Why I Started Rise Gently Therapy
I remember it clearly, as if it were yesterday. It was 2021, a couple of years after I’d already faced some of the hardest seasons of my life. I was sitting in my van in the grocery store parking lot, trying to summon the energy to go inside.
I had to get this done so I could make it to the carpool line at the elementary school early enough to get out quickly, and then rush to the special-needs private school six miles away and stake out a spot near the front of that carpool line so I could—once again—get out quickly. From there, my oldest and youngest and I would head through Atlanta traffic to pick up my middle son from his private school twenty-five miles away.
By the time we were all finally in the car together—three tired boys and one equally tired mom—I was bracing myself for the drive home through rush-hour traffic. The boys somehow always argued more when they could sense my exhaustion and anxiety, which only made everything feel louder and heavier. It was a cycle I couldn’t seem to break. I’d rush to get supper started while they let loose all their pent-up energy, trying to help with homework while juggling dinner. Through all of it, I was stretched thin—frustrated, overwhelmed, and ready to explode. I often did. I’d yell and snap at my kids, my dogs, even myself.
It was early April, and our family was struggling as my husband pushed through the end of tax season—working seven days a week and usually over eighty hours. The kids were missing him, and I was too. We had just come out of the early days of COVID lockdowns, and now we were trying to adjust to new schools, new routines, and a pace of life that left no room to breathe.
By mid-April, I was limping through each day. When tax season finally ended and my husband could help with school pick-ups again, I felt like I could finally exhale—but only a little. By late May, school was out, the kids were home, and I had nothing left to give.
The first few weeks of summer, I lived in my “comfy clothes” and watched a whole lot of nothing on TV while scrolling my phone. My boys turned half feral, staying up too late and playing too many video games. My husband came and went, just as tired as I was. I knew something had to change, but I didn’t know where to start.
Finally, I told him I couldn’t keep doing life at that pace—that the constant driving and pressure were wearing me down. No amount of rest was touching the exhaustion. So, I started taking small steps to reconnect with myself. I began waking up a little earlier for a quiet moment before the house stirred. Instead of turning on the TV, I read, journaled, or sat with a cup of coffee. I went outside more. I let the boys play in the yard instead of dragging them to planned activities.
Those small choices started to help. That summer, I insisted that we adjust our family’s pace—fewer last-minute decisions, more breathing room, more grace. I stopped chasing the ideal of the “perfect mom” and gave myself permission to be a good-enough one. I quit listening to outside judgments about how I “should” parent or what I “should” cook. Sometimes, dinner was pizza or chicken nuggets, and that was okay.
Little by little, I began to recognize myself again.
I thought I’d already learned how to slow down. I’d been through illness, recovery, and reflection, but somehow, the noise crept back in. Life got busy again, and so did I.
The truth is, I’d already had a wake-up call a few years earlier, when my body drew a line I couldn’t ignore. What started as constant fatigue and pain became a clear message: I couldn’t keep pushing at this pace. Within just a few months, I was diagnosed with an autoimmune disease that caused a serious chronic illness—and then, cancer. Everything stopped. The life I’d been sprinting through came to a full, screeching halt.
That season taught me what real rest looked like and how fiercely my body would fight for it when I wouldn’t listen. But as time passed and the world sped up again, I slowly slipped back into old habits—the same rushing, the same noise, the same belief that I could keep pushing if I just tried harder.
In those months of forced stillness—the quiet space I’d avoided for years—I started listening. To my body. To my mind. To my heart. That’s when I began to understand what healing really meant. Not powering through. Not performing wellness. But learning to rise gently, exactly as I was.
My “cancer year” was 2019, and then COVID arrived. Like everyone else, our family suddenly had more time together than ever before. And in that stillness, I saw clearly how I was showing up—how often I yelled, how tense and impatient I had become, how little joy I was feeling in the very moments I’d longed for. Facing my own mortality while watching my kids grow older made it impossible to ignore how fast time was moving. The old saying was right—the days are long, but the years are short.
So I began again, with small things. A few deep breaths alone in my bedroom. Short walks instead of longer workouts. Letting “enough” be enough. As I found small pockets of calm, I started to feel present again. I began enjoying time with my boys—not in grand, picture-perfect moments, but in ordinary ones. We found little ways to connect, to laugh, to be together. And slowly, gently, I started to feel like myself again.
As I found myself again—treating my body and spirit with compassion and love—I began to rise from the deep place where I had landed in by the time my body demanded rest. I started to recognize that I wasn’t in that same dark space anymore; I was slowly, quietly, rising up.
One day, while describing this to a friend, we talked about how healing didn’t feel like a triumphant leap forward. It felt gentle, steady, and grounded. That word—gently—stayed with me. It felt like everything I had been learning: that growth doesn’t have to be fast, and rest isn’t failure.
As I continued to heal, I started looking beyond my own family and noticing the women around me. I realized that while I had felt so alone in my burnout, there were so many other moms just like me—trying so hard, giving so much, and quietly breaking under the weight of it all.
I began to think about how I could help them rise gently too. I thought about my journey before kids, my work as a mother, and the professional skills I’d gained through my training and experience. I realized I had the tools, the compassion, and the perspective to do this work in a meaningful way.
And that’s how Rise Gently Therapy was born.
When the name came to me, it felt perfect—because it captured exactly what I wanted to help others do, and how I wanted to show up in the world. It became the guiding phrase for everything I do: to rise, yes—but to rise gently.
If any part of my story sounds familiar, please know you’re not alone. Burnout doesn’t mean you’re broken—it’s a sign that your mind and body are asking for something different. Healing doesn’t have to look big or dramatic. Sometimes it starts with a single breath, a small boundary, or a moment of rest that reminds you you’re still here.
I’d be honored to help you find your own gentle way forward—to rediscover yourself, reclaim your calm, and rise again, one small step at a time.
