I thought a sentence this morning that absolutely broke me open. "I can remember how her hand feels." Hands that cared for me for 38 years. I believe the early morning belongs to thinkers, grievers, and wonderers. As I sit here with tears in my eyes and my body shaking, I find myself met with so many things at once: grief for the childhood I never got. For the violence a small body didn't choose but experienced anyway. For the life my mom could have had if she'd known she was a girl worthy of love. For the innocence my sister should have been able to carry longer, but life had other plans. For my son, given to parents who were still babies themselves; he deserved more. For my mom-mom. For every hit my husband has taken to stay with me. All of it sits in my chest. The tears fall like they never have. For a moment, I wonder if I will drown in them, if they could fill the sea four times over. And then, without meaning to, some of the heaviness lifts. There is light. The...
I am a clinical social worker. I am also someone who has lived through what I treat. This is written from the second place, not the first. What you read here is not clinical advice. It is a record of metabolizing what I was handed: trauma, grief, addiction, shame, lineage, and the long work of not becoming what hurt me. I bring my training with me. But I come to you as a person, not a provider. Some things no longer belong inside of me. So I am putting them here.