I lucked out when I got to college. After surviving a stressful and complicated home environment, I was blessed to land in the best possible place for me – a dorm filled with loving, fun artists, musicians, actors, and dancers. We had Rocky Horror Picture Show munchies at 10 pm, practiced music in the basement at all hours, had spontaneous dance parties in our shared living rooms or drag dance parties in the auditorium, hosted a cappella concerts and theater shows, and so much more.
My roommate was the best companion I could have asked for. We related on many levels, but especially at being silly. We put up a kids’ jungle print of fabric on the wall. We would eat Teddy Grahams with chocolate frosting and dance to Harry Belafonte. We tye-dyed our underwear for Easter and proudly let them dry on a clothesline across our room. A gay male friend of ours came in, shielded his eyes, and yelled, “Nooooo! I didn’t need to see that!” We were so proud.
This silly and joyous expression of life was a necessary counterpart to the intense work we were doing. Both my roommate and I were wrestling with hard trauma healing. I was also in two degree programs that emphasized the gender, racial, and economic inequities and the violence that has resulted from that. I was assigned hundreds of pages of reading each week, each book evoking anger, tears, sometimes nausea, and always a sense of injustice and a desire for things to be different. It was in this pressure cooker (with a playful, delicious candy coating) that I had one of the most important turning points of my young life.
The memories of being sexually abused as a young child surfaced in the weeks right before my sophomore year. Though this is a long story for another day, the upshot is that someone – I can’t remember who – put the book “The Courage to Heal” in my hands. It was one of the greatest and most lasting gifts anyone has given me.
This book became my Bible, my comfort when the emotions and thoughts were roiling and confusing; my lighthouse in dark, stormy seas. I would sit on the top bunk in my dorm room, leaning against the comforting jungle print while reading, journaling, and weeping. I don’t remember much of the book’s content now, except for two things that have stayed with me.
The first was a list of signs that indicate someone has been sexually abused as a child. I identified with almost all of them. What startled me, however, was that some of those traits were also ways others told me I was like my dad. With shock, I realized he may have been sexually abused too… and boy, would that explain a lot. At the very least, we know he was physically and emotionally abused.
The second piece that struck me was how sexual abuse, along with other forms of trauma, gets passed down through generations. I don’t remember the exact quote in the book, but I remember a surge of ferocity and a powerful voice arising from my depths: “IT WILL STOP WITH ME.” This was a turning point moment; I trace my fierce and ongoing determination to heal back to this moment.
“It will stop with me” wasn’t a cry to escape my reality. It wasn’t a cortisol rush to flee. It was a fierce, mighty, grounded connection to the earth and a greater wisdom in me that knew – this cannot continue. This will end. And it will end with me. I will not be a part of perpetuating abuse or being a victim of abuse. I will not let myself succumb to mental illness from trauma that will have more ripple effects and negative consequences on everyone around me. I will not continue the insanity.
It will stop with me was a commitment to do whatever it takes to end the cycle of generational trauma and suffering. It will stop with me was a battle cry to go into my and my family’s darkest darkness of hate, shame, guilt, fear, pain, and grief – and come out on the other side. What was on the other side of it was completely unknown to me at that moment. I didn’t care. It didn’t scare me. I knew my mission with stunning and blinding clarity.
The force and ferocity of that moment have propelled me for my entire adult life. I have spent more time, effort, and energy facing all of my and my family’s demons than most people even fathom is possible. I treated it like I was an athlete training for the Olympics. But I didn’t do it for glory or a fun challenge. It wasn’t fun or glorious. I did it out of love. To my family and ancestors, I say – I love you too much to let you down. I love you too much to let this continue. By freeing myself, I hope I give you a little slice of peace, wherever you may be.
