Just Love Harder

Trauma begins when memories become shrapnel. Something blows up your psyche. That sounds like a metaphor, but it doesn’t feel like one. Before a traumatic event, there’s you, a person with a fairly intact mind—then in just the time it takes to answer the phone, 
to flick a switch,
to hit the brakes,
to open your eyes… 
a bomb goes off. Nothing is in the same place anymore. Your senses go into overdrive and never go back to low gear. Or maybe you find yourself on the other side of a wall you can’t scale. You could be numb or buzzing or screeching. Wherever you are on the other side of trauma, there is no easy way out. 

Maybe, before trauma, you had developed a boxful of coping mechanisms. But how do you access them after the explosion? How do you even find them when your brain has holes in it? Your memories have blurred into a frightening cloud. Your problem-solving skills have been smashed. You can’t focus or hold onto a thought, and when you do hold onto one too long it burns your fingers. 

So that’s where I was. Nearly two years after losing my oldest son. I have a mind full of bent nails and shattered glass. Some memories have attached themselves to colors or sound bites. I’m scared to examine them. I can’t pick my way through most of the carnage. I’ve been stuck. Some of this stuck is my brain trying to be kind. Here, I’ll stick that feeling way in the back of a closet. I’ll erase some of the worst stuff. I’ll build a thousand little boxes and tuck the shrapnel away. 

But denial and defense can only hold up for so long. For me, the shrapnel has begun to shift and the walls are starting to crack. I had to do something. This is what I’m doing. I’m writing it down. Or some of it anyway. I’m going to therapy and slowly working through the trauma. Literally, moment by moment. Breath by breath. I’m trying to piece together a narrative I can process. I’m trying to take away the power of the pain. I’m trying to tell myself what happened. And I’m going to try to tell you too.