Ilana Estelle is a mental health and wellbeing advocate who combines educational insight with her personal experience of living with physical, mental, and emotional disabilities.
She holds diplomas in Counselling, Diet and Nutrition, Nutritional Therapy, Psychotherapy and Counselling, and Stress Management. Through her writing, Ilana supports others in navigating their emotional, mental, and physical health challenges.
In addition to writing for The CP Diary, her work has appeared in healthy lifestyle magazines.
Ilana is also the author of three books: Cerebral Palsy: A Story – Finding the Calm After the Storm, Spirituality, Healing and Me, and Survival: The Covid Years – Time for Change.
Something inspirational: “Think wrongly, if you please, but in all cases think for yourself.” DORIS LESSING Thinking for yourself means more than having your own opinions. It means owning your words, your choices, and ...
Something inspirational: "We are not what happened to us. We are what we choose to become.” JAMES HOLLIS "I am drawn to James Hollis's words: 'We are not what happened to us. We are what we choose ...
Something inspirational: "Healing begins when we can hold our own experience with compassion." TARA BRACH Brach's quote reminds us that healing begins when we meet our pain with kindness instead of judgement ...
Unfortunately, I was created by both of my parents who went out of their way to break me, so I only got the worst parts of them.
They always made me feel like such a monster, which I eventually came to believe I was. It has only taken most of my life for me to even begin to feel anything differently which has been a miracle for me.
I have been trying to change my way of thinking. I know that things won't change overnight as much as I wish they would.
Thanks for your honesty Tim. I think if more of us were honest with ourselves, or people recognised that fact, more would come forward and talk about their experiences.
The reality for many of us is as you describe. We may live in denial that we have grown up, and it initially starts with family, who have built and broken us, or perhaps we just don't see that we have.
It is often that we begin to see how broken we are through the eyes of our children. Before then, I am not sure how many of us stop to question our lives, or how our lives have worked out and if we do, how much we're in denial on the facts.
You only have to pick up a newspaper or listen to the news to understand how much people have been affected by their childhood. We can become stronger, but it can also break the spirit too.
I can understand when you say we should 'thank' those who try to break us, but having been on the receiving end of that, I have come to a different conclusion.
Not everyone will come through broken to be built up stronger. It very much depends on how mentally strong they are, or whether their circumstances will change.
Also, if their circumstances do change they may still not be strong enough to change 'being broken.' It has taken too many years for me to have come through my own circumstances, not knowing I had a disability or for me to understand what my symptoms were.
Truthfully, had it not been for 'autism' even with my set of circumstances, I am not sure anything would have changed. I would have just been another statistic, who slipped through the net.
Even with a diagnosis, unless we are able to express ourselves, our issues stay with us. I am lucky that I have the ability to be able to write through my blog. There is a serious note to what I have done.
I understand my disability and my life now. I would never have understood, without my writing. The enormity of what I have mentally been through was too great. My writing helps lessen my mental health issues.
Unfortunately, I was created by both of my parents who went out of their way to break me, so I only got the worst parts of them.
They always made me feel like such a monster, which I eventually came to believe I was. It has only taken most of my life for me to even begin to feel anything differently which has been a miracle for me.
I have been trying to change my way of thinking. I know that things won't change overnight as much as I wish they would.
Thanks Randy. I am sorry your parents made you feel like that and you're absolutely not.
The reality is that no matter what kind of childhood we have, it is up to us to change the things we're not happy with.
I am pleased you have been trying to change your thinking. I'm routing for you.
Throughout my life people have casually tried to break me. It never occurred to me how much influence they had on my life until I read this quote.
I should thank them for trying to weaken me, because it only made me stronger.
Thanks for your honesty Tim. I think if more of us were honest with ourselves, or people recognised that fact, more would come forward and talk about their experiences.
The reality for many of us is as you describe. We may live in denial that we have grown up, and it initially starts with family, who have built and broken us, or perhaps we just don't see that we have.
It is often that we begin to see how broken we are through the eyes of our children. Before then, I am not sure how many of us stop to question our lives, or how our lives have worked out and if we do, how much we're in denial on the facts.
You only have to pick up a newspaper or listen to the news to understand how much people have been affected by their childhood. We can become stronger, but it can also break the spirit too.
I agree with Tim. We should 'thank' those who try to break us, as we have to be broken to be built up stronger.
In that way, we can see there is beauty in being broken.
I can understand when you say we should 'thank' those who try to break us, but having been on the receiving end of that, I have come to a different conclusion.
Not everyone will come through broken to be built up stronger. It very much depends on how mentally strong they are, or whether their circumstances will change.
Also, if their circumstances do change they may still not be strong enough to change 'being broken.' It has taken too many years for me to have come through my own circumstances, not knowing I had a disability or for me to understand what my symptoms were.
Truthfully, had it not been for 'autism' even with my set of circumstances, I am not sure anything would have changed. I would have just been another statistic, who slipped through the net.
Even with a diagnosis, unless we are able to express ourselves, our issues stay with us. I am lucky that I have the ability to be able to write through my blog. There is a serious note to what I have done.
I understand my disability and my life now. I would never have understood, without my writing. The enormity of what I have mentally been through was too great. My writing helps lessen my mental health issues.