When Trauma Knocks
Recently, I was having a fantastic week and then suddenly things started falling apart at record pace. My sweet dog, Coco, began declining in recent weeks. She was 10+ years old when we adopted her a little over 4 years ago. She was absolutely precious and sweet and gentle. She didn’t leave my side if I was home, and when I was gone, she’d lay on her blanket and greet me at the door when I arrived. She has been my constant companion over these last years. We made the call that it was time, after she wasn’t able to get up and down the stairs without assistance or a carry and she placed her head on my lap with tired eyes looking up at me as if to say, “It’s time.” We found a lovely vet that would come to our house, so that she could depart in my arms, and in the space that was hers. We scheduled it for Saturday.
On Friday night, we received a call from a friend, a young man that our boys went to school with had been in a motorcycle accident just minutes before and our friend knew we were close to him. He called us mom and dad. She told me things didn’t look good. 20 minutes later she called again, he did not make it. This young man, who embraced life, who had a quick smile and a big hug for everyone he knew and even for strangers. He knew no strangers - those were just friends he hadn’t yet met. I took some solace in the last conversation that he and I had just weeks before his death. I had told him I loved him. I always try to make sure no one leaves my house without hearing that, that way no matter what happened to me, they would carry those words with them.
The next day the veterinarian came to the house, mid-afternoon, and we said our final good-byes to Coco. The tears didn’t feel like they would stop flowing. That night, I caught myself waiting for her at the top of the stairs, I even turned around to look down, expecting her to be on the landing at which time I’d have said any other night “Come on baby.” But she wasn’t there. I cried myself to sleep.
Sunday, I cleaned. I isolated a bit, quiet in my thoughts, my husband knows this is my process. I cleaned and then I went to a local Feed My Starving Children event and packed food for two hours. Smiling and having fun with the group I was with. The whole time getting closer and closer to tears as I was happy being with them, but I was also feeling a lot of emotions and by the end of the event, those emotions were hitting me hard. My husband and I got in the car to leave the event, and I was again in tears.
Monday was hard but I was immersed in work. Tuesday, I worked from home. My brother called. He had received a letter from his dad. His dad is my abuser. Letters were sent to, our sister, and our other brother. They are his kids. I am not. He turned 80 in August, and I’ve heard he’s not in great health. He reached out and, in the letter, said to my brother that he’d like a relationship with him…now after all these years. I can only assume that the other letters are the same or similar.
Moments after getting off the call, and sitting back down in front of my computer to start working again, I felt the heaviness hit. Not so much a lot of feelings or overwhelm but a feeling that I should be feeling something more than just curiosity, a sadness, and then wonder that I wasn’t feeling any big emotions. I sent 4 texts, to my husband, my oldest child, my best friend, and another very close friend. The first response was simply “What do you need? I can drop everything. Are you okay?” Shortly after more responses came. I spoke briefly to one of them; explaining what I was feeling and what I was not feeling, and the confusion that was causing me. I took deep breaths. I recognized that I simply needed to be still for a few moments, examine each thought and emotion as it hit. Mostly, I considered the curiosity around publishing my book just two months before and the thoughts that I should be feeling something more. I sat with all of this a while. How odd not to be totally overwhelmed by his having reached out to my siblings. I was far more in my emotions about the loss of the young man our family had loved and my dog, Coco.
I talk about this in my book - healing - what it is and what it is not and how your trauma will rise up, unexpected. I had hoped for so long that healing from my trauma would mean it couldn’t hurt me or impact me anymore…but that’s naive. Of course it will pop up, it will sneak up when you least expect it. It will hit when you already feel like you are at capacity for dealing with things or the insidious echo of past events will sneak in when everything is going wonderfully. It doesn’t have a timer, there’s no announcement. It will just hit you. Healing doesn’t make the trauma disappear. Healing isn’t magic. Healing is the ability to navigate that sneak attack. Healing is recognizing what’s happening, addressing it, leaning into your support system, trusting them to be there, and using the tools you’ve learned to sit with your feelings, acknowledge them, examine them, accept them, and then move forward. When moving forward do so with grace and ease, allowing time to rest, to revive your spirit, to move your relived trauma out of your body (More about that in another post).
Truth be told, the timing of everything was simply, curious. I didn’t need to have big emotions around my abuser reaching out to my siblings, that was okay. That was healthy. It was just a moment and it passed. Other times, it comes up and it’s not this easy to navigate, and that’s okay too. It simply means, we have to unpack and few more things and be kind to ourselves as we do so, leaning into the new tools we have.
For now, just know that if you are doing the work, your trauma won’t go away, it will still impact you, it may even feel like you were just hit in the chest by a sledgehammer. It’s okay to struggle - just keep moving and utilizing every tool that you have. Game shows have lifelines; we need them too! For some it may be a hot bath, getting lost in a book, exercise, calling a close friend to talk it out, getting a coffee, gardening or a variety of other things…as long as those things bring you the ability to work through the hard moments and re-center without causing you (or those around you) harm, you are doing great! Keep healing!
