Breaking Free From A Life Of Dissociation
“I don’t know what’s real and what’s not."
I told my therapist after receiving news from my Neurofeedback coach, I had massive cognitive damage to my brain, signifying the extreme effects of complex trauma throughout my life.
My brain scans showed I had spent the majority of my life disassociating from the present moment. This was heavy news on my heart...What I thought was ADHD, a diagnosis I had been seeking for the past year, was actually symptoms of the emotional and psychological abuse I have endured throughout my life.
“I don’t even know what joy feels like if I was always in survival mode,” I told my therapist.
She told me the moments of joy, peace, and the whole version of me had emerged in safe spaces. That I have gotten a taste of what this looks like and now that I’m finally healing my childhood trauma I will have more moments like this.
More joy and more peace.
After our session, I thought about where in my life I felt the most aliveness…
And I realized that the times I knew for sure I wasn’t disassociating were the times I was writing.
The times I felt the most myself was when using my voice in poems, prose, and essays.
Every time my fingers touched the keyboard I was slowly but surely returning to the wholeness of who I’m meant to be.
Many students who come to me to be their writing coach have also suffered from the same unfortunate circumstance of childhood trauma. So many of us have spent our whole lives with strong coping mechanisms to smile through deep inner wounds at the appeasement of making those around us comfortable.
But we no longer have to do that anymore.
When we write our stories, we shine a light on our shadow selves. Because our shadow selves deserve the most nurturing and healing love from the version of who we are today.
Today, give yourself permission to bring your stories to life.
Writing our stories is a loving act of salvation from the lost years of our lives.
Writing our stories is putting ourselves first and giving ourselves what we inherently know to deserve…humanity in the coexistence of the dark and light.
Sincerely,
Mary
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