← All letters

This Year, I Met the Most Broken Version of Myself but Also the Strongest

Hey!

It’s Trang, messy bun mama 😊

Let me start by sharing 3 fun facts about myself:
I enjoy sipping on my drinks throughout the day—an iced coffee or matcha in the morning, and a warm tea before bed.
I’m currently battling depression and anxiety.
Lastly, I absolutely love spicy food.

How about you?

I became a mom at 34 years old. Six months later, I quit the career I spent more than 10 years of my life building.

8 years of school.

7 years of working.

Years of trying to become someone people would be proud of.

Then suddenly
 I became a stay-at-home mom (SAHM) sitting in the quiet aftermath of everything I thought I wanted. Motherhood changed me in ways I was not prepared for. Not just physically, but mentally and emotionally too.

After having my son, Kai, I experienced postpartum depression, and my anxiety got worse. I think becoming a mother forced me to finally confront parts of myself I had spent years outrunning through achievement, productivity, and survival mode. For a long time, I thought that was normal. Everyone has their own struggles. Right?

Stress was normal.
Anxiety was normal.
Overthinking was normal.

Shortness of breath was normal.

Waking up with jaw pain and headaches was normal.

Relying on substances to sleep was normal.

Bloating was normal.

Carrying emotional heaviness in my chest every night was normal

Functioning while mentally exhausted was just a part of being an adult, and constantly pushing through was strength. So, I kept going without any direction.

But motherhood has a way of exposing everything in the most raw and relentless way. The triple burnout (physically, mentally, and emotionally). The unresolved childhood wounds resurfaced. The invisible pressure. The identity crisis. The grief. The loneliness at 3 a.m. The pent-up frustration turned into anger. The bathroom breakdowns. The version of yourself you slowly abandoned while trying to survive.

I knew I was suffering, and it was up to me to change for my son’s sake, my marriage’s sake, my family’s sake, and my sanity.

Somewhere between physical recovery postpartum, painful breastfeeding, constant anxiety, sleepless nights, long walks with Kai, emotional exhaustion, and moments of complete uncertainty, I started asking myself one question over and over again:

“Trang, what would truly make you happy?”

And the answer wasn’t:

“I wish I worked more.”
“I wish I stayed longer in a career that was slowly draining me.”
“I wish I kept ignoring myself.”

It was much simpler than that.

I wanted slow mornings.
I wanted to feel calm.
I wanted the freedom to bond with my son during his first few years.
I wanted to be less realistic and more creative.
I wanted more love and self-compassion.
I wanted to be more grateful and enjoy the present.
I wanted the courage to finally listen to myself.

So I left dentistry. Not because I hated it, but because I could no longer ignore the fact that I was deeply unhappy, anxious, emotionally exhausted, and disconnected from myself. 

At the time, I had no idea what I was doing.

I didn’t have a business plan.
I didn’t have experience creating content online.
I didn’t even know if anyone would care what I had to say.

I just knew I needed an outlet, so I started posting online. At first, it was random short videos about motherhood, life, funny moments, thoughts, and emotions I couldn’t fully explain yet.

Slowly, content creation became something much deeper for me.

It became art.
A journal.
A voice.
A coping mechanism.
A place where I could finally say the things I spent years suppressing.

My favorite word is alchemy, which means taking what hurt you and turning it into something that gives back to you.

Alchemy, to me, is turning pain into art,

wounds into wisdom, and what once hurt me into something meaningful.

Strangely enough, the more honest I became online, the more people resonated with it. The videos that changed my life were never the perfectly curated ones. They were the vulnerable ones.The videos where I talked about anxiety. Childhood trauma. Identity loss. Motherhood. Healing. Burnout. Sensitivity. Feeling emotionally exhausted while still trying to hold everything together. Those videos  reached millions of people. For the first time in my life, I realized maybe my sensitivity was never the problem. Feeling deeply was never something I needed to be ashamed of.

After going viral, I received thousands of comments and messages from people sharing their own stories. Mothers. Fathers. Daughters. Sons. People grieving the old versions of themselves. People quietly struggling in careers they no longer recognized themselves in. People trying so hard to keep functioning while mentally drowning inside.

And so many of them said the same thing:

“I thought I was the only one.”
“Thank you for putting what I couldn’t explain into words.”
“It’s like you are talking about my life.”

That stayed with me. I think that’s why this website exists. Social media moves fast. Instagram captures moments, emotions, quick thoughts, pieces of myself in small fragments. But this space is different.

This space is slower. This is where I can write the thoughts that never fit into captions. The reflections that need more room to breathe. The stories behind the videos. The books helping me heal. The things I’m learning about anxiety, trauma, nervous system healing, motherhood, identity, and becoming softer after surviving for so long. A place where we get to connect and comfort each other.

This space is not about pretending I have life figured out. I don’t. I’m still healing too.

I’m still learning how to rest without guilt.
How to stop measuring my worth through productivity.
How to become emotionally healthier for myself, my marriage, and my son.
How to stop abandoning myself in order to make other people comfortable.

How to let go of what doesn’t serve me.

Healing was never meant to look perfect. It just looks like honesty, awareness, slowing down enough to finally hear yourself, and becoming the person you needed when you were younger.

This space is just that, a place for all the thoughts that became too heavy to keep inside.

The thoughts that spill over.
The emotions we were told were “too much.”
The stories we kept swallowing just to make other people comfortable.

A place where I overshare honestly. Reflect a lot. Heal slowly.
Where healing is messy and unfinished.
Where emotions are allowed to take up space instead of being hidden away.

And hopefully, a place that reminds people they are not crazy for feeling deeply too.

So if you’re here, welcome.

To the thoughts that never fit into captions.
To the parts of ourselves we’re still trying to understand.
To the mess.
To the healing.
To the overflow.

And if you’ve ever felt too emotional, too sensitive, or too much for the world around you
Maybe you’ll feel a little safer here too.

With love
Trang

— Trang

If this brought something up for you

That’s okay. You don’t have to wait until it feels “bad enough.” Support is free, confidential, and a click away.

messybunsofunmama Avatar

Written by

More about me →

A gentle conversation

This is a kind space. You’re welcome to share as much or as little as you like — and you can comment with just a first name or a nickname. Comments are read before they appear, and anything unkind won’t be published.

Leave a Reply

More letters

Discover more from Trang

Subscribe now to keep reading and get access to the full archive.

Continue reading