Trauma: Friend & foe
I’m slowly ascending from a darker chapter of my life that drastically* effected my mental health. Although I can feel myself transitioning into a lighter chapter, the one I feel myself entering is still relatively dim.
Thinking about the last year of my life, specifically since May 2023, I know that I am different than I was a year ago.** I am slightly more weathered in terms of my perspective due to secondary trauma I experienced. As a result, my view of the world has become a little less saturated with color.
I think about how any kind of trauma - childhood abuse, systemic racism, pregnancy complications, a fvcking pandemic, etc. - irrevocably changes you on a cellular level.
Trauma changes how we view ourselves and those around us. It changes how we view society and the world we live in. It changes the lens with which we use to navigate our lives, the choices we make for ourselves and the paths we choose.
We can never un-see or un-experience something.***
Many things happened during the early COVID years that tweaked my lens, and not for the better. I find myself even less trusting of figures of authority and government, less optimistic about humanity and ultimately, an little less like myself. I feel this way because of what happened in 2020 and how it transpired. That period of history unfolded in real time and I lived it.
We all lived it.
We were not reading it in a textbook, studying a list of facts for a quiz or watching a movie based on true events (all which would be enough to elicit all sorts of feelings like sadness, disappointment and rage.) History is the forest and while you can empathize deeply with horrific events of the past, you are removed to a point that makes it feel almost abstract.
I now know from first hand experience that something like a pandemic is 100% realistically possible. It is absolutely possible that we could be bound to our homes because of something potentially deadly that we can’t seem to control as a result of knowing so little about it.
It’s absolutely possible that some people might have to die a painful death alone for the sake of everyone else, in an attempt to keep it as contained as possible.
It actually happened in my lifetime which is something I never, ever, ever gave any serious thought to until 2020, and there’s nothing to say that it can’t happen again.
Just as trauma can open our eyes to new perspectives and catapult us onto positive, unexpected paths, it also opens our eyes to all that is possible: the scary, the disheartening, and the truly downright evil.
In the past year I’ve seen a much darker side of humans. When you realize that sometimes the most despicable people can infiltrate your inner circle, it’s very disorienting and makes you begin to question everyone and everything.****
I’ve also seen first hand how easily the human brain can be manipulated be it by another person, social media, conspiracy theories, etc. It’s scary to know that the human mind is actually somewhat fragile. Given certain circumstances, a person can be indoctrinated to a way of life that is wildly unhealthy or full on dangerous, and then make important life choices based on that manipulation.
I now move about the world never fully convinced that any one person isn’t capable of very serious wrongdoing. I also do not for one second think that anyone is immune to brainwashing of any kind. Are some highly unlikely to be indoctrinated? Sure, but incapable? Not so much.
While I don’t love this new vista, each time I experience trauma it weirdly reinforces this simple fact:
Most of this ::gestures vaguely:: doesn’t matter.
Like, at all.
Truly, most of it doesn’t matter at all. In the long run - which is ideally how long we’re here - a majority of this doesn’t make or break your life. In an instant - be it by way of disease, violence or chance - it is absolutely possible for those who legitimately take up real estate in your heart and give you life to vanish.
I’m not saying that we shouldn’t celebrate the wins or mourn the not-wins - goals, accomplishments, experiences, etc. They serve a purpose, but let’s put those into perspective. Let’s allow ourselves to have the feelings that come naturally followed up by a big ‘ole cold glass of reality to wash them away as we make peace with the fact that our lives are so much more than those things.
When PMADs hit me hard I found myself constantly thinking, I just want to be myself again. Once I got treatment I did find myself and it was so fvcking awesome.
Shortly after that recovery COVID hit hard and I found myself constantly thinking, I just want to be myself again. I wanted to feel normal and to feel joy again. Eventually, after creating a new plan of attack with my MD and attempting to make the best of what was happening, I found myself again.
In the past year, betwix the stress, grief and lack of bandwidth all I could feel was, I just want to be myself again. I know she’s in there but it’s taking time to fully find her.
I just want to be myself again.
I guess what I mean by that statement is, I just want to be the me I was before I knew and saw what is now a permanent part of my psyche. And perhaps that’s not the best way to look at it.
Trauma can be the best or the worst thing to ever happen to someone.
For me, it has given me a very good bird’s eye view of the little time we all have on this green and blue sphere, and guided me as to where and how I should spend my energy.
Most days I am extremely grateful for my life. It’s not extravagant and it’s not what most would describe as adventurous (unless you’re a parent because I would argue that any day trying to raise a living human is an adventure.) However, I am grateful every single day because I’ve experienced the diametrically opposite mindframe through trauma, and I know that it could return in at any time.
Peace is not promised to any of us.
Let’s allow trauma to do its work and open the parts of us that we didn’t know existed and hopefully, we can find some good in even the darkest of places.
With heaps of humor and heart,
*Not to worry - I have no thoughts of harming myself or anyone else. It’s purely a matter of having limited bandwidth and spending a majority of it in highly emotionally charged circumstances.
**Mind you, I’m not even beginning to address how the events of October 7, 2023 have forever skewed my view of the world. That is a whole other conversation that is relevant but also a VERY large conversation.
***…and in some cases, some things should never be un-seen. All the work I did at The Trevor Project provided me with a priceless, raw introduction into the realities of oppressed groups of people and that is something I never want to un-see. I take that with me each day as I continue my journey to be less sh*tty to those without the privileges I was granted by society when I was born.
****I will not be more specific than that for the sake of my loved ones’ privacy, but I’m sure it’s a concept that anyone can understand.