It's Not Safe to Be Me Series — Part 1: Rupture
The demands of life suddenly outweighed my capacity
Everything came crashing down on November 16th, 2021, a date seared into my memory.
And oh, the irony of this moment…
It happened as I was making the final edits on my ‘Build the Life You Want’ chapter in the Elevate Your Voice anthology. In my piece, I talked about overcoming a season of challenge in 2016 in the same area of my life. I’d written the draft just months before, believing we had reached a finish line.
So, it was like life laughed and responded, “Oh, you think? Hold my beer,” before delivering a season that would break me in ways I never expected.
Let’s back up to my origin story. I once completed a 365-day photo project that lasted three years and three months. It started on my daughter's birth day and continued through my son's first birthday a few years later.
Through the daily practice of seeking a story to record, my awareness of the stories in my life surged and expanded. New stories were happening every day, but stories of the past kept surfacing, too.
The more stories I realized had ended, the more flash forecasts of future stories came to mind. This dimensional way of seeing has truly been a gift.
But the biggest thing was the endings that had come and passed without notice—before I was ready for those stories to end—and without record.
I wrote more about that here.
Waves of grief have shaped not only my approach to photography but how I want to show up in the world as well.
As a photographer, I wanted photographs of the stories I already found to be meaningful.
I wanted to give those photographs to my clients.
In my life, I started intentionally sprinkling reminders of many meaningful things around my environment, like these few things I have pinned to my cabin wall:
Meaningfulness became my vibe.
I was driven to connect with and appreciate my stories while I live them so that I'm never blindsided by time again.
This desire ignited my passion for broader story work, expanding beyond photography.
Before this new story in 2021, my understanding of loss was limited to family, friends, memories, and time. But this new story is about a different kind of loss.
This story is about losing myself at the height of my self-confidence—when I’d think of who I am and unwaveringly say, ‘I’m Marie Fucking Masse.’ I knew who I was. I loved who I was. But I couldn’t access her.
How does that even happen?
Losing access to Levi’s ADHD medication in August 2021 was more than an inconvenience. It was the loss of a lifeline. The change in him was profound and overwhelming, casting a shadow over our entire world. Levi didn’t have “a little ADHD.” He’d been on stimulants since he was five, and those medications gave him access to himself.*
*Not a typical ADHD situation, but that’s a story for another time.
We went from having the best year and a half we’d ever experienced as a family to suddenly being thrown back to square one. The stark contrast in our days took a staggering emotional and physical toll on me.
I used to wake up slowly and journal with my coffee. Now, mornings consisted of jolting awakenings, as Levi’s erratic behavior, driven by his condition without medication, resembled that of someone in a drunken stupor rather than a young child. But this story is about me, not Levi, so I won’t divulge too much on this topic.
The point is that I was constantly on edge and bracing myself while navigating public meltdowns and private battles—both physical and emotional—for several months. It hadn’t been this hard in over two years. The thought of, “We’re back here? Really?” was needling me with every passing day.
Meanwhile, I desperately searched for answers. When our therapist suggested Autism, I dove deep into the research, which led to a startling discovery:
“I think I’m Autistic, too.”
Side quest: Later, I would learn about a profile of juvenile bipolar that has to do with your body’s temperature regulation. I’m sharing this point because we’ve explored lots of options around “This is more than ADHD alone,” and the hardship I’m describing was not because of Autism per se, and I mustn’t add to the stigma.
The month after losing Levi’s medication, sensory overwhelm was heightened within me, and my capacity was crumbling. The load I carried grew too heavy.
I actually vocalized the tightness in my chest to Dave (my husband) at the end of that month (September 2021), but it wasn’t like we could do much about it.
Our whole family felt it, but it wasn’t like anyone was coming to save us. So, we persevered.
And then, on November 16th, I hit my breaking point in my little cabin.
I erupted into an uncontrollable rage, screaming and hurling things I love at the walls of my most sacred space. It wasn’t just a meltdown. It was like my spirit had been ripped from my body and was slipping away through my fingers.
I was gutted, hollow, and stripped of my pulse and my sense of self in this world. Everything that had tethered me to who I was felt severed because it was like, ‘Turmoil rises when I'm just being myself.’
It wasn’t just a feeling. I had the facts to back it up. And I collapsed to the floor, powerless, swallowed by my circumstances.
And here's the thing: I've always bought into the old adage, “If you don't like your life, change it.” I’d spent the last 90+ days being as resourceful as I knew how, but in that moment, there was no fight left in me. I couldn’t see a way out. All I could see was how the fight had robbed me of who I am.
Intuitively, I thought, “This is one of those moments where everything changes.” And with that thought, I snapped a photo of myself, as if to bear witness to my own undoing. Proof that I existed in the wreckage, even when I didn’t recognize myself anymore.
Let me bring you up to that moment…
A few weeks before that night, on a good day, Levi asked me to move some logs that were too heavy for him. This kid has been deeply interested in making firewood since he was five. He was eight on this day.
So, I brought out lunch—pizza, chocolate milk, and his midday dose of ADHD stimulant medication (not his usual med, but a substitute we were stuck with). As you can see, I snapped a photo of that lunch with my phone.
Then, this moment happened…
Sitting on a log, silently eating his food, he looked up to the left, and then to the right. He was in his own world.
“What'cha looking at, buddy?” I asked.
“Looking for dead trees,” he replied.
The noticer in me was captivated. In that moment, I saw him—I really saw him. It was pure Levi, his soul on display.
I had my DSLR camera with me, so I made some photographs. If you know me, you know that photos like these mean everything to me. After all, I wrote the eBook on How to Make the Most Meaningful Photos of Your Life.
These weren’t just photos. They were proof that I was engaged, paying attention, and deeply appreciating my life. Reflecting on my origin story and the lessons I’ve learned from noticing meaningful stories that have ended, the metacognition that comes from being aware I was thinking, “This matters,” is one of my highest personal values.
But a couple of weeks later, on that November night, when I went to export the photos from my camera to my computer, they were gone.
I’d formatted the memory card, a mistake I’ve never made in my (then) 10 years as a photographer. Those photos are gone forever.
A wave of shock and dread and unraveling ran through me. I kept repeating, “I am so tired. Everything is so overwhelming. I’m not even myself anymore!”
I’d felt so out of control in my life over the past few months, and the final thread connecting me to myself had snapped. Losing those photos through such a rudimentary mistake was shocking and surreal, like, “Did I really just do that? This is not me.”
The one thing I could count on, knowing and being who I am, suddenly felt severed, leaving me unmoored and adrift.
I know what you must be thinking, and it’s true… In a calmer, safer state of mind, I never would’ve spiraled so quickly into a full-blown fight-or-flight response.
But my nervous system was already stretched to its limit, and this mistake felt catastrophic then. My nervous system was trying to keep me safe. Our brains and bodies are wild, aren't they?
I knew Levi’s connection to the trees wasn’t going anywhere.
I knew that day wasn’t a one-hit-wonder. I could’ve found another moment.
But at the time, I’d lost access to the core of who I am through the culmination of months of stress, exhaustion, and diminishing capacity.
I was face-to-face with my brokenness, untethered from what once anchored and grounded me, and there was no solution in sight.
Continue on to Part 2: Implosion
Here’s the entire series: