In 2016, I started journaling like my life depended on it—because in many ways, it did. My body was in crisis. My mind, shattered. My nervous system was holding the weight of unspeakable trauma. I was navigating the aftermath of a violent event that shook my family, my identity, and my home to its core. But somewhere in the rubble, I had this whisper: Write it down.
So I did. Nearly every day. Scribbled truths. Small victories. Mysterious symptoms. Quotes from books that landed like medicine. Details about court dates, gut issues, yoga classes, my daughter’s routines, and the moments that hurt the most—like when someone refused to meet my partner’s eyes in public, or when I was too scared to share what was really happening.
These were the notes from the edge.
Looking back now—over 492 days into what I called “the adventure”—I can _see something I couldn’t then: I was healing in real time. It was messy, raw, and unglamorous. But it was healing. And if you’re reading this now—if you’ve been through trauma and you’re still walking forward—I want you to know something: You are healing too.
The Body Keeps the Score, But So Does the Soul
When I reread entries from those years, I see what I couldn’t quite articulate then: my soul was trying to survive. A violent event had tried to strangle the life out of me—not just physically, but energetically, emotionally, spiritually. And the trauma didn’t stop with the incident. It rippled through my home, my relationship, my daughter’s life.
The stress manifested in migraines, neck injuries, gut issues, and emotional paralysis. But even then, my body was also trying to heal. I started to piece together tools—rebounding, inversions, deep pranayama, sunbathing, journaling, Bikram yoga, trauma-informed parenting, meditation, and more.
What I didn’t understand at the time—but I now teach through my work as Superhuman MAMA—is that healing is not about fixing yourself. It’s about remembering yourself.
Why Travel Was a Surprising Therapy
One journal entry from our spring break trip reads:
Traveling to new places is actually a wonderful way to heal your brain from trauma because your mind is busy mapping new territory, not regurgitating the past.
This is real. When we’re in new environments, our brain activates differently—it’s not in the loop of hypervigilance. It starts taking in fresh data, forming new connections. In a way, we become new too.
Taking that helicopter ride over the mountain we’d just snowboarded felt like flying over my pain. Not away from it—but above it. Higher perspective. Literal and metaphorical.
This is what I wish more survivors knew: You don’t have to be stuck in the cycle of reliving it. Your brain and body want to heal. They are constantly trying to return you to wholeness. We just have to give them a way.
The Real Damage: What Happens to Our Children
But the part that never leaves me—the part I kept writing about again and again—is how this trauma affects our children.
The court drama. The tension at pick-up and drop-off. The stomachaches. The sleep disruptions. The emotional whiplash of going between safe and unsafe environments. The fear. The shame. The confusion. The loss of innocence.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again:
When violence erupts inside a family, the ones who lose the most are the children.
This is what fuels the blog now. This is why Strangled in La Jolla will always exist. Because this story is not just mine—it’s so many women’s story. And more often than not, it’s hiding behind curated Instagram feeds, matching family outfits, and forced smiles.
We need a movement.
I dream of a hashtag that starts showing up everywhere:
#StrangledInYourCity
Because this didn’t just happen in La Jolla. It’s happening in Austin. In Chicago. In Charlotte. In Boise. In YOUR neighborhood. It’s happening to women who are too afraid to speak—and too exhausted to keep silent. We need a digital lighthouse. A place to process. A space to remember who we are beyond what happened to us.
What I Know Now
Today, I don’t need to purge like I once did. The frantic “get it out of my system” energy has softened into something else: a calling to teach.
To show women how to rebuild. To offer tools. To create safety. To become the mothers we needed for ourselves. To honor our stories—but not live in them.
That’s the work of Superhuman MAMA. But Strangled in La Jolla is the root system. This is where I cracked open. This is where I became.
So if you are still in it, please know this: you don’t have to climb your way out all at once. Start small. Take a walk. Lay on the floor. Breathe deeper. Write a page. Drink water. Say “no.”
And if no one’s said it to you lately:
You’re doing a phenomenal job.
Keep healing.
Keep moving.
Keep telling the truth.
You are not alone.
With you in the stillness and the fire,
—Superhuman MAMA
Strangled In La Jolla 