Posts tagged with “trauma”
How I’ve Been Shaking Out My Pain Since Losing My Daughter
“Movement has incredible healing power.” ~Alexandra Heather Foss
My ten-year-old daughter, who had been ill for all her life, was dying. She was hooked up to tubes and monitors, and they were always going off. Her numbers were off the charts, and the doctors kept saying, “Your daughter’s numbers aren’t normal, and we would normally have a team coming in here to check on her breathing and to rouse her.”
After the last operation, one doctor said she was surprised that she was still alive when she came into work. We all were. She kept fighting. She would just be …
How Tonglen Practice Healed My Pain After Trauma
“Tonglen reverses the usual logic of avoiding suffering and seeking pleasure. In this process…we begin to feel love for both ourselves and others; we begin to take care of ourselves and others. Tonglen awakens our compassion and introduces us to a far bigger view of reality.” ~Pema Chodron
It was challenging to focus during the summer months, with my six-year-old son at home more than usual. I had tons of ideas to write about, but my creative energies were exhausted from hours of playing. When the school year started, I finally sat down to write. The words took their own …
How Trauma Affects the Brain and How I’m Healing from PTSD
“Owning our story and loving ourselves through that process is the bravest thing that we’ll ever do.” ~Brené Brown
Several months ago, I was stoked about writing a piece on the living legacy of trauma, sharing how much we think we know about these so-called injuries of the mind, body, and spirit when, in reality, we know diddly squat.
I thought that a piece on this topic would inform and help folks like me. I’d suffered long and hard from PTSD, triggered initially by the sudden death of my brother and, simultaneously, the unfortunate finding of an email that confirmed
How I Healed My Strained Relationship with My Addict Mother
“We come to love not by finding a perfect person, but by learning to see an imperfect person perfectly.” ~Sam Keen
Like so many of us, my relationship with my mother throughout my life is best described as complicated.
We’ve had our fair share of turbulent times in our journey, and her alcoholism and drug abuse while I was growing up fueled great dysfunction on every level: literal physical fighting when I was a teenager (yep, Jerry Springer-style), seemingly continual acts of rebellion, a total lack of understanding, deep mistrust, unwillingness (or likely even an inability at the time) to …
A Little-Known Truth About People-Pleasing and How to Stop (for Good)
“Being a people-pleaser may be more than a personality trait; it could be a response to serious trauma.” ~Alex Bachert
Growing up in a home, school, and church that placed a lot of value on good behavior, self-discipline, and corporal punishment, I was a model child. There could have been an American Girl doll designed after me—the well-mannered church girl with a nineties hairbow edition.
I was quiet and pleasant and never got sent to the principal’s office. Complaining and “ugly” emotions were simply not allowed. Though I was very rambunctious and “rebellious” as a toddler, all of that was …
Dysfunctional Family Survivors: 7 Myths that Hold Your Healing Hostage
“I have never known a patient to portray their parents more negatively than they actually experienced them in childhood but always more positively–because idealization of their parents was essential for their survival.” Alice Miller, Thou Shalt Not Be Aware: Society’s Betrayal of the Child
If we’re born into dysfunctional families and, by some miracle, manage to recognize there’s something really wrong there, we can end up devoting a huge portion of our time on Earth (if not all of it) to piecemealing a life not defined by the despair and pain we felt as children.
Coming out of Survival Mode: How I Healed and Found Peace
“I have come to believe that caring for myself is not self-indulgent. Caring for myself is an act of survival.” ~Audre Lorde
I can’t pinpoint the exact moment when I realized that I no longer needed to fight for my survival, but I do know that it came after several years of prayer, healing, and intensive work. It wasn’t an event, but rather the feeling of peace and calm that comes after a storm.
For me, the storm dissipated slowly. It was the kind of storm that kept swirling and re-emerging until I finally realized that it would take concentrated …
3 Things to Do if You’re Wondering: Why Can’t I Just Be Happy?
Do you sometimes see people running around enjoying life and wonder what you’re missing? Sometimes I used to think I must be a horrible person. I had so many things going for me, and I still couldn’t be happy. I would ask myself, is there something wrong with me? Am I a narcissist?
Then sometimes I would decide I was just going to be happy. I would fake it until I made it and just accept that’s who I was. But it wouldn’t take long for me to feel overwhelmingly depressed.
I had a little dark hole that would …
Releasing Fascia: A Simple Way to Reduce Tension, Pain, and Disease
“Take care of your body, it’s the only place you have to live.” ~Jim Rohn
I hear this happens to so many, but when it happens to you, it’s unsettling. I didn’t know what was going on with me, and I wasn’t getting any satisfying answers either.
Most days were good, and I felt fine and went about my regular routine wearing my many hats: mother of two young kids, human mom to three fur babies, a household-manager-of-all-the-things and full-time dental hygienist. And then out of the blue, it could hit me like a ton of bricks… the backache, neck …
Learning to Speak Up When You Were Taught That Your Feelings Don’t Matter
“A proper grown-up communicates clearly and assertively.”
This is something I have heard many people say.
By that definition, I wouldn’t have classed as a proper grown-up for most of my life.
There was a time when I couldn’t even ask someone for a glass of water. I know that might seem crazy to some people, and for a long time I did feel crazy for it.
Why couldn’t I do the things others did without even thinking about it? Why couldn’t I just say what I needed to say? Why couldn’t I just be normal?
Those questions would …
Anxiety Sucks, But It Taught Me These 7 Important Things
“Anxiety is the dizziness of freedom.” ~Soren Kierkegaard
Let’s be clear:
This isn’t an article about positive thinking.
This isn’t an article about how silver linings make everything okay.
This isn’t an article about how your perspective on anxiety is all wrong.
The kids call those things “toxic positivity.”
No toxic positivity here.
This is an article about my lifelong relationship with anxiety and what I’ve learned from something that won’t go away. At times the anxiety spikes and feels almost crippling. I have a hard time appreciating the learning at those times, but it’s still there.
That is what …
How I’ve Stopped Letting My Unhealed Parents Define My Worth
“Detachment is not about refusing to feel or not caring or turning away from those you love. Detachment is profoundly honest, grounded firmly in the truth of what is.” ~Sharon Salzberg
A few months ago, my father informed me that he’d been diagnosed with prostate cancer. Although he seemed optimistic about the treatment, I knew that hearing such news was not easy.
After a few weeks, I followed up with him. He ignored my message and went silent for a couple of months. Although his slight ghosting was common, it made me feel ignored and dismissed.
In the meantime, I …
How I’ve Navigated My Grief and Guilt Since Losing My Narcissistic Father
“One of the greatest awakenings comes when you realize that not everybody changes. Some people never change. And that’s their journey. It’s not yours to try and fix it for them.” ~Unknown
In 2021 my father died. Cancer of… so many things.
Most of the events during that time are a blur, but the emotions that came with them are vivid and unrelenting.
I was the first in my family to find out.
My mother and sister had gone on an off-grid week-long getaway up the West Coast of South Africa, where there’s nothing …
One Thing We Need to Survive Crisis, Loss, and Trauma
“What man actually needs is not a tensionless state but rather the striving and struggling for a worthwhile goal, a freely chosen task.” ~Viktor Frankl
A couple of years ago, I was sitting in my little mountain cottage, writing away on a new novel. It was a cold and dark February afternoon. So, first, I felt pleasantly surprised when I saw something bright lighting up behind me: I thought it was the sun coming out. But when I turned around, I noticed that my porch was on fire!
Before I knew what was happening, I was standing out in the …
How I Learned That My Pain is Valid and Worthy of My Own Empathy and Love
“Sit with it. Sit with it. Sit with it. Sit with it. Even though you want to run. Even when it’s heavy and difficult. Even though you’re not quite sure of the way through. Healing happens by feeling.” ~Dr. Rebecca Ray
It’s July 2022 and I’m in the middle of a red tent at Shambala Music Festival in British Columbia.
I sit elbow to elbow, knee to knee, heart to heart with a group of women who I am meeting for the first time.
It’s hot and we’re sweaty.
A teacher is leading a healing womb meditation, and she prompts …
How I Claimed My Right to Belong While Dealing with Imposter Syndrome
TRIGGER WARNING: This post briefly references sexual abuse.
“Never hold yourself back from trying something new just because you’re afraid you won’t be good enough. You’ll never get the opportunity to do your best work if you’re not willing to first do your worst and then let yourself learn and grow.” ~Lori Deschene
The year 2022 was the hardest of my life. And I survived a brain tumor before that.
My thirtieth year started off innocently enough. I was living with my then-boyfriend in Long Beach and had a nice ring on my finger. The relationship had developed quickly, but …
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