my why

From womb, to earthside, to children services + restraining orders, to loss of my idol, & precancerous cells in my uterus. I remember being told a long time ago that “God gives his toughest battles to his strongest soldiers.”

At the age of eleven I ran into the hallway out of my english class sobbing. My teacher had been telling us about her divorce she was currently struggling with and was apologizing for how she had been showing up as. When she came out of the class, obviously confused she asked me what was wrong. My reply was short “I think I need to tell someone what’s happening at home.”

Growing up it seemed as if it was all normal, that it was just how our family worked; that it was normal to be scared to get off the bus somedays after school, that extreme fatigue due to stress caused me to fall asleep at any time. That we were the perfect children, well behaved, so diligent in school, and hard workers. That’s all anyone ever wanted to see. The bloodshot eyes from crying, and discolorations of my face that was patched over with makeup, and the complete emotional shutdown was never talked about. Because it was easier. It was less messy. In a small town you don’t ‘air your dirty laundry’. This metamorphosed into dreaming about driving into the lake on my drive home from school, to swerving into oncoming traffic, or taking too much of the medication in the pill cabinet. From ‘not expressing the whole truth’ in court to have an entire family attend the graduation of a sister, to packing belongs in garbage bags wishing this would be the time we left + never came back. But it wasn’t. It never was the last time. The rollercoaster of trauma response severing + ripping the soul and body apart then attempts to patch it back together until the next time.

Trauma is not pretty. It’s not delicate. It’s painful etchings of stories charred into someone’s soul, into their thoughts, into their core beliefs. It is extraordinary to see the strength that someone can have in the face of tragedy. But where is the crowd cheering when the battle is won? When the pieces start to fall apart? When the bindings + bandages fall away.

This. This is why I am so diligent in my work. Because I will be there, I am here to guide you back, I am here to mend those wounds, to show you your beauty even if you find it ugly. I see you. I know you. I have been you. I am you. You are not alone. Will I just do it for you? No. I will not. Because I can’t. I do not know the pieces that you now want to make your soul a part of; as souls we are changing, evolving, and perfecting ourselves every moment of everyday. Which means I cannot tell you which pieces to keep and which to throw away. I cannot tell you where they go. But I am here to guide, to light the way out of the darkness.

I am here for you. I am here to tell you that your trauma is not something that was “unfortunate” “a hardship” or “a battle won”, it is a piece of your story that we now get to work with. A piece of you that doesn’t have to fit, or feel good, or be normalized. I am here to guide you back into your body; back home.

So are you ready to let the light in?