Growing Through Our Trauma

Growing Through Our Trauma

Have you ever thought to yourself that maybe you just don’t fit in with the people that raised you? Growth is a mandatory thing in life that we all as humans should experience, but does it count as growth when the ones around you fall back into old habits sending you into past trauma? Is it growth when you continue to allow the ones that aren’t growing, to have a consistent spot in your life as if that spot has their name on it, or that you are obligated to hold that spot open for that individual?

I thought for years that I needed to hold these spots open, not for the individual, but for myself.  I tried to find the excuses for those individuals that made sense in my own head on why they possibly couldn’t find that growth, or just because life got hard, it was okay to fall back rather than push forward. My whole childhood I was forced to watch the unbalanced coping skills that the adults in my life upheld. The constant partying stages, that to a kid at the time, may have seemed “Easy” or “Fun” but grew into “Fear” and “Hatred”. I learned how to clean a house from top to bottom with only the sincere/fearful help from the siblings I lived with but was taught that there is always going to be something wrong with it. I learned how to forget the ugly things in life by just taking a drink and was taught that it’s okay to wake up and do it again, no matter where it was you were waking up. I learned how to be a parent to the children everyone else wanted to save and was taught that giving is always the best way rather than receiving. I learned that it’s a women’s job to take care of not only the house, but also the children, and paying half the bills yet a man is only responsible for going to work and being outside, unless he wasn’t feeling it, then that was the woman’s job as well, because it would make his life easier. I learned that you can’t have much without working hard for it, but I was taught that money is only what everyone else can lend you on credit, and that it’s a getaway from the insanity we called home.  I was taught that bending over backwards for your friends/family is loyalty and if you can do it, you should, but I learned that its only true when others can see or know about it. I was taught that mental health is just a choice, and that if I want to be happy you should make sure the ones around you are happy and comfortable, because if you do right, you receive materialistic things and that is where happiness comes from. I learned that only the vindictive ones get the breaks in life because they keep a look out for the individuals that are capable of not only holding up their end but also yours. I was taught that having siblings isn’t to have a close bond with someone as you grow up but to keep your secrets in your own head or they will be used against you when one of us got questioned about what was said or done and then turned against each other. I learned that I had to find my own examples of what growth looks like and not to depend on a single soul because you never know who they are talking too or if their intensions are solely pure or deceitful.

As we grow through the years and become adults of our own, we start to create our own morals, our own views, our own beliefs, and we start to live the life that we, want to live. Rather that means continuing to live life from what we were taught or from what we learned through the experiences that life threw at us. I choose to do a complete 180-degree flip from what I was taught because I believe that a household, a partnership, a friend, and/or family member should all give 100% in their part of giving and receiving. As I grew up, I never thought that my life was this unstable spiral that could explode at any point but looking back at it now I find the inconsistency, the narcissistic tendencies, the unlogic pleas or demands, the rath that could come at any moment, as a life that I would never dream of giving someone else. I find myself often thinking about how I was pulled this way and that just to make everyone else around me secure in the life that they were miserably living, or to make sure that my siblings were safe and sound from the terrifying things that were happening behind closed doors. I picked out friends that typically needed a hand to hold onto to be lifted to their next level but also was looked down upon once they didn’t need the hand or because they felt like I wasn’t giving enough of my time to them. I went through relationship after relationship always blaming myself for why I wasn’t enough, thinking of different ways I could show up more, or feeling like I let them down, when all they were worried about was who was going to be next or what was the easiest way out. I fought for relationships with family because I was told that “You only have one family” even though they didn’t even notice the blank space that was missing. Why hold people to a higher level then they hold you? As I got older, I started to realize that I was the black sheep in my family that everyone complained about not being around yet couldn’t take the time to come around me. It has always been what they need or what they want, but now as an adult I realized that its what I need and what I want.

            Through my, after 18, life of continuous obstacles I was happily able to choose where and what I was going to be doing or going. I experienced Freedom, no more wild demands of “Spring Cleaning” every weekend or walking through a home that only the children cleaned, and having swiping tests to see if you did the job right. However, I did move into the dorms and that was an awful experience, living with 5 other women then myself was fun yes but nasty, and I ended up being the only one that would clean that nasty, STD infested, scum growing, flip flop wearin’ bathroom. Even though, I was able to drive my car whenever I wanted no matter who told me not to and have a whole year to just myself without filling bad about not having a job or wanting to work just to be out of the house, even though I spent a majority of my savings on eating pizza hut cookies, offering to pay for my friends, and yes alcohol. Eventfully, I too got drug down into the rush of escaping my experiences into a substance that I was disgusted by but felt so good having, until I decided it was a good idea to “Catch A Grenade” and tore my meniscus. I ended up slowing down on the adventure, moving, breaking a friendship, and meeting my wife before completely ending my “Partying Stage”. I have been magically enchanted with a beautiful little boy that calls me Mother, which allowed me to portray a more appropriate way of parenting, guiding, and teaching rather than creating a slave under manipulation within my own home. I became the parent that I wish I had growing up, yet my trauma tends to sneak up and I tend to become a hover parent as I don’t want anything negative to happen right under my nose. Now as an adult I despise cleaning my house top to bottom every day and I refuse to do it alone. My wife and I both pick up the slack in our home and if one of us isn’t feeling it the other may handle it or if both of us aren’t feeling it then it waits till we are. We don’t have a timeline on when the laundry basket needs to be empty or a rule that the dishes must be hand washed. It will get done by both of us whenever we feel like doing it. Now with me saying that I will say that every weekend whatever is lacking, we will handle our business so that it isn’t twice as messy the next week. We do not have our kiddo cleaning the house alone or passing out chores for him to receive an item. Once he is a little older, he will have an opportunity to earn extra cash by completing a task on the task board, however doing so is completely up to him. We did not bring our child into this world to pick up after us, we brought him into this world to create more positive, understanding, levelheaded humans for this ridiculous world we call home. If you have heard the saying “It takes a village” and agree then you should consider it to mean more than just watching your children, it should include everything, cooking, cleaning, working, communicating, and yes, the children. If we all live in a house, we all eat at the house, then we are all making the mess and we all should clean it up. In my home there is no Woman jobs or Man jobs because in the end they are all just jobs. Plus, I have a wife so no man here to pick and choose, besides our son which is also learning that if we all make a mess, we can all pitch in to help clean it up. Through my whole life I was preached to about how important college is and that if I go, I would be set up for life where I would not have to worry about the financial side of life, which was a lie. I busted my ass through school and graduate college in 4 years with two bachelor’s degrees, one in Psychology and the other in Social Work. I have been a case manager for the last 5 years and I have struggled more with money than I did as a waitress or a Certified Nursing Assistant (CNA). I currently have family and friends who have never stepped onto a college facility, and they are making more money than I do, which is annoying but what can you do. All college gave me was an increase in my anxiety, a chance to become the people I resented the most, and thousands of dollars in debt. The financial hardship that my family and I have had to face in the last couple of years drained me and created a blank space within myself thinking that maybe I did life wrong. I bent over backwards for everyone that walked into my life because I thought that “You get what you hand out.” Yet, I was shown the complete opposite. Everyone wants to give advice or say how they can help in different situations yet never want to show up when the help is needed, which created just more barriers that my family and I have had to overcome. Going through a life where what you preach isn’t practiced was utterly overwhelming, yet I was made to believe that my family was truly all I had, which is why I was easily diagnosed which sever separation anxiety. However, mental health to my father is that it’s all a choice, so I had to undergo self-improvement on my own with my anger outburst that only got me in more trouble. I was finally able to start receiving therapy in my older years and slowly but surely I continue to work through my mental health because it’s a roller coaster a lot of the time, and I know that if I could choice to just wipe my slate clean I most definitely would on most days, but I know that it’s not a choice it’s a silent consequence that people have to deal with because of traumatic or unexpected events in our lives.

There are so many people that can just ride the wave and work through it, and I was that someone for a while, but I’ve seen my darkest days when I didn’t even want to be on this earth anymore and its scary just thinking about how easily it could have been for it to work. Luckily, my fate wasn’t sealed for me that day, but now I dedicate myself to learning how to become the better me with all my flaws, all my scars, all my trauma, because I am me because of all that no matter how shitty, or how emotionally overwhelming it was and still sometimes is. The best quote I have ever heard and that I will never live down honestly changed my life and it still rings so true “It’s Never Okay to Just Be Okay!” I don’t want to be just okay, because I choose to put a smile on my face or kept what I really felt inside because it may have hurt someone else’s feelings. I love that I speak my mind now, even though sometimes I just want to coward away into a little hole and not have to worry about it, because this is me and if you don’t like then hell, I’ll hold the door for you to walk out. I have learned that I don’t owe a single thing to anybody no matter who they are, and boundaries are just a visible wall for people to see that your uncomfortable and that’s okay. Some people are going to respect them, and others aren’t going to be able to and that’s when our choice comes into play. We choose who to keep around and who to let go, rather it hurts or not it’s a choice that we truly get to make. We may not have the choice to be magically happy in this hell hole we all live in, but we do have the choice to be whoever we want as adults, do whatever we want as adults, and make the choices of how we are going to live our lives with the anxiety and depression, and that is a magical thing. I have lost a lot of family members some by their choice and others by mine, sometimes I think that one day it will be different, but I know deep down that more than likely it will not. I’m not able to provide, do, or be what everyone else is wanting from me and for a long time I wanted to change myself to make others choose me. Today I know that it’s not worth it I love being me even when there are times that I don’t know who that is, I will be the person to never give up on myself to find out who that little girl was screaming out to be but too scared to come out. I don’t want to look out for myself and others anymore, especially when others can’t do that for me and rather that’s selfish so be it. I’ve been told by many that my big heart could change this world but what if this big heart doesn’t want that weight on it? What if it just wants to be loved back, cared for back, and wanted back. As I’ve grown my own little family, I have been allowed an opportunity to see how families were so much more different than mine. I long for the day to have a loving sisterly relationship with my sibling before they are all gone, because life is too short, and trauma is too heavy but its lighter if you have someone to hold it with you. I am who I am not matter what life throws at me I will fight for myself no matter the situation, I have blocked people, cut people off, expressed my boundaries, been the best human, mother, and wife I could possibly be, which is different than how I was raised to act. Yes, I am different from my family call me the black sheep, the brown cow, or the one-eyed crow, however you can never tell me that I haven’t grown even when the people around me weren’t capable of it. Does it make me a bad person now that I have grown? or that I refuse to stand in the shadows of those who don’t? Does it make me troubled human because I speak out and claim my mental health or that I work towards a better me every day and truly never know if I’ll get there? These answers could be a yes to some and a no will be the answer for others but the best things that all of us have is a story and rather you agree with mine or not it will never change unless I buckle up with a tissue box in the passenger seat and make it happen, we must grow no matter how hard it is.