Thoughts Over Coffee via @survivingchildhoodtrauma ☕️
This one is from November 2021, but it is still relevant as ever.
Last year in November, for first time in my five years of healing I leaned into my trauma anniversaries instead of trying to devise a plan of distraction.
More than any other month last year, in November I wanted all of this to stop. To just be done with it. I wanted to forget everything and not feel the weight of unpacking and processing the things that hurt me so badly as a child.
Last year I spent some time in my deepest grief yet, made connections to wounds in ways that take my breath, and found answers that have helped my healing journey continue to move forward.
I say often on my Instagram livestream shows that we don’t “get over” our childhoods because they are always there anytime we look back; there is no getting around that.
Stepping Into Awareness
I feel that even deeper now, as I touch some of my earliest wounds from childhood and continue to work on the betrayals I have lived through.
There is no magical number of years that will pass to make my grandfather’s abuse less vial or traumatic.
I will not suddenly reach an age where my father’s abuses and betrayals won’t strike deep in my heart.
Yes, healing will teach me how to recognize these triggers, how to cope with big emotions, and how to show up for myself …
But it will not make the pain of my childhood suddenly go away or change the fact that it was my family who did this.
Healing Looks How I Want it to Look
Last year I was told by two of the remaining family members on my abuser’s side to get over it and move on. I was been told that I play the victim, seek attention, and don’t tell the “whole” story, among other things.
They can fuck off.
Healing takes as long as I need it to, and it will look and sound however I need it to as I move through my healing process because the shit I went through as a child doesn’t just stop hurting one day. The memories will always be there.
What I lived through as a child was seriously messed up and it changed me.
*****
It doesn’t matter how old you are or how long it has been since your abuse happened – it doesn’t just suddenly go away. I understand you.
Please don’t let anyone put a timeline on your healing. It is okay if it still hurts, be gentle with yourself.
On goes the journey
Survivor’s Circle Peer Support Groups meet on alternating Wednesdays and Fridays via Zoom.
Attend a session and experience the magical healing that happens when survivors connect and support each other through shit only we can understand.
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