064 When Your Body Finally Feels Safe: Trauma, Chronic Illness, and Healing with Leanna Wydick

What happens when the body you live in becomes a daily reminder of trauma?

In this episode of the Invisible Illness Club, April Aramanda talks with Leanna Wydick about surviving domestic violence, sustaining a traumatic brain injury, and navigating life with fibromyalgia, ME/CFS, migraines, and pancreatic enzyme insufficiency.

Leanna explains how trauma can rewire the nervous system and influence pain, fatigue, sensory processing, relationships, and chronic illness flares. She also shares how striving to control everything kept her body in a constant state of vigilance—even after she entered a safe and loving relationship.

Her healing began when she surrendered her fear to God, learned to receive care without expecting a hidden cost, and allowed familiar tools such as mindfulness, breathing exercises, and a weighted blanket to finally support her nervous system.

April and Leanna also discuss acceptance, self-advocacy, grief, boundaries, vulnerability, and the difference between giving up and making peace with the reality of your body today.

Content note: This episode includes discussions of domestic violence, strangulation, pregnancy loss, and traumatic brain injury. Please listen with care.

In this episode, we discuss

• 05:44 Leanna’s experience surviving domestic violence and a near-death assault
• 10:13 Recovering from a traumatic brain injury without adequate medical support
• 11:11 Message to Audience about Domestic Violence
• 13:38 Living with fibromyalgia, ME/CFS, migraines, and pancreatic enzyme insufficiency
• 16:42 How trauma can affect the nervous system and chronic illness symptoms
• 18:48 Why physical pain can become an emotional reminder of past trauma
• 20:56 How control and hypervigilance can exhaust the body
• 23:02 Leanna’s “seek and surrender” approach to faith and healing
• 29:18 Learning to receive care without expecting a hidden cost
• 36:17 Grieving the gap between what your heart wants and what your body can do
• 42:36 Small, practical ways to begin caring for yourself
• 45:37 What I wish someone said in my darkest moments
• 46:56 What is bringing you joy?

Memorable takeaways

“Imagine that the body you’re living in becomes your reminder. It’s hard not to be triggered every day of your life.”

“Acceptance is not giving up.”

“You deserve the time, effort, and focus—whatever it takes—to find your safety and find what works for you.”

“Untangle that yarn, be vulnerable, and then tackle the little things you find.”

“You are precious.”

About Leanna Wydick

Leanna Wydick is a wife, mother, chronic illness advocate, and early childhood systems-of-care professional. Her work supports families, providers, nonprofits, and organizations by helping them create more connected systems of care.

After surviving domestic violence and sustaining a traumatic brain injury, Leanna developed multiple chronic health conditions. She now shares her story to help others understand the relationship between trauma, nervous system safety, chronic illness, faith, grief, and self-advocacy.

Outside of her work and health journey, Leanna enjoys reading, gardening, baking, fossils, bats, and spending time with her family—and her delightfully quirky flock of chickens.

You can find her at:

https://www.facebook.com/leannawydick

https://www.instagram.com/Leanna_supermom

https://www.tiktok.com/@Leanna_supermom

A note from April

If you are experiencing abuse, please tell someone you trust and seek qualified local support when it is safe to do so. Abuse is not your fault, and you do not deserve it.

Connect with the show

Listen, subscribe, and share this episode with someone who needs to hear that healing does not have a deadline—and that they are worthy of the time and care it takes to find safety.