Silvia Vasquez-Lavado was the first Peruvian woman to summit Mt. Everest in 2016. Her journey up the world's tallest mountain was more than a strenuous hike- it was a step toward healing.
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado summited Mt. Everest in 2016, and was the first Peruvian woman to do so. Her trip up the world’s tallest mountain was part of an incredible journey toward healing - from sexual abuse when she was a child and from alcoholism as an adult. Her book, In the Shadow of the Mountain, tells the story of her childhood in Peru, her immigration to America, and her climb up Mt. Everest.
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Artwork photo credit: Emily Assiran
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado:
Climbing was never so much about overpowering or conquering. Even the very first time when I trekked to the base of Everest and I came across the Himalayas, that possibly was the beginning of my healing. It was the very first time that I saw my place in the universe and being so tiny, such a little miniature. I felt I had bumped into something that was stronger and more powerful than me or than any human.
Shelby Stanger:
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado summited Mount Everest in 2016. She's the first Peruvian woman to climb Everest and the first openly gay woman to climb the tallest mountain on each continent known as the Seven Summits. Her trip up the world's tallest mountain was part of an incredible journey toward healing from sexual abuse when she was a child and from alcoholism as an adult. As she climbed, she learned to let go of a dark past and instead, embrace a world of hope. I'm Shelby Stanger, and this is Wild Ideas Worth Living.
Shelby Stanger:
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado's memoir, In the Shadow of the Mountain, details her childhood in Lima, Peru, her immigration to the United States, and eventually, her climb up Mount Everest. The book is being made into a major motion picture, starring Selena Gomez. Silvia didn't climb Mount Everest by herself. She hiked the 80 miles from Lukla to Everest Base Camp with five other climbers, three Nepalis and two Americans, all survivors of sexual abuse. The group came together as part of Silvia's nonprofit, Courageous Girls, which aims to empower survivors and help them heal by guiding them to Everest Base Camp. Once they made it to base camp, the group returned to Lukla while Silvia joined an expedition to summit the mountain. It was an adventure she couldn't have imagined when she was a young girl growing up in Peru. A note, Silvia's story involves a number of sensitive topics, including sexual abuse, alcoholism, and ceremonial drug use that could be triggering to some folks. Please take care.
Shelby Stanger:
What made you want to climb mountains?
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado:
Great question. I was born and raised in Lima, Peru. And both my parents, especially my father, was born in the Andes. My mom's family, they are actually from Huascaran, which is our tallest mountain. And even though I had that heritage, I was never interested in mountains. If anything, they always seemed daunting and something that only the toughest of the toughs could do. And unfortunately, I was just, like many women around the world, I was sexually abused as a little girl for a long time, for about ages six to 10. And that took away the joy of my childhood. Ultimately, because of the complexity of how it had happened, I couldn't tell my parents until I was close to 15, 16. And when I told my mother, she felt that the best thing for me would be to leave Peru.
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado:
So, I ended up moving to the US on a scholarship. And unfortunately, when I finished college and I moved to San Francisco, I became an alcoholic. And there was a way for me to soothe the pain and sooth my trauma. I was getting into a whole lot of trouble. My life was spiraling out of control, and I hit a point that I asked my mother for help. So, she had me come down to Peru, and out of the blue, ask me to do a session of Ayahuasca, which my mother was not this new age kind of person. She was this very conservative Catholic woman. However, she had tried it, and somehow, it had resonated with her. So, she felt that potentially, it could help me. I would never forget. August 25th, 2005, I go down there not having any expectation. I do this Ayahuasca session. And the first thing I see is me as a little girl, the little girl that I hated the little girl that I was trying to erase.
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado:
And I see her just wanting to be embraced by my adult self. And I was very compelled, she had been suffering. So, I just wanted to protect her. As I reconnect with my little girl, then we start hearing this rumbling, and this mountains formed around us. And my little girl extends her hand and pulls me into walking into mountains. So, I got out of that vision and I told myself, aha, mountains, wow, this is weird. And it was one of those things that I felt there was a sacredness about connecting to this part of my life that I had been trying to erase. There was something about you know what? Maybe I should take this, do something about it. And I figure I need to bring this massive pain, it would only make sense to bring it to the tallest mountain in the world. That's when I took myself to the base of Everest, without any prior experience, not knowing what to expect. I was just following this crazy vision, something that was very sacred. And that is what started this whole journey for me.
Shelby Stanger:
Silvia was 31 years old when she had her Ayahuasca experience. Little did she know that vision would lead her to a full fledged climbing career and the life she has today. When she reached base camp, Silvia made a promise to herself. She would come back and climb to the summit. We can't just wake up one morning and climb Mount Everest. It takes training, dedication, and mountaineering experience. So, Silvia decided that she would start by climbing the tallest mountain on each continent, working her way up to the mother of all mountains, Everest.
Shelby Stanger:
You describe climbing in a way that we don't hear stories about climbing the way you've described it. There's this motherly connection that you have with the mountain. And Everest has a different name. Can you tell me what that name is and what it means?
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado:
Yes. Yes. The name Everest was actually, it was after a British colonel who had done... They had done a survey expedition. So, I think they named it after him when they discovered the peak. But the local culture, the Sherpas, people in Nepal, and the Tibetans, the Tibetans called her Chomolungma, which means mother of the world. For me, the name resonated, Chomolungma, mother of the world. I felt that was so powerful. They didn't call her father of the world. The fact that they had this beautiful maternal connection. But sharing the whole journey in the book, the way that I experienced it, climbing was never so much about overpowering or conquering. To me, even the very first time when I trekked to the base of Everest and I came across the Himalayas, that possibly was the beginning of my healing.
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado:
When I saw these towering peaks, I was climbing up this beautiful village. And as I got to the top, and I'll never forget almost a riding this curve, and boom, it was a beautiful sunny day. And then, you just see the side of the Himalayas and these overpowering, these towering, massive formations of gorgeous mountains, completely dominating over you. It was the very first time that I saw my place in the universe and being so tiny, such a little miniature. I felt I had bumped into something that was stronger and more powerful than me or than any human. And by the time that I got to the base of Everest, I remember just having this appreciation, this gratitude, that when I found that it meant mother of the world, to me, it just made the most sense.
Shelby Stanger:
I'm really curious about how nature became such an important part of healing for you, and how you found your way to it, and what it did for you.
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado:
I believe that very first time I came across the Himalayas was awe. And I think that is an emotion that is a feeling that we can easily take it for granted. I love it when you see it in little kids. Every day for them is awe, is about discovery. I think as adults, we get jaded. And especially in my case, the way that I was
burying my trauma... And Florence talks beautifully in The Nature Fix. But almost getting out into nature, getting disconnected from everything, not having any distractions opens up the rewiring of the brain. And I felt that was really important. And it allows you to find yourself being present, and it allows you to reconnect to your body. When you start putting all those elements, I think that was the beginning of the transformation for me, the opening of the healing. And the fact that here I am connecting to something that it is much bigger than me just starts bringing this harmony.
Shelby Stanger:
In many ways, being in nature encouraged Silvia to push herself harder, to develop more grit and break through barriers. But climbing mountains also taught her to be softer, cracked her open and encouraged her to be vulnerable. She quickly learned that there was no strength without vulnerability and that the two were deeply intertwined. The insights that Silvia gained from mountaineering were so impactful that she wanted to share her experience with other victims of sexual abuse. In 2014, she started a nonprofit called Courageous Girls.
Shelby Stanger:
How did your experience lead you to get involved with other sexual abuse survivors and you leading them to do these climbing trips and starting this movement called the Courageous Girls?
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado:
When I started climbing, I took my personal journey. I remember when I got to the base of Everest that very first time, I made the promise when seeing the sunrise, I'm like, "Okay, I'm going to come back one day under two conditions." I told myself, "Okay, I need to come back prepared with the experience of a mountaineer. And I need to come back with a social cause so that I can say thank you and give gratitude for what I had just experienced at the time." So, I already put the seed about the social cause. And I didn't know what, how, when, how it was going to come about. For the very first couple of years since I started climbing, I remember being like, "So, what is this going to be?"
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado:
I wasn't open talking about my own journey being an abuse survivor. I kept it very private. And I remember just being like... It kept being in the back of my head because I knew I needed to return to Everest with a particular social cause. And actually, it was in Aconcagua, when that night of my breakdown, I remember just crying my eyes out, doubting myself, not knowing what was going to happen. And the day after my breakdown, I was able to summit Aconcagua. And the evening after my summit, in my sleep, in my dreams, I heard this powerful voice that said, "Silvia, you have to continue climbing. You have to get to Everest. And also, you need to bring survivors to the base of Everest. They need to come with you. You need to recreate this journey for them."
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado:
And that was, I remember I woke up the minute that I had this, I felt it was a voice, this kind of order, a mandate. And I looked at myself and I was like, "Oh my God, the altitude has gotten to me." But it was this almost relief about, wow, okay. This makes sense. This is what I had been asking what to do. That was the very beginning of putting this whole crazy idea. All right, well, let me convince women to come to the base of Everest from Nepal and San Francisco to do this journey with me, not knowing what to expect.
Shelby Stanger:
Is the Courageous Girls a nonprofit?
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado:
Courageous Girls is a nonprofit. Bringing this group of survivors and healing in nature worked. I just didn't know in my own experiment, I didn't know, okay, it happened to me and is this really going to be relevant for everyone else? And I think one of the most beautiful... The two chapters that I love the most on the book are Rhythm and Nothing You Do is Small. Because to me, it's almost you can see the healing happening on those chapters. And actually not just the healing, but the community that we're building, and this incredible sisterhood and motherhood. And what I also love about them is that you can tell from the previous chapters, I'm this neurotic person going like, "Oh God, what am I doing?" But it is beautiful because if anything, it's one of these beautiful journeys that you can actually see the healing taking shape.
Shelby Stanger:
Climbing from Lukla to Everest Base Camp is no easy task. It's about 80 miles and gains 8,300 feet of elevation. By making this trek with Silvia, these survivors discovered the power that comes from pushing herself to do hard things, especially outside. In fact, three of the young women from that initial trek to base camp have become mountaineering guides. When we come back, Silvia reads an excerpt from her book and talks about challenges of the writing process.
Shelby Stanger:
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado's story is full of low lows and high highs. Like 29,032 feet above sea level highs. In early 2022, Silvia published a memoir titled In The Shadow of The Mountain. It takes readers from Silvia's upbringing in Lima to her adulthood in the Bay Area, and her decision to start climbing. In the book, Silvia writes in detail about her trek with Courageous Girls and about her expedition to the summit.
Shelby Stanger:
When you go to book talks, what excerpt do you usually read?
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado:
Can I read you mine?
Shelby Stanger:
Yeah.
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado:
I love this particular... The chapter that I wanted to read to you is when we're doing this beautiful blessing by these nuns that I had met once, and something unexpected, that wasn't even planned. Here I am in the middle of this experience.
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado:
Lucy's eyes open and she meets my gaze. She smiles and quickly looks away. Her fingers absently stroking the silk kata at her shoulder. I take a deep breath and close my eyes again. The sound swallows me. The nuns' voices become wind, divorced from any person or object. It moves freely, abundant, and available for us to receive. Like the Buddhists say about the value of prayer, it is unconditional untethered to any judgment or performance. All I have to do is be, and I will be loved. I don't know where this thought comes from, but it's so radical, so foreign to everything I've ever known, that the simplicity of it almost crushes me. I feel a physical twang in my heart. As the song fades to silence, I open my eyes to find the girls looking at me. The faces of the women in the room are warm and tender.
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado:
I'm not sure how much time has passed. A minute, 10, an hour? I realize I have been sobbing. My face is soak with tears and little rivulets of snot run down my chin. Embarrassed, I smile and quickly wipe my nose on my sleeve. "Thank you." I bow to the nuns. "Thank you so much. I swear, I wasn't planning to cry today." Laughter ripples through the room, but the nuns seem to know exactly what I mean. They bow to bid us goodbye. They've got another blessing to do in Pamboche, and their smiles are joyful. Shreya and Ehani reach out their hands to pull me up and embrace me in a hug.
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado:
"It's okay, Silvia," says Ehani. "I know," I say. "They're happy tears. I promise." I had no idea the nuns were going to do a full puja. I had never experienced anything like that. Maybe the Nepali girls had. As we leave, the nuns promised to pray for us every day and to keep praying for me until I reached the summit. "But send us a message when you get to the top," calls Anichokla, in a serious tone, "So we can stop praying." I laugh. I guess even unconditional love has its limits.
Shelby Stanger:
So much of your book is inspiring. I couldn't put it down. I am blown away by your story and of your ability to share it. Let's talk about your book, In the Shadow of the Mountain. When did you first decide I'm going to write a book?
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado:
I always felt when I was doing the Seven Summits, but the impetus didn't come until my first anniversary while summiting Everest, I was involved in a horrible bike accident. I ended up on the ICU. I fell without a helmet. So, I had this massive brain concussion. And while I was in the ICU, they found a small brain tumor at the base of my brain stem. And for a couple of days, they couldn't determine if my tumor was benign or cancerous. I remember that very first night, I had my friends who were visiting. I kicked everybody out and I told myself, well, if it's cancerous, I will quit my job tomorrow. And I will spend the rest of my life trying to climb as much as I can, trying to connect with as many young women, and trying to find a way of sharing the story.
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado:
And so, luckily, my tumor was benign. Yet, this was in 2017. I still had to complete Denali. And Denali had been elusive. I already had tried going there two times. And I felt that I maybe needed to finish that before I could feel like, hey, I want to share the story. Unfortunately, because of the accident, I eventually had to have brain surgery. But it took me over a year and a half to get my strength again. And after I came back from Denali, I had a bad episode with drinking. And I told myself, "This is it. It's either one more drink or my life."
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado:
And I decided to get a little bit of help and went into this inner exploration of, okay, what is this addiction and how can I overcome it? Can I really work? Can I for once and for all deal with it? So, as that started opening up, I think I was six months into my sobriety when I felt okay, then I feel I can start walking this path of telling the story. I wanted to for once and for all free myself from all the shame that I had. And I've been very lucky now. I'm four years sober. And I needed to come to terms with that part. And I think it's been able to share through this really raw book, just the beauty that we can find in us.
Shelby Stanger:
Yeah. Vulnerability and getting in touch with vulnerability is a whole other Everest to climb.
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado:
Yes, it is. It is. But the beauty of that, and that's what I love how we start the book, that episode with almost getting blown by this storm at 25,000 feet. And I am about to quit the expedition. I just, I need somebody to come and hug me, somebody to give me that strength. I'm at my lowest, and there's no one. And still, I was able to just, by trying to hug my oxygen tank and hugging myself, was I gave myself the kind of the strength that kept me going.
Shelby Stanger:
Yeah. In some ways, you were your own mother.
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado:
Yes.
Shelby Stanger:
It's such a good book because it vacillates between your past and your present with climbing a mountain. And it goes back and forth and back and forth. And you feel like you're on the mountain with you, and you feel like you're in the moment, and it's really well written. So, tell me about the writing process. How did this book come together?
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado:
It wasn't just an individual process. I had a whole team. From the very beginning, my journey... Originally, I wanted to write a book about the Seven Summits. I have kept my journals on every single one of my expeditions. So, I would say my ego was why don't I write about every single learning on every mountain? And when we started putting the, how would the memoir take shape? What would be some of the areas that we wanted to focus? We felt that it would make most sense to keep the story concise in terms of the climbing and focus on the Everest journey. Because we also had a lot with the story with the girls and how to bring that forward. So, instead of being more of a creative process, it became almost more, a little bit of a business process.
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado:
I was incredibly structured. And the way that we broke it out is, okay, let's look at the whole structure of the story. What are we going to focus? Everything was broken down for me into little snippets. Then, I would go on and start writing. One of the things that became so pivotal for me is I had no idea how much knowledge of all the trauma was stored in my body. And my therapist is a somatic therapist who is able to reawaken at times those experiences. Through this whole journey, writing the book. And the irony is I was able to really fully do it through the pandemic where there was no distractions. And I had to isolate. So, I literally was isolating.
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado:
And one of the hardest things for me was to reopen the can of worms and to reopen the detail that I did. And even as I have been an outspoken activist about my own experience, I never really got into the details until the scenes kept calling for it. I literally would use my therapy sessions into digging into it. And that's why I've told people it's not going to be an easy read. It can be a little bit triggering, but it is one of these things that just like any storm, at times, before you see this gorgeous sun, sometimes, you're going to have to go through a little bit of turbulence.
Shelby Stanger:
I'm really grateful that you did share your story. I can just tell you have the zest for life that's intense because you know that life can be fleeting, and hard, and painful, but also beautiful.
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado:
Yes.
Shelby Stanger:
That's what I took from it.
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado:
To me, this is an invitation to anyone. And even though it hides as a climbing book, it's not a climbing book. It is a journey that we all have. This book is about really following your dream, whichever dream it is.
Shelby Stanger:
What's your advice to people who just want to get out there and pursue whatever wild idea they have?
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado:
What I will tell all of our listeners is just take that first step. Just go for it. As tiny as it could be. It could be a baby step. It doesn't matter. Just take it, just trust it. Check it with your heart. Not to make it too cheesy, but close your eyes, put your hands to your heart and ask, "Okay, is this what we want? Do we want to follow it? How does this resonate? We have no clue how we're going to make it, but does this
resonate in us? Yes. Okay. Let me take that first step." I think we are the biggest manufacturers of change. It just takes that little baby step to just say it out. I think it is the very beginning of anything that it is wild.
Shelby Stanger:
Okay. Well, what is your next wild idea? You have so many.
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado:
The biggest, biggest wildest idea, which I'm putting it out there will be to climb the tallest mountain in the universe, which is in Mars. And it's called Olympus Mons.
Shelby Stanger:
What?
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado:
The downside about it yet is, if I go to Mars, I will become blind. So, I'm giving myself maybe a couple of decades before I do that. I feel I still need to see things.
Shelby Stanger:
I didn't even know this was a thing or a possibility.
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado:
It is not, but that is as wild as I get.
Shelby Stanger:
Wow, Silvia. You dream big, Mars. I did not expect that.
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado:
Short term, I think personally, I would love to continue the second Seven Summits, the second tallest mountains in the world. I call myself a messenger of the mountain, trying to bring as many people as I can, trying to make it as inclusive.
Shelby Stanger:
Can I just ask you another piece of advice for listeners?
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado:
Yes.
Shelby Stanger:
Using nature to heal from trauma. I get that it's not just nature. There's therapy. There's a lot of ingredients. But if someone who's had abuse or trauma, trauma is so sticky and it's not a straight line. Just any advice on where to start that healing?
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado:
Yeah. Personally, for me, and you will see it on the book, I feel that what trauma sometimes does, it takes us away from our bodies, especially if we had had to endure something that was against our will. What I have found is that with trauma, we sometimes get disconnected to our bodies. And especially for me, the addiction was numbing it. And my humble advice is by being in nature, especially if we can give ourselves a little bit of time, and just by taking in the landscape, by taking in the environment, it will allow us to re-center and refill ourselves, rekindling that relationship with our own bodies.
Silvia Vasquez-Lavado:
Just reconnecting, giving ourselves a little bit of space, I think it will give us a very first step of coming back to our bodies, appreciating that, feeling our feet touch on the ground, feeling our heartbeat. If we get a little agitated, depending on what we're climbing, just being able to open up that all. I would say for anybody who feel they're struggling, nature will bring you that. And to know that you are not alone, to know that you're being held, that you're being witness, that you're not alone, that you're being watched in the most sacred of ways.
Shelby Stanger:
Silvia never expected to become a mountaineer, much less to climb the tallest mountain in the world. Connecting to these peaks taught her so much about strength, about tenderness, and about respect. By sharing her journey, Silvia reminds us of the incredible healing and transformative power of nature.
Shelby Stanger:
Silvia, thank you so much for talking to me and telling your story with such vulnerability and energy and so much courage. You can get her book, In the Shadow of the Mountain, anywhere books are sold. Go buy it now, it's my favorite book I've read this year. Follow Silvia on Instagram at Silvia Vas La to see what adventure she’s doing next. That’s S-I-L-V-I-A-V-A-S-L-A. Silvia’s story is being made into a movie, starring Selena Gomez as Silvia. There isn’t a release date yet, so be sure to follow Silvia on Instagram to find out when it will be out. If you want to learn more about Silvia’s non-profit, Courageous Girls, you can go to Courageous Girls dot org.
Shelby Stanger:
Wild Ideas Worth Living is part of the REI podcast network. It's hosted by me, Shelby Stanger, written and edited by Annie Fassler and Sylvia Thomas of Puddle Creative. And our senior producer is Chelsea Davis. Our executive producers are Paolo Mottola and Joe Crosby. As always, we appreciate when you
follow the show, rate it, and review it wherever you listen. And remember, some of the best adventures happen when you follow your wildest ideas.