The Illness That Took Everything… And Led Me Here

The story behind The Wellness Path Coach

I push myself to be vulnerable at times, but not like this. It has been a long time since I’ve opened the door this wide into my personal life.

When I decided to go all in to become The Wellness Path Coach full time, and follow my passion to help others, I also made the decision not to hold back. To do it right, to be raw and real. Is this comfortable? No. Is it a valuable message to share and does it align with my heart and soul? Absolutely.

So here it is.

There was a time in my life when I was living what felt like my best life. It was 2010. I had just bought a new journal and wrote on the inside cover: “2010 – my best year yet.”

That journal held a long list of all the plans I had for the year ahead. I still remember the excitement I felt as I wrote them down, never once imagining that life was about to take an unexpected detour.

I was happy, healthy, and active. I was married with two young children, living in a new and wonderful neighborhood, surrounded by friendships that felt warm and easy. Our kids were in elementary school and life felt full and vibrant in the way you hope it will be when you build a family. I was very active, spending my free time in the gym, pushing my body the way I always had.

Then the symptoms started. At first they seemed random.

A lip twitch was the first one I recall. I had just left the gym and I remember sitting in the car rubbing my lip, somehow thinking I could make it stop if I just pressed hard enough. It came and went and I eventually ignored it.

Then I started getting rashes, my hair began falling out, my vision would blur and I was dangerously underweight. Headaches became constant, my hands and feet would turn purple from vascular issues and my body would swell in random places. Sometimes a cheek, sometimes a finger or an ankle. My heart would pound or race without warning.

My body felt like it was breaking down… out of nowhere. And I had no idea why at the time.

But the scariest part wasn’t me. It was my kids.

My daughter started sleeping sitting upright for nearly two years because she couldn’t breathe lying down. Night after night she had to prop herself upright just to get enough air. Imagine watching your child try to sleep like that.

She and my son both had various issues, and watching your children suffer when you don’t understand why is a kind of fear that is hard to describe.

And yet every day I still had to walk out the front door and pretend life was normal. I would say hello to the neighbors, talk to my kids’ teachers, and do my best to smile and make small talk. But my heart just wasn’t in it.

I was always in my head, trying to solve our medical mystery. Or I was busy seeing so many doctors and specialists, undergoing tests and relentlessly seeking answers. My smile may have well been painted on, because inside I didn’t feel like smiling.

It is such an indescribable feeling when I reflect on it now, as I write this. I don’t look back at it much and prefer to live in the now, but I’m willing to for the greater purpose of helping others.

As my symptoms increased, all I had the energy and focus for were my kids. Friends wondered why I kept saying no to plans. Even the few close friends I opened up to eventually seemed to grow tired of hearing about it.

While it was painful, I understand it now. It’s easier to support someone when there’s a clear end point… like recovering from surgery or healing from a broken bone. But in our case, there didn’t seem to be an end in si. I’ve come to realize that prolonged suffering can be difficult for some people to witness, because it forces them to confront their own mortality and the unsettling truth that something like this could happen to anyone.

The kids were in elementary school then, and I remember the strange looks when I didn’t volunteer for PTA or show up for events. Even missing a cookie exchange caused issues with friends. I recall that specifically.

I was sad it came to that, but I was living in something far too serious to spend much thought on it.

Nevertheless I withdrew a bit more, and it became lonely. Even when I was around people, I felt lonely because most people couldn’t understand. How could they when I couldn’t understand either?

From the outside it probably looked like I had withdrawn from life. But the truth is I was fighting for our health every single day. It was an incredibly isolating journey.

The vibrant, energetic woman I had always been was still inside of me but seemed so far away most days…everything I was carrying was taking a toll on me in every possible way.

At that time, one of the hardest symptoms for me was anxiety. I had never experienced anxiety, and it came on as a physiological anxiety from my nervous system. Suddenly my nervous system felt like it was constantly on edge, like something was wrong all the time. It was unfamiliar and frightening.

But one part of me was still alive and well: The investigator. If you ever need a determined investigator, find a mother whose children are sick. I was relentless.

I saw specialists. Integrative physicians. Naturopathic doctors. Chinese medicine practitioners. Acupuncturists. Homeopaths. I tried treatments, supplements, juicing, detox protocols, IV treatments, Stem Cell Therapy and anything someone suggested that might help.

We even flew to the National Institutes of Health hoping someone there might finally connect the dots.

I was simultaneously looking for answers and trying treatments and that was my life.

I signed up for every class I could get my hands on, read every book I could find, and spent far too much time in chronic illness Facebook groups.

I originally joined them hoping to find answers, but what I found instead was the community I needed at that time. Other people in my shoes, who could relate. For the first time I felt seen.

Having that community became a piece of my healing… finally seeing others who were going through what I was.

I started my own group online at that time, to help others with chronic illness live well in spite of circumstances, because helping others was the only thing that felt good to me during that time. I now know there is a science to that, but that’s a topic for another time.

Looking back, there are many things I would have done differently had I known then what I know now.

My marriage was already collapsing under the weight of everything we were going through, but then something happened that made the next step obvious.

It was the beginning of winter and we turned on the heater in our house for the first time that season. Like many people do, we opened the windows and left the house so the dust could burn off.

When we returned a few hours later, my kids and I almost immediately started reacting. Within thirty minutes my son had a nosebleed. My daughter’s eyes turned red and her nose began swelling. My skin and eyes were itchy and burning. Headaches followed for all of us. Something was certainly wrong.

The property manager came over and vacuumed just inside one of the vents with a hand vacuum, to check what looked like a black area. He said everything looked fine and it was probably just an allergic reaction to dust.

The next day my daughter came to get me and said there was “black Sharpie” dots on her wall.

I went to look. It wasn’t Sharpie, it was mold and my heart sank. I knew we had our answer.

“It wasn’t a Sharpie. It was mold.”

Mold in the air ducts.

In the very room my sweet young daughter had been sleeping upright for two years. Mold had come out of the vent and made it’s home on her wall, spreading around the vent like dark ink.

When the vent had been vacuumed, it disturbed the mold inside the ducts and pushed it out into the house, although the toxins had been airborne for years, according to the expert I had come in. I was soon learning about the dangers.

I remember the shock of realizing what we had been breathing for so long.

The kids and I left that house the very same day.

We never went back except to remove what little of our belongings we could salvage. If you aren’t familiar with black mold…you lose just about everything.

I even wore a hazmat suit when I went back in. Yes… it was that bad, although everything about our house looked normal except those “sharpie dots.” The dangers were lurking where we couldn’t see.

That house, a place where dreams had been hoped for, where the memories of raising my babies lived, had been robbing us of our health.

Every part of our life was changing. We spent part of the week in a hotel and part of the week at a friend’s house until I could figure out a plan.

The hotel staff even put up a Christmas tree in our hotel room. I will never forget their kindness. There were so many moments like that throughout.

It all felt surreal. I had been a healthy, successful woman living a stable life with my family. Now I had no home, a failed marriage, failing health, and two sick children depending on me.

One of the things I remember most is my daughter had a large collection of stuffed animals, and we had to get rid of them all because of the mold.

As we drove away from our house, I took her straight to the store to pick out a new one. My heart ached every moment.

When we finally saw our doctors again, it was confirmed that we had our answer. Mold exposure. Toxic black mold, as we had it tested by a special mold remediation company.

It had been robbing us of our health. Unfortunately, there was no quick fix. Healing from mold exposure is slow and complicated, and it leaves lasting effects.

It became about doing whatever I could, day by day, to rebuild some kind of life for my children and myself. In some off way, I had closure and was ready to think present and forward.

Eventually we moved several hours away to live closer to my family. Life was different but full of hope, because we finally had answers and a plan for moving forward. I was excited to start again in my hometown.

I still can hardly believe what came next. We settled into our new home and I got the kids into their new school. But it was February of 2020, and the novel virus COVID did not care about everything we had just been through.

For the first time I had doctors who could clearly see my decline. They were incredibly kind and genuinely wanted to help. But I still didn’t have answers. And then, just three weeks later, the world shut down…quarantine.

By that point I felt like I was losing my identity. The vibrant, capable woman I had always known myself to be felt like she had disappeared somewhere along the way.

I kept it together for my children. But there were days I truly didn’t know if I would wake up. That is something hard to publicly share, but if I’m being honest, I should say there were also moments I didn’t even want to wake up. Except the love for my children kept my mind steady, so I didn’t sit with those thoughts long.

During that time I prepared my version of memory boxes for the kids. Inside I placed letters, photo albums, and small gifts for milestones I was afraid I might not live to see. Their sixteenth birthdays. Their graduations. Moments I didn’t want them to feel alone during if I wasn’t there.

I wasn’t being dramatic. I truly didn’t know if I would make it. And yet somehow, little by little, I did.

Somewhere along the way something inside me shifted. My body was still struggling, but I realized something important.

I was still here. And if I was still here, then I had a choice.

“If I was still here, I had a choice. Stay trapped in survival mode… or fight my way back to living’”

I could stay trapped in fear and survival mode… or I could fight my way back to living. Not just existing. Living. I wanted to genuinely feel happy again.

So I began studying. Before this point, it was purely for survival. I wanted to understand what had happened to my body. I wanted to help my kids. I wanted answers no one had been able to give me. During that time I studied as if I was a doctor, reading research articles, PubMed, medical books, learning all I could about mold, it’s affects and treatments. I was seeking to heal us physically and did all I could do. Then I just had to have patience, which I was lacking!

At some point, I happen to come across neuroplasticity and then it hit me. I was spinning in circles and my body was going to take time to heal. I needed to look at my mind and the way I felt about it. I needed to change my perspective in a real and lasting way to get my body into a healing state, and it was excited to learn this was possible.

Vegetable juice alone could not rebuild my life. Healing required rewiring my nervous system, my thoughts, and the way I showed up in the world.

So I took more classes. I was the definition of a lifelong student. And I began showing up in the world.

I studied the nervous system. I studied the mind-body connection. I studied stress responses, trauma, and how our thoughts and nervous systems shape our health. I learned meditation, mindfulness, positive psychology, and more.

But the most important part wasn’t the studying, it was the practicing. I began applying what I was learning. Truly applying, every single day.

I worked on calming my nervous system, and rewiring my thoughts and changing the patterns of thought that had formed during years of fear and survival.

And something else that became incredibly important for me… I pushed myself back into life.

Social environments were hard at first. After years of illness, isolation, and stress, it’s easy to forget who you were before such a traumatic time, and it can feel difficult to relate.

But I refused to continue living in my small world I had created, and pushed myself to connect again. To laugh again, go places again, experience true happiness again.

Not because everything was perfect, but because I wanted to live. And I wanted to live well.

At one point I was in so much physical pain that I could barely function, and my doctor referred me to a therapist at a top ranked research university. He wanted to be sure I had support for the stress and pain I was carrying.

I remember him explaining something that has stayed with me ever since.

He said we all have a baseline of health, and severe stress can actually change that baseline. If that happens, it becomes incredibly difficult to recover unless you address the stress itself.

That conversation changed the direction of my life. It reminded me I have some control. So I studied harder, and I practiced harder.

I studies all the pieces that make up true wellness. I began practicing what I was learning with even more intention. I started a gratitude journal using science-backed techniques. And I forced myself, no matter how I felt physically, to do some of the things that had once brought me joy.

One of my favorite memories was a challenge I gave myself. For thirty days straight, no matter how I felt, I visited a new coffee shop every day. I made myself get out of my own head. I made myself strike up conversations with people in line like I used to before everything happened.

No looking down. No hiding behind my phone. Just being human again.

I documented each little coffee shop adventure so I had something light and joyful to focus on. Each visit grew easier. By the 30th day, I was laughing and smiling again, made some wonderful connections and learned alot about coffee along the way! My symptoms were still there, and some days were still hard. But something inside me had changed. I was ready to focus on living again. I was ready to turn the page on a very long and painful chapter. I have since become certified in The Science of Well Being, and now realize that I was rewiring my brain during those 30 days of going to the coffee shop and taking myself through it the way I did, including the journaling.

That daily practice contributed to changing my thought process, and outlook. Even documenting it later in the day, contributed by helping me relive a good and happy moments, and also was increasing my well-being and happiness.

I was shocked. My body was still struggling, but I was changing.

Everything I studied and practiced changed me. And slowly something beautiful began to happen. The woman I thought I had lost started to return.

Not the exact same version of her. A stronger one, a wiser one. Someone who understood health in a way I never could have before.

Over the years I continued studying. I finally found something that was truly helping.

So I kept going. More courses, more certifications, more programs and especially more practice.

At some point I stopped keeping track because I wasn’t collecting credentials. I was collecting tools. Tools that helped me rebuild my life.

Eventually something became very clear to me. Everything I had been through… the illness, the searching, the rebuilding… had prepared me for something:

To help others who are walking their own difficult paths. That purpose eventually became The Wellness Path Coach.

Not a perfect path, a human one. Because healing is rarely linear or simple. But know this - it is always possible to rebuild a life that feels meaningful, joyful, and full again.

“Post-traumatic growth is real. Sometimes the hardest chapters of our lives become the ones that teach us how to truly live.”

And if you are reading this while walking through your own difficult season, I want you to know something I wish someone had told me years ago.

You are not crazy. You are not weak. And you are not alone.

There is always a path forward, sometimes it just takes time. Sometimes courage. Sometimes someone walking beside you reminding you that healing is still possible. And the nervous system needs to be tended to, in order to put the body in a healing state.

This goes for all types of healing.

There are actionable steps that can get you to a much better place, but only if you take the steps. We are so wired to survive and scan for problems and for safety, that sometimes we need to rewire our thought process for well-being and happiness. And it’s really amazing that we can do just that!

I want to reiterate that the tools I’m talking about help in all areas of life which I find really amazing. This knowledge helped me rebuild my health, my mindset, and my life… and ultimately my happiness. Genuine happiness, even when circumstances are hard.

My hope is that something in what I’ll be writing and teaching about will help light the path for you too, so I’m here to share one blog at a time, one seminar at a time, one workbook at a time… whatever it takes to reach the people who need to hear this.

If this resonates with you, I hope you’ll let me know in the comments below, and subscribe, share, and join me on this journey to help people truly heal.

xo,

Linda, The Wellness Path Coach