Down the Rabbit Hole in Cowgirl Boots!

Sometimes I think healing is a lot like Alice in Wonderland.

You follow one white rabbit, convinced you know where it's leading, only to find yourself somewhere completely unexpected. Every answer leads to another question. Every doorway opens into another room.

I've learned that if you're willing to keep wandering, eventually the rabbit hole starts leading you home.

Someone asked me recently if I was finally done healing.

I smiled.

I don't know that healing ever really works that way.

Instead, it feels like peeling back the layers of an onion. Every time one layer heals, another quietly introduces itself and says, "Okay...now I'm ready."

This season has been another one of those layers.

For the past six months, Mark and I have been remodeling our new home. Walls have come down. Floors have been replaced. Every inch of the interior and exterior has been transformed. Every room has required patience, unexpected detours, and more work than we ever imagined.

A few weeks ago, we finally started moving back in. As we've rebuilt this house together, I've realized healing isn't always a solo journey. Sometimes someone quietly hands you another hammer or box to unpack, believes you'll get there, and just keeps building beside you.

It struck me that my body has been doing exactly the same thing. Piece by piece. Room by room. System by system.

Neither the house nor my body needed cosmetic fixes. Both needed a stronger foundation. Many people don't know that my story actually began decades ago...unless you're a true fan of my blog. 😘

When I was sixteen, I was involved in a serious car accident that shattered my pelvis. Surgeons reconstructed it with a steel plate that is still part of me today. If you've seen my X-rays, you know exactly what I'm talking about. Recently, I found myself wondering what nearly forty years of adapting actually looked like. So I asked to see new X-rays.

The size of the steel plate on my left hand side of the pelvis still takes my breath away!

Look at the deformation of the pelvic bones - it’s a miracle I was able to become a mother.

For years, my body did what bodies do best. It adapted. Muscles compensated. Fascia tightened. Bones shifted. I survived.

But surviving and healing aren't always the same thing.

Looking at those X-rays today, I don't just see metal. I see resilience. I see the beginning of a journey I couldn't have understood at sixteen.

Maybe my body has been waiting all these years for the right people, the right therapies, and the right season to finally unwind what it has been holding onto.

Over the past several months, I've found an incredible chiropractor here in Billings. Rather than simply chasing symptoms, we've been rebuilding my foundation. We're working on skeletal alignment first.

As my body finds a healthier structure, I'm intentionally building the muscles needed to support it so I don't simply fall back into old patterns.

At the same time, another chiropractor has been dry needling my fascia. If you've never experienced fascia work, imagine years, maybe decades, of restrictions slowly beginning to release. It's uncomfortable. It's fascinating. And paired with regular myofascial massage, it feels like my body is finally letting go of tension it has carried for years.

Weekly appointments of dry needling therapy have made the healing process go exponentially faster.

All muscle groups have needed an overhaul with dry needling.

I've done versions of this work before. But this time feels different. My body isn't resisting anymore. It's participating. Everything is connected.

Bones.

Muscles.

Fascia.

Infection.

Trauma.

Emotions.

Even our homes.

I'm also preparing for another round of ozone therapy. I can still tell there's a small pocket of infection lingering from my jaw. Every now and then I cough up phlegm or notice a few red spots appear on my cheek. My body has become remarkably trustworthy. It always tells me when something still isn't quite finished.

Last year, after surgery to remove the infection from my jaw, my body went into survival mode. A few months later, my hair began falling out. That was hard to watch and also surprising! You wonder if it will ever come back. It has! Not the way it used to. It's curlier. Healthier. A little unruly.

Honestly, it's teaching me patience. Every awkward stage reminds me that growth rarely looks polished while it's happening. A head full of curly, healthy hair reminds me that I won't become who I used to be. I'll become someone entirely new.

And then there's mercury.

This month I completed my 150th round of chelation.

One hundred and fifty.

As America celebrates her 250th birthday this year, I couldn't help but smile at the coincidence.

Is it a sign? I don't know. But I do know this. Freedom comes in many forms. For our country, it's the ability to chart our own course. For me, freedom has looked like 150 intentional decisions to keep going when it would have been easier to quit.

One hundred and fifty mornings of believing my body could heal.

One hundred and fifty opportunities to trust that restoration was happening, even when I couldn't yet see it.

I've spent years believing I was chasing healing. Now I wonder if healing has been patiently chasing me all along, waiting until I was finally ready to receive it. I've also spent a lot of time reflecting on my guides and the stars over the past year. Again and again, they have pointed me back to the same lesson:

Before we step into a new chapter, sometimes the foundation has to be rebuilt. Looking back now, that seems to be exactly what has been happening. Not just in my career. Not just in my relationships. But in my body.

As I celebrate my 150th round of chelation while America celebrates her 250th birthday, another milestone quietly arrives. We're moving into our home. A rebuilt foundation. A body finding alignment. A home finding new life. Maybe that's how healing was always meant to work.

Healing has taught me something I never expected. The goal isn't becoming the person I was before mercury toxicity. The goal is becoming someone I've never been. Someone whose body is aligned. Someone whose nervous system finally feels safe. Someone whose body is no longer just surviving, but thriving. Someone who understands that healing isn't about erasing the past. It's about creating a stronger future.

So if you're somewhere in the middle of your own healing journey and wondering why another layer keeps showing up…maybe it isn't a setback. Maybe it's simply your body saying, "I'm ready for the next chapter." Healing isn't about getting your old life back. It's about building a body that finally feels like home.

Maybe that's where the rabbit hole was leading all along.

Home. 🤍

July 3, 2026 - hike to Mystic Lake in the Beartooth Mountains to celebrate America’s birthday. Grateful for every adventure and time with my son.