Vulnerability for me was the hardest obstacle to get over. I have feared being seen, really seen my whole life and my past trauma and struggles have made me believe that allowing yourself to be vulnerable is a bad thing. I knew logically this wasn’t true but the belief has been embedded deep into my subconscious mind for so long that I didn’t even realise it was there until I peeled back the layers, there were so many layers, and realised how much this was affecting my life.

As a young child I became very ill. I was diagnosed with a condition called Schurmann’s disease, which is a condition which affects the spine and growth of the vertebrae’s and caused excruciating pain and limited mobility. Every year when I grew the condition would flare up meaning I was unable to go to school, needed home schooling and had to go through agonising treatment. As the years went on forming friendships and having a normal social life became more and more difficult and as a result I was very badly bullied, to the point where at the age of 14 I had a nervous breakdown. This was my first experience of crippling anxiety and it would come from nowhere full force knocking the breath from me, numbing my whole body and immobilising me. I was so scared of this happening that I couldn’t go out alone and was like a prisoner in my own home.

After receiving a lot of help I moved school and was happy but everything I tried to do after leaving school was cut short because of horrendous back pain. First I went to College to do Childcare but that was too taxing on my body so I worked away at holiday parks for a couple of years and had an amazing time then came back and studied Beauty Therapy as I was told my health problems would resolve when I was fully grown. Unbeknown to me I had nerve damage in my spine and although I did qualify as a Beauty Therapist and started working in a Spa I would end the day crying with pain and eventually had to give up.

I took on a job where I was sitting all the time and this worked well. I was madly in love and everything in my life was moving along so well. Then my world was blown apart by trauma and within 2 weeks I could hardly get out of bed. I was completely exhausted and every part of my body hurt. 2 years of back and forward to the hospital followed until I was finally diagnosed with Fibromyalgia and later ME.

I went from being a positive determined go getter to an absolute shadow of my former self. I had carers in and out of my house and had to have someone with me dressing me, helping me to bathe etc. It was soul destroying. My breaking point came when home support said they would have to install a commode in my bedroom as I couldn’t get up to go to the toilet without the chance of my legs going from me. By then I had spent some time in the sun for my sisters wedding and although I had gone there with wheelchair assistance within a couple of days I was walking around feeling better than I had in years and even managed to walk down the aisle with my sister, a memory I’ll never forget. So I decided to take a huge leap of faith to see if I could get a better life and went to Honduras to volunteer teaching English to underprivileged kids.

It was not easy to begin with. I was exhausted all the time and the people who were also volunteering didn’t understand why I was there and thought me a bit of a burden to begin with. Slowly that changed as I proved I was there for me, to improve my life and the experience was the most humbling and biggest changing point in my life.

When I returned to Scotland I became very sick again but I had fire in my belly and was determined to get out of the situation so I trained to be a teacher of second languages, mainly from my bed, and then moved to Spain where I taught on and off over 3 years. I loved it and felt for the first time I was ‘normal’ whatever that is. The problem came when, although I was completely honest with my employers about the fact my body would flare up sometimes, usually resulting in me ending up in hospital, when it actually happened there was no understanding and I was fired from my job and would have to return home again. This eventually became too much and lead to my decision to do something where I could work for myself on my terms.

I knew I wanted to help others as I felt I had overcome so much in life and felt I could be a positive influence on others but wasn’t sure what I wanted to do. I started working on myself and my mindset and found a love for meditation. I came across the “Yes Supply” course and Reese Evans and everything she stood for I resonated with. Now I’m fully qualified in NLP, Hypnosis and Life Coaching and I’m ready to go out in to the world and use my experience and all the tools I have to help others.

As you can see I have learned to embrace ‘Vulnerability’ even though it is still a huge challenge for me. I decided by putting myself out there raw and real and saying ‘This is me’ will hopefully help others to see it’s ok not to be ok sometimes. I now genuinely like myself and I’m confident I can do anything I put my mind to. Now it’s time for you to feel the same and I am so happy to have you here with me on this journey. “Let’s do this”.