TW: This article discusses topics that may be distressing or triggering. Please practice self-care + discretion while reading, and visit our Resources page for additional support.
Anna is an ICF-accredited abuse recovery coach, speaker, and founder of Brave & Free, a community of more than 150,000 survivors dedicated to telling the truths that are too often silenced. Through her writing, resources, and unwavering honesty, she helps survivors rebuild their identity after abuse and empowers them to be their own brave. Read on to learn more about Anna's incredible journey.
How do you define a "Cycle Breaker?"
A cycle-breaker is not someone who got it right the first time. A cycle-breaker is someone who walked back into the fire over and over because it was the only temperature their body recognized, and kept choosing to leave anyway. Even when it took ten tries. Even when it took twenty.
A cycle-breaker is someone who was groomed to lie, trained to hide, punished for truth, and decided to tell it anyway, even when their hands were shaking and every nerve in their body was screaming that honesty would cost them everything. A cycle-breaker is someone who did imperfect, messy, morally complicated things to survive, and instead of letting the shame of that eat them alive, chose to offer themselves the compassion the world refused to give them.
A cycle-breaker is someone who listened to their own voice when every person around them was saying it's not that bad. Who trusted their gut over other people's comfort. Who chose themselves when choosing themselves meant standing completely alone. A cycle-breaker doesn't break the cycle once. They break it every single day. In every relationship. In every moment where the old pattern shows up wearing a new face and says come back, I feel like home. A cycle-breaker says no. Again. Badly. Imperfectly. Terrified. And keeps going
What adversities or experiences have you lived through?
Childhood sexual abuse, witnessing domestic violence, domestic violence, narcissistic abuse, spiritual abuse
What is a cycle, belief or pattern you’ve worked to break or challenge in your life?
The cycle of walking straight back into what almost killed me, wearing a different face. Controlling relationships. Controlling friendships. Over and over. Not because I was stupid. Because it felt like home. My nervous system was wired to mistake control for love, and no amount of knowing that intellectually stopped my body from reaching for it. It took so many tries. So many breakdowns. So many moments of why am I here again.
Because the truth is that leaving the relationship is one thing. Leaving the pattern is a whole different war. The belief that I didn't deserve compassion because I wasn't the perfect victim. I did things I'm not proud of. Things I was judged for. Things that made people question my character rather than my circumstances. And I carried that shame like a second skin. It made me want to disappear. Because the world has this idea of what a "good" victim looks like, and I wasn't her. I was messy. I was morally imperfect. I did what I had to do with what I had to survive, and some of it looked wrong from the outside.
But had I not done those things, I may not be here today. Learning to show myself compassion when the world wouldn't, that was some of the hardest work I've ever done. And I'm still doing it. The pattern of lying because I was groomed to. There was a time in my life where telling the truth had consequences I can't describe in a caption. I was trained to hide what was happening. To cover, to protect, to perform. And when the abuse ended, that pattern didn't just pack its bags and leave with him.
It followed me. Into safe relationships. Into friendships that deserved honesty. Into moments where "no" was a completely acceptable answer but my body wouldn't let me say it. I lied because the truth had only ever cost me something. Unlearning that, choosing truth even when every part of me is bracing for impact, that is a fight I am still in. And I am winning it slowly.
What helped you begin healing, growing, or changing that cycle?
Being brave enough to ask for help: Not the watered down kind where you hint and hope someone notices. The kind where you sit in front of a stranger and say this is what happened to me and your voice shakes the entire time. That kind of brave. The kind nobody applauds because it doesn't look like strength. It looks like a woman falling apart. But it was the first real thing I did for myself in years. Listening to my own intuition even when everyone around me downplayed it: People told me it wasn't that bad.
People told me I was exaggerating. People who saw the bruises, heard the stories, watched me shrink, and still said but he seems so nice. I listened to myself anyway. That quiet voice underneath all the noise that kept saying this is not okay and you know it. Choosing recovery for me: Not to prove anything. For the life I deserved to live. The one that was stolen from me. I decided I wanted it back and I was going to fight like hell to get it, even when the fight looked like crying on the bathroom floor. Refusing to be ashamed of my own story: Even the messy parts. Especially the messy parts.
The parts where I went back. The parts where I believed him. The parts that make people uncomfortable. I stopped editing myself to make my survival easier for other people to digest. That's what helped me grow. Me, choosing me, over and over again, badly and imperfectly, until it stuck.
What are your proudest accomplishments?
Escaping a violent marriage by fleeing the country. With terror in my chest and a passport in my pocket.Rebuilding my entire life from ash. No money. No roadmap. And the people who knew what was happening to me were silent. I rebuilt anyway. Building Brave & Free. A community of over 100,000 survivors where we say the things people shove under the rug.
Where we talk about the rage, the grief, the ugly parts of recovery that nobody wants to hear about at dinner. No niceties. No sugarcoating. No making it palatable so bystanders feel comfortable.That's my proudest accomplishment. Building something that tells other survivors you were never the problem and meaning it with my whole chest.
Is there a message, quote, lesson, or reminder you’d like to share with others who may be struggling along their healing journey?
Quote: "Be your own brave." The world will tell you how to heal. What to do. What not to do. It will hand you a timeline you never agreed to and call you wrong for missing it. None of that belongs to you. Your healing is not up for a vote.
It doesn't need a stranger's approval, a deadline, or a script written by people who've never lived in your body. When you choose brave, you choose it on your own terms, in your own time, however messy or quiet or loud that looks.
Do you have any projects you're working on that you'd like to highlight?
Rediscovering Yourself After Abuse Workbook -A trauma-informed workbook for survivors rebuilding identity after long-term abuse. Vetted by therapists. Loved by survivors. 60 pages of trauma-informed exercises to help you: Rebuild your identity and sense of self Set boundaries without guilt Reconnect with joy and what you actually want Move from survival mode to living on your own terms
Connect with Anna:
- Visit her website: braveandfree.co
- Instagram: @iambraveandfree