Success Demanded I Disconnect, Until My Body Called the Shots

I didn’t miss the signs because I was oblivious. I missed them because I was so practiced at pushing through them.

As a high-performing woman leading in an industry I loved, I had learned to read everyone else’s needs better than my own. I could feel my clients’ energy shift. I could sense when my team needed encouragement. I gave generously: to my work, my community, my people.

But to myself? Not so much.

• I knew how to care, but not how to receive.
• I knew how to stay calm, but not how to slow down.
• I knew how to tend to others, but forgot how to tend to myself.

And even as someone curious about wellness, personal growth, and holistic tools, I didn’t fully understand how disconnected I had become from the one thing that mattered most: my body.

Photo by Ketut Subiyanto on Pexels

The Quiet Trade-Off No One Talks About

Here’s the truth no one says out loud to high-achieving women: We learn to disconnect from our bodies to succeed. We get rewarded for it. Applauded, even.

We push through exhaustion., We ignore pain. We swallow discomfort so we can stay sharp, strategic, and effective.

And that works, for a while. But your body keeps score. And sooner or later, it stops asking politely.

The Cost of Giving That Excludes You

About 60% of the women I work with are entrepreneurs, and the pattern is striking.

They all find themselves stuck in cycles of depletion. They’ve built incredible success, often fueled by generosity and resilience. But behind the outer strength is a private truth:

• They’re exhausted.
• Their health is suffering.
• They feel “blah”, even while life looks good.

Their bodies are speaking, through gut issues, hormone imbalances, autoimmunity, and many are doing “everything right” in terms of lifestyle. They’re on the supplements, doing breathwork, maybe even seeing a functional medicine doctor.

But something still feels off. That “something” is usually burnout. And no one teaches us that it can show up silently.

Burnout Doesn’t Always Explode—Sometimes It Erodes

The burnout I’m talking about doesn’t come with a dramatic collapse. It’s more like a slow erosion of vitality. A dulling of your light.

You’re not falling apart. You’re still showing up. But the spark? The you underneath the role? She’s quieter now.

You know something’s off, but can’t name it
You crave rest, but feel guilty when you take it
You feel disconnected from joy, even if you’re surrounded by beauty
You miss yourself, but don’t know how to come back
This version of burnout doesn’t come with drama. It doesn’t announce itself.

It whispers in the way you scroll instead of sleep, in the tightness you ignore in your chest, and in the resentment that creeps in when another person “needs” you.

I’d been running on fumes so skillfully that no one even knew I was empty.

The solution isn’t a better planner or a silent retreat in Tulum.

When I had to face it, I saw that I didn’t need to escape my life. I needed to come home to it, starting with my body.

I often tell my clients who are so brilliant and whose minds are sharp: Healing from burnout isn’t a mindset fix. This can be hard when you depend so much on your logic and smarts.

The solution is a full-body reconnection that builds resilience:

• Regulating your nervous system, not suppressing it
• Feeling your emotions, not rationalizing them
• Completing stress cycles, not powering through them
• Rewiring the belief that your worth is tied to your output
• Restoring relational intimacy with your body and your people
• Prioritizing yourself, not just your performance

And here’s the shift that’s hardest for driven women to hear:

Healing takes time.

But let me say this clearly: Pausing is not the same as stopping.

Reordering your priorities doesn’t make you less ambitious, it makes you more sustainable..
Your personal life, the partner you miss, the kids you want to be present for, the body that’s been asking for your attention, is not a distraction from success. It’s part of what you were working so hard to enjoy.

So do yourself a favor and just start where you are. If you’re reading this and recognizing yourself, not in collapse, but in slow depletion, I want you to know:

• You don’t have to wait for the crash
• You don’t have to justify needing support.
• You don’t have to earn your rest.
• You’ve done enough.

Now let’s help you feel like yourself again, connected, present, alive. You built this. Now let’s help you feel it, in your body, in your heart, in your life.

Maria Marcano is a Somatic Burnout Recovery Coach and stress regulation expert who helps self-aware, high-achieving women overcome chronic stress and burnout by reconnecting with their bodies and inner resilience. A former corporate executive and current Life Coach and Clinical Mental Health Counseling graduate student, she blends somatic therapy, mindfulness, and nervous system science to support sustainable success. Visit www.mariamarcano.com for practical tools on burnout recovery, somatic healing, and building real resilience from the inside out.