Today’s Disaster Diary comes to you from the floor of my childhood bedroom–turned–home office, because I needed to feel grounded in the one room that has always felt peaceful and safe.
I talk about feeling physically run down, emotionally raw, and deeply reflective as I sit in that space and reach for my Brené Brown books, especially Braving the Wilderness. Her words about not belonging in your own family crack something open for me, because that’s exactly what this season feels like.
I unpack the tangled mess of:
I read and reflect on Brené’s idea that not belonging in our family is one of the deepest hurts we can experience, and how the “third way” — owning our pain and turning it into empathy — is the one I keep choosing, even when it hurts like hell.
There’s talk of job hunting in a saturated market, trying to figure out how to work while managing constant appointments, skipping movement because I feel like garbage, and still tracking protein like the strong bariatric girlie I am.
It’s vulnerable, unpolished, and tender — a real-time snapshot of what it feels like to navigate caregiving, grief, and being the black sheep who keeps choosing compassion anyway.
See you tomorrow for the next installment of the Disaster Diaries. đź’›
This episode includes discussion of family estrangement, painful comments from relatives, caregiving stress, job loss anxiety, and feeling like you do not belong in your own family.
family estrangement, not belonging, Brené Brown,...
