All tagged healing

Thirty-four years ago today

I take a seat next to her and take her hand. She immediately leans in to hug me. She knows that I know what is really happening for her in that moment even more than she does. This is comforting to this younger me who felt chronically misunderstood. I tell her how beautiful she is. She brushes it off like yeah-yeah. I take a beat and look in her eyes and say it again, “You are so beautiful, more beautiful than you know. I promise.” She takes it in this time, understanding and not brushing it aside.

Today I have decided to stop trying to heal

Sometimes, when the moon is in just the right phase, and the stars are in just the right alignment, and the house is too quiet, and I feel too alone, and someone says or does something that reminds me of that trauma, or that song plays…I find myself awash with the grief and pain and sadness and come face to face with my trauma all over again.

Until this morning, in those moments, I have tried an infinite number of healthy and not so healthy ways to, well honestly, not feel what I am feeling. This morning I want to apologize to my sweet traumatized self for trying relentlessly to erase her. Instead I open my arms and heart to her and say, “Oh honey, of course you feel this way. How could you not?”