The headspace of the traumatized isn’t easy to understand unless you walk in the shoes they wear.
Looking into the eyes of someone who has experienced many horrors and afflictions isn’t easy. You can say you understand their pain, but you don’t know. Trauma isn’t just the big scary things that can affect us greatly, but it’s also the small things that matter not. When you can understand both sides, let them know because you’ve become an obstacle that cannot be moved right now if you remain silent.
The need to have others fight your battles for you comes and goes because you want to achieve something yourself, while on the other hand, you want to escape this hellish place. It’s those demons that haunt you every time you close your eyes at night, the chains that bind your mind while you breathe each breath you take. A horror you cannot explain to the average person that may exist in your circle of friends and or family.
Trauma isn’t an easy thing to heal from; it follows you everywhere you go. While you battle the trauma from the past, you experience other traumas from the present as well. Then the pain sinks in, a pain that is constantly occurring in your heart and also your mind. “But if you pray it away it’ll all go away, and you’d be healed,” is what Christians have received from others. Even if someone follows the Path of Righteousness, how come it remains?
While you battle the demons of trauma, your body is also deteriorating along with your mind and heart. No one truly gets what it’s like to feel constant pain, inflammation, sleepless nights, and heart palpitations. They think it’s just for a day or an hour; it’s every day you wake up and live on this earth. That means no offspring, and being constantly tired and fed up with your body. Can you relate?
Oh how nice would it be to have the people around you to understand and get it, but no matter how much you scream, explain and express, there’s no active listening to the heart and mind. Why? Sometimes people care more about themselves and their issues than rather looking into the eyes of the depressed and hurt. Loneliness is a great death for those who don’t truly understand you.
Can you see the traumatized person behind your ego? How you’ve hurt them and painted them in a corner of pity. They don’t need false hope, all they need is someone who genuinely cares for them. Oh, you get it? No, you don’t. Just because their mind runs differently and walk down a path that isn’t yours, don’t patronize them. We can never be perfect people; The Lord didn’t create us to be perfect.
Be at peace with everyone you meet and live around. If only that was easy when you are fighting your own battles alone in a new place. No one around you can see them and when you even express the issues you’ve experienced it only ends up hurting someone else. What about me? The hurt has affected me. The isolation has affected me! But who cares, right? No one truly does anymore. Which is why stepping away is easier than being involved in groups that make you feel invisible…
Make an oath then make mistakes
Start a streak you’re bound to break
When darkness rolls on you
Push on through
– Oldies Station, Twenty One Pilots-
This post is written in a format that relays my thoughts and what I would say to people who I wish would get what it’s like to walk around in my head. It’s not easy to just start working again after things I’ve experienced even if it’s been a long while since my assault incident. But it wasn’t about the assault, it was that I was bullied and ridiculed every day from my past co-workers every shift because I could never do anything right and I was very verbal about my belief in my Savior. It’s not just the fear of being assaulted, which that trauma has passed me, I think… It’s about being bullied, not understood and mistreated daily by worldly people. Also knowing that if something like that ever happened like that again, I’d be alone again like the last time. No one to fight my battles with me.
The other thoughts along with this post explains that I am not a healthy person. Not by choice mind you, but it’s just illnesses that have developed over time and how I despise my own body every day. I will never have children, which is fine by me. But I feel for others that I am basically nothing because I can’t do that and probably won’t. Do you know how pathetic that makes someone feel? Very. “Sam you shouldn’t worry about what others think of you,” well I think about it a lot. Just ask my husband. Being perceived isn’t a fun feeling to have every day.
The last few thoughts here are about being different and having mental health issues. Sometimes neurotypical people don’t truly understand what it’s like being on the Autism Spectrum or having ADHD. For them it’s easy to get over how you feel and that it’s not a disability. Once they realize their child is not like you, it’s suddenly an issue and the family doesn’t look perfect anymore. A problem to be cured by medication and then pushed to the side like dust under a rug. I am not a problem to be fixed, I just view the world differently and do everything on my own time. If it’s not done in my time or something messes me up, I lose it. Being autistic or neurodivergent isn’t a problem, it just means The Lord has blessed you differently and it needs to be celebrated and appreciated.
When I moved to Texas, I was told constantly that I’d be heard. For a while it was like that, but the moment issues happened between my husband and I, being heard slowly became isolated. Sitting at a table full of people talking turned into silence and looks. The feeling of not being good enough flooded back in and that’s all my mind focused on; not good enough for anyone. Not my family, not my husband and not my in-laws. Do you know what it’s like to feel like you are fighting yourself every day? It hurts and doing it alone hurts more when it’s just you. I hate being alone in my own fights…
Lastly… Travis if you ever read this post sometime down the road, I will miss you. You helped me greatly feel welcomed and loved in your family. I will never forget the impact you made in my life when I first met you and the young man you have become. I know the things you’ve battled in the past hurt and I hope that whatever you discover in your next chapter brings you back to a place of healing and peace. I will always be here as your friend and sister even when you are gone. Stay safe, and I hope you find what you’re looking for in this next life chapter you have decided to walk down. I’ll be in prayer for you every day and I’m always a text away. Love you, Sam
“Pardon my delay, I’m navigating, I’m navigating my head…”
Corem Deo
Inside My Head 