Something has felt a bit off lately. Maybe it’s the move to Pittsburgh — this new house, this new rhythm, this new version of community. Maybe it’s being both student and teacher at Chatham University. Maybe it’s turning 50 — brain fog, weight shifts, temperature spikes — the whole premenopause parade.

Probably yes to all of it.

As many times as I’ve reinvented myself, I still secretly expect to land like a gold medal gymnast — two feet firm, arms up, crowd roaring. But that’s not how it goes. Getting out of your comfort zone is messy. It takes time to adjust, to acclimate to a new way of being.

My body has been trying to teach me that for decades.

It started in my late twenties with HAPE — high-altitude pulmonary edema. Back then, I did everything you shouldn’t do at altitude: flew from Mexico after drinking too much and sleeping too little, went scuba diving, then straight to the top of Loveland Ski Area in Colorado. That night I woke up gasping for breath, lungs burning, coughing up pink foam. I knew instantly: my lungs were bleeding. My pulse ox was in the high 50s. My body was waving a red flag the size of the Rockies.

Looking back, I realize I’d been getting altitude sickness my whole life — the headaches, nausea, breathlessness. I told myself I was lazy, out of shape, not good enough. I blamed my body instead of listening to it.

In my thirties, my body tried a new tactic: benign positional vertigo. Again, I woke up in the middle of the night — the room spinning faster than any carnival ride. I thought I was dying. But it was just a microscopic crystal dislodged in my ear, throwing my entire sense of balance into chaos.

And now, at fifty: sudden hearing loss in my left ear. No infection, no tumor, no clear cause. Maybe, I thought, if I can’t hear the outside world, it’s finally time to listen inward.

So I did.

Working with a yoga therapist, I went upstairs to the small room on the third floor, closed the door, and lay on the couch. Laptop on my belly,

guided me through a practice of letting go. Breath by breath, something familiar returned — a stillness I’d been missing. I felt the electricity of presence again, the sweetness of quiet.

I remembered the parts of me I’d left behind in my hurry to evolve: restorative yoga, chanting, meditation, breath. I could feel my teachers —

Chapman,

Joanna Barbera (Music City Mindfulness), Gabby Delorenze — right there in the room with me, whispering reminders I’d been too busy to hear.

And in that stillness, a single sentence rose up like a song:
“Molly, come home.”

So this morning, I did. I set my alarm for 5:30, an hour before anyone else. When it buzzed, Kelly stirred beside me.
“What’s that sound?” she mumbled.
“My alarm,” I said. “I’m getting up to meditate.”
“Oh, I love that,” she murmured. “Will you make us some green juice first?”
Without hesitation: “No. I’ll make it at 6:30. This hour is mine.”

She smiled, rolled over, went back to sleep. And no one died.

That small act — saying no — felt like a deep yes to myself.

This is what returning feels like. Listening to my own rhythms, honoring the body that’s been teaching me all along. Letting the world quiet just enough so I can hear the wisdom that’s been whispering for years:

Come home.