatized and re-victimized for just trying to help. That's my goal is to have and create and share how important this safety is in ourselves, in the deepest part of ourselves, and recognize that we are responsible for creating our internal safety physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually. We are responsible for our beliefs in this now moment. We are responsible for creating our reality now and going forward. And if we get that and if we're willing to unpack all of that and look at ourselves, I truly believe we can do anything. But if you're somebody who also wants to share your story, it's even more important to do that work so that you can do so safely and help others do the same.

Speaker 1: 33:29

All right guys. That is all I had for this week. I hope you enjoyed this episode and I will see you next week. Lots of love.