I've spent my career in rooms where things are hard. As a nurse-midwife, I've been present for the highest-stakes decisions women make about their bodies and their lives. As a Sexual Assault Nurse Examiner, I've sat with people of all genders in the worst moments imaginable, helping them document, advocate, and navigate systems that felt designed to confuse and overwhelm them.

And then I went through my own divorce. What I didn't expect was that the hardest part didn't end when the marriage did. Significant legal issues followed, and I found myself doing exactly what I'd watched so many of my patients do: trying to make high-stakes decisions while completely overwhelmed, without the right information at the right time.

What I found was a gap I couldn't unsee. There were lawyers. There were therapists. There were financial advisors. But there was nothing that helped you get organized and clear enough to work effectively with any of them. Nothing that translated what was actually in your agreement. Nothing that told you what to do first when everything feels urgent.

After my divorce, I became the person my circle called. Friends, colleagues, people I hadn't talked to in years, all navigating the same overwhelm, asking the same questions, wishing someone would just tell them what to do next. I answered those calls. A lot of them.

Breaking Upward is what I wish had existed. Not a replacement for legal counsel or therapy. The thing that helps you get clear enough to use those resources well. I built a tool because the need is bigger than my calendar.