This story contains discussion of abuse.
When Sage asked Danica to describe “the most amount of pain” she’s ever been in, she replied, “The breakup with Aaron in 2020.”
“Because it was sudden, it felt like,” she explained. “It was my life. So like when you live with somebody, it’s your whole life. And because the nature of the relationship was emotionally abusive, so that wore me down to nothing.”
“People could never imagine that I would lack…any confidence or belief in the simple things about who I am. Everything was torn to bits. Yeah, he leaves a trail of blood. I don’t think I’m saying too much earth-shattering stuff after we — there’s been enough out there.”
Sage then asked Danica if she’d realized “at the time” that the relationship was “emotionally abusive,” and she replied that she came to the realization “in hindsight.” “I ignored it, but in real life, it was just like I just feel like — I would say all the time, ‘I’m built for hard things. I can handle hard things.’ And so I just saw it as a hard thing,” she added.
“And my nature is to try harder and do more. And I was like, ‘What if I don’t do it for the right person?’ Like, what if I just get a stick up my ass about this and get too proud and go like, ‘You know what, I’m just done.’ Instead of going, ‘Man just try a little harder because what if you look back and wish you would have tried?’ Like, I would never want that in my life.”
Danica also said that her ultimate takeaway from the relationship’s dissolution was that “everything leads to the next thing.”
“It gave me the greatest gift — the greatest gift — which is myself,” she said. “It gave me the greatest gift of how much I needed to show up for myself and take care of myself.”
You can watch the entire interview here.
The National Alliance on Mental Illness helpline is 1-800-950-6264 (NAMI) and provides information and referral services; GoodTherapy.org is an association of mental health professionals from more than 25 countries who support efforts to reduce harm in therapy.