Episode 84

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Published on:

30th Nov 2025

Surviving 100+ Electroconvulsive Treatments

This episode is not light. It’s not soft. And it’s not going to let you sit comfortably behind your assumptions about mental health treatment. Lisa survived more than 100 ECT (electroconvulsive therapy) treatments, a practice still used — and often unregulated — in the U.S. and around the world. She shares how depression, bipolar disorder, OCD, panic attacks, and anorexia led her into a medical system that promised help but delivered brain damage, memory loss, and the erasure of her identity.

This episode covers:

  • Losing 20 years of long-term memories
  • Forgetting the years her son grew up
  • Getting lost while running because her brain couldn’t process directions
  • Having to train a service dog to guide her back home
  • The stigma, judgment, and discrimination she still faces
  • Running a marathon with a brain injury
  • Writing a book as a form of advocacy
  • And becoming a fierce voice for the people who cannot speak for themselves

If you’ve ever doubted your own strength, this story will rewire something in you.

🎙️ What We Talk About

  • The dark truth behind shock therapy and why its machines are not regulated
  • What it feels like to lose your memory while your life keeps happening
  • Navigating deep depression, bipolar disorder, anorexia, panic attacks, and stigma
  • The moment she realized ECT caused permanent cognitive injury
  • How her service dog became her lifeline
  • Feeling unseen, unheard, and misunderstood in medical systems
  • How movement, running, and community helped her fight back
  • Why running a marathon became her act of rebellion
  • What reinvention looks like when your brain has been altered against your will
  • Advocating for others still being forced into ECT


🔑 Key Takeaways

“I lost my memories, but I did not lose my will.”
“Not all disabilities are visible — and not all treatments are safe.”
“Running was my way back to myself. Writing was my way back to the world.”
“Shock therapy took my memory. My resilience rebuilt my life.”


🙌 Why This Episode Matters

There are thousands of people living with the invisible aftermath of ECT — memory loss, trauma, cognitive damage, shame, and stigma. Most suffer in silence. Most never get to tell their story. Lisa refuses to stay quiet. This episode is not just awareness — it’s a call for compassion, for advocacy, and for a medical system that stops harming the people it claims to save.


💬 Connect with Lisa

📖 Book: Shocked — authorlisac.com

Facebook: authorlisac.com


🔗 Resources & Links:


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About the Podcast

Survival Mode Disrupted with Leticia R Francis
Disruptive Unapologetic Conversations about Survival Mode
Survival Mode Disrupted is not just a podcast. It's a rebellion.

A raw, unfiltered space where we finally stop pretending we're fine and start telling the truth—the truth about the trauma we've carried, the identities they had to wear to survive, and the radical decisions we made to break free.

Because here's the deal: survival mode isn’t just a season. It’s a damn identity. One that so many were forced to adopt just to get through life, to stay safe, to stay needed, to stay sane. But eventually, it starts costing you more than it protects. Your peace. Your purpose. Your power.

This podcast is for the disruptors—the people who were told to stay small, stay silent, stay grateful for crumbs… and said “hell no.”

Hosted by Leticia, The Survival Mode Disruptor herself—a trauma recovery mentor, speaker, and woman who has lived through the fires of abuse, betrayal, and breakdown and still chose to rise—this show dives deep into the unapologetic exits from survival mode that no one talks about.

You’ll hear from women (and a few brave men) who walked away from toxic relationships, soul-sucking careers, generational dysfunction, religious trauma, cultural expectations, and the lies they were taught to believe about themselves. Not because it was easy—but because staying would’ve killed something sacred inside of them.

These are the stories of bold pivots, quiet courage, and messy but miraculous rebirths.

Each episode is a conversation—a disruption—meant to wake something up in you. Whether it’s a guest sharing the moment they chose themselves for the first time, or Leticia dropping a truth bomb that makes you question everything you’ve normalized, this podcast is here to shake the foundation of your survival mode identity and replace it with something truer. Something freer.

We’re not here for surface-level self-care tips or fake empowerment slogans.

We’re here to talk about what it really takes to:

Reclaim your voice after being silenced.

Reinvent yourself after being broken down.

Rewrite your story when everyone else wants you to stay the same.

Release the guilt of choosing YOU.

This is for those who are done performing. Done pleasing. Done pretending.

It’s for the ones ready to exit survival mode—not slowly, not quietly, but disruptively and unapologetically.

You won’t leave this podcast the same.
You’ll cry. You’ll rage. You’ll laugh.
You’ll see yourself in every story.
And more importantly, you’ll remember who the hell you are.

Welcome to Survival Mode Disrupted.
It’s not just a podcast.
It’s a movement.
And your exit begins here.

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About your host

Profile picture for Leticia Francis

Leticia Francis

I am not here to inspire you—I am here to activate you.

As a Survivor, Keynote Speaker, and Trauma Recovery Mentor, I know what it’s like to fight battles no one sees. I also know that breaking free is possible. My work is about disrupting survival mode, exposing trauma-driven success cycles, and giving women the blueprint to reclaim their lives.

🔹 200+ podcast features & speaking engagements
🔹 Global Women of Choice Award Winner 2022
🔹 Creator of the Survival Mode Exit Plan
🔹 Host of Survival Mode Disrupted Podcast