NANCY DEYO: WHEN PUSHING THROUGH STOPS WORKING

NANCY DEYO: WHEN PUSHING THROUGH STOPS WORKING

What happens when the determination that created your success becomes the very thing causing you harm?

In this episode of Peace, Love, and Bring a Bat, Uncle Dave welcomes Nancy Deyo, former Silicon Valley CEO, writer, speaker, resilience advocate, and longtime champion for women and girls. Nancy shares how business failure, a devastating injury, 15 years of chronic pain, and opioid dependence forced her to redefine resilience and rebuild her identity.

Nancy was the CEO of Purple Moon, an innovative technology company created to help adolescent girls become comfortable and competitive with computers. The company combined software, internet experiences, collectibles, and books designed specifically for girls.

Nancy built a team that was approximately 94 percent women and believed in hiring the smartest people possible. However, her leadership example came with a cost. She worked longer, pushed harder, and measured herself by how many goals she could surpass and how much she could endure.

When Purple Moon began running out of money, Nancy sold it to a competitor she considered an archrival. Although others viewed the sale as an accomplishment, Nancy experienced it as a personal failure. Determined to prove she could still achieve something meaningful, she decided to climb Mount Kilimanjaro.

Two weeks before the climb, Nancy injured her back. Instead of stopping, she compartmentalized the pain and continued. Her team eventually fashioned a back brace from duct tape and an inflatable pillow. At 16,000 feet, she collapsed in a tent, unable to move her legs and feeling as if a steel rod were being driven through her spine.

That moment exposed the danger in the strategy that had guided her life: pushing harder could no longer solve the problem.

The injury began a 15-year struggle with debilitating chronic pain. Nancy spent years lying down beside a supply of opioids, grieving the athlete, CEO, wife, and active person she had once been. Even after surgery repaired the original damage, her nervous system remained sensitized, creating a cycle of pain, fear, isolation, and declining function.

A pain-rehabilitation and detoxification program attempted to remove the medication and rapidly restore physical activity. Nancy’s body could not tolerate the aggressive approach, and she entered the hospital unable to walk and requiring even higher doses of opioids.

Nancy finally recognized that the medical system had done what it could. Her survival required a different strategy: listening to her body, respecting its limits, releasing the person she used to be, and directing her remaining energy toward what was still possible.

A therapist encouraged Nancy to accept a “new normal.” Nancy hated the phrase until she understood that acceptance was not surrender. She did not have to give up; she needed to stop fighting herself long enough to move forward.

Unable to sit in a classroom, Nancy enrolled in graduate school and attended while lying on an army cot. During orientation, she told her classmates, “I’m good with it, so you can be too.” Months later, those classmates challenged her description of herself as a disabled chronic-pain patient. They saw a capable contributor who simply happened to work lying down.

Nancy realized that her limitations affected her—but did not define her.

She eventually traveled by purchasing three airplane seats so she could lie down, returned to meaningful work, strengthened her body, regained function, and completed a careful yearlong opioid taper under the care of a compassionate physician.

In this episode, you will discover:

• Why pushing through is not always genuine resilience
• How professional failure can damage identity and self-worth
• What Mount Kilimanjaro taught Nancy about listening to her body
• Why accepting a new normal is not the same as giving up
• How Nancy attended graduate school while lying on a cot
• Why chronic pain patients can feel blamed or dismissed
• How medical bias may affect women’s treatment
• Why our roles and limitations should never define our worth
• How focusing on what remains possible can reopen a life

Nancy’s seed for the magic garden is to separate yourself from your professional roles. Titles such as CEO—and labels such as chronic-pain patient—may describe part of an experience, but they are not your complete identity. Determine what is true, stay aligned with your body and mind, focus on what you can do, and take the first step before you feel completely ready.

Connect with Nancy:

Website: https://nancydeyo.com
Substack—Life Inside Pain: https://nancydeyo.substack.com

Bring peace and love into your life. When necessary, bring a bat, bring awesome thoughts, listen to your body, remain authentic, and hit your sweet spot.

#PeaceLoveAndBringABat #UncleDave #NancyDeyo #LifeInsidePain #ChronicPain #Resilience #Identity #WomenInLeadership #OpioidRecovery #NewNormal #Authenticity

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