Thank you for writing this, Susan. I hope your mouth has recovered, the infection all cleared! And oh yeah, I experienced something similar when I had Lasik eye surgery. I had no idea at the time that for people who had experienced trauma, being told you cannot move, especially your eyes, while at someone's mercy can be a major trigger. It ended up being a months' long ordeal and I lost my eyesight for a while.
Yikes! I’m fine now. Stronger for having the experience and writing about it. I’m not sure I would tolerate my eyes well, though. Might take a lot of prayer. I hope you are fine now, too.
Sadly, that's so true. If things happen for a reason, it's because the shadow of the United States is so dark, this reconing was what happened. Shadow possession is not reasonable. It's non-rational, and I'm afraid, it's also perfectly matched to the horror of our unconsciousness. These arcs of culture can be hundreds of years long. Or not. I hope not, but I don't know. It's not just the US, either.
You are so right. I have to wonder what the long-term effects will be, and I wonder if I will live long enough to see them. IF there were ever a "things happen for a reason" thing, none of what is going on now is reasonable.
Thanks so much. Sorry if it was like a gut punch for you. I just wasn't able to soften it after the week I had. Part of my fear of posting it was hitting folds with that "oof."
Thanks for your thoughtful reading and generous comments.
First, I'm sorry you experienced patriarchal violence at the hands of your mother. Mothers can be true believers and mete out corrections every bit as much as fathers can. I was always more likely to emulate my father than allow a man to abuse me. Fortunately for everyone, the bottom fell out, and I was forced to deal with the issues of safety that arose from the violence in my home through the experience of homelessness rather than recreating my parents' marriage. I had refused, so circumstances took a different shape, as they will.
The US Constitution is all the things you say, but more, too. It has been consciously perverted by people who want to drag us back to pre-1920, before the time when women won the right to vote. Since Roe v. Wade, think tanks like the Heritage Foundation (and others) have been working to change the meaning of very plain words. They succeeded with the 2nd amendment (the right to bear arms), and the blood bath that results does not move them. Then they perverted the 1st Amendment about the separation of church and state, and free speech, in Orwellian Newspeak. In it's day, the Constitution did liberate - from the rule of kings, and yes, it is not perfect, as no one then or now is perfect. But that is no reason to abandon it. There is an amendment that would have prevented Trump from running again (he's guilty of insurrection), but it was not enforced. Part of the reason the Constitution is not enforced is that the Supreme Court has been corruptly appointed and routinely bribed - as part of a decades-long plan (thanks, Mitch McConnell!). They have made one corrupt decision after another, one of the worst being Citizens United, which allowed secret money to influence political campaigns by claiming money is speech when clearly, money is just money. Newspeak. This is why a white South African was able to spend 288 million to purchase a presidency. And that's just one example. No document can survive an assault like that. I would add that though the document reflects its time, other countries were also caught in their times. We were rising above the times until 50 years ago. The backlash is vicious. But now, the rich, and not just ours, are trying to carve the whole world into "Spheres of Influence" which transcend countries. Germany has their fair share of right-wing activists working toward this goal. I hear they are great friends with our JD Vance.
Some institutions and corporations are fighting back, and no, we will not get out of this without them. Governor Mills of Maine fought and won the battle to continue to allow trans youth to compete in sports. The Trump admin. punished her by withholding funds and making it so hospitals could not report births and funeral homes could not report deaths - an extreme hardship on families. She said: See you in court. He lost. Harvard is fighting back, and now many universities are joining them - banding together. That's safety in numbers. Not all rich white men support what is happening. Some corporations, like Costco, refused to do away with diversity, equity, and inclusion policies, and no harm has come to them. Others, like Target, bent the knee and are now in serious decline because people refuse to shop there. Target may not survive that decision, especially after tariffs really kick in. So I don't think my call to action is inappropriate at all, In fact, we need to call attention to it and demand more. The unchecked religious structures you refer to are not the fault of the Constitution, but of its perversion, just as the perversion of Free Speech stretching to include political lies about immigrants eating pets. Our problem isn't Trump. He is merely an accelerator of chaos - which is helpful to all the evil actors.
I read an article the other day that scolded liberals for not waking up to the fact that people regretting their vote is only 2%. But this is in the first 100 days. There has never been any voter remorse in the first 100 days before, and that number is growing. 2% of millions is a lot of people. And it's only the beginning. That said, time is not on our side.
The last point I want to address is Darwin, who was also a product of his times. The dominance problem you refer to precedes him. It's in the Bible, which is why Darwin didn't question it either. He was raised on it. It's the foundation of all three Abrahamic mythologies. And for me, as a student of myth, this is the problem. Our god complex is the problem. Trump has been so hollowed out, there is little left of him other than his Yahweh complex, and that is what people voted for. Because they have been frightened so much, they think only a strong man can keep them safe. Bad actors are manipulating this for political power and wealth. They know exactly what they are doing in mythologizing him, and by disempowering our institutions simultaneously. Yahweh is a jealous, angry war god who hates women, nature, and indigenous people. His lust for power mirrors their own. He wants, after all, to insist he is the only god, which is ridiculous. The human psyche is full of such powerful archetypes. They imagine their god told them to "take dominion." And so they do. By any means necessary.
Susan, I want to thank you for sharing so openly — your words, your body’s memory, your experience of helplessness and recovery. I read them here in Germany, and while our histories are different, I resonate deeply with the pain beneath the surface, the silence that so many of us were taught to keep, and the systems that held it all in place.
I agree that the family suite often reflects how we are living together. I, too, am a survivor of physical abuse — yet in my case, the more violent one was my mother. It has taken me years to come to understand that her violence emerged not from evil, but from her own trauma, her own overwhelm, her own unlived life. That doesn’t undo the harm — but it allows me to see the wider system she was caught in.
And it’s that system — the scaffolding beneath both family and state — that I hear echoing through your piece. What struck me most was the recurring presence of helplessness, not just personal but structural. Because what we see in homes echoes what’s embedded in institutions: a strictly hierarchical and patriarchal baseline, sustained generation after generation.
From here, the U.S. Constitution reads not as a living framework, but as a relic. Yes, it has been amended — but never fundamentally modernized or rewritten to reflect the reality of how people live together today. It was created by men who lived in a time when Descartes had just declared, “I think, therefore I am,” when Darwin’s theories reinforced survival through dominance, and when democracy was still an experiment — not yet rooted in solidarity or inclusion.
That Constitution didn’t liberate. It enshrined exclusion. It preserved slavery. It denied more rights than it granted. And today, its continued reverence prevents meaningful transformation.
What’s more, the proliferation of unchecked religious structures, including homeschooling within highly rigid or isolating belief systems, makes it possible to raise generations within closed loops of ideology — often disconnected from the broader fabric of civil society. That, too, reinforces control.
So when I read your powerful call to plead with lawmakers, judges, media and firms to act, I understand the urgency — but I also feel the weight of history. Asking those in power to correct this means asking them to give up the very structures that grant them power, wealth, and control. And from everything I see, this system functions exactly as the founding fathers designed it to: to benefit the white, Christian, and wealthy — and to fuel the American Dream through the exploitation of everyone else.
There is no solidaric component built into this system. No true shared responsibility. That’s not failure. That’s design.
They will not help you.
You have to help yourself.
And — ideally — each other.
Your voice matters, Susan. It’s needed. Not because trauma should define us — but because naming it clearly is the first step to not passing it on.
P. S. Susan, I'm so sorry to read of your pain, past and present. But what a kickass move to transmute it through your writing! Amnesty International Secretary General Agnès Callamrd says, "For resistance to deliver it must be dispersed and decentralized." I see you being part of that.
"We are not centered in our animal bodies, so we make terrible decisions or become incapable of taking decisive action. Both responses are destructive to freedom. Our trauma causes shock waves to pass through the collective culture without resistance, as if this were normal. We either aren’t doing anything to stop the authoritarian takeover..." Wow! You and I are in sync with our posts this week, Susan. We must stand up and resist authoritarianism. There is no time to waste. And by the way, I am responding as your neighbour, a Canadian. Increasingly, we live in an age where global suffering enters our homes and we must not turn our backs.
Thank you for being such a great neighbor, too. Thanks for reading, commenting and getting it so deeply. I’m off to find your post and read it. Can’t wait.
I thought my father was a “nice” man because my mom has always said so. Everyone has always said so. But last week when he pounded on my front door (we’re neighbors) and raged at me for 10 solid minutes in front of my kids — I remembered. I remembered the times when I was a little girl and lived in his violent, terrifying castle, and my enabling mother went along with whatever he wanted and told me I was the problem. And not knowing any different way of being, I believed it. But finally, the “nice” guy veil burned away and I see a tyrant willing to terrorize his children and then grandchildren to maintain his power.
Whether they show their rage openly because they’re protected by the good ol’ boys or whether they hide it from everyone but their family, authoritarian men are nothing more than patriarchy’s foot soldiers. Your essay states this truth beautifully.
I get that in my bones. It is absolutely essential they be held accountable and be expected to control their emotions. The men who are out of control in our culture should have been in jail long ago. The fact that we were incapable of doing that brings us to the problems we have now. I never had to navigate these waters with my dad because he died when I was 17. That’s a whole different ocean from the one you are in. You are in charge now, though, and can set whatever limits you think are appropriate. Just in this conversation, I know that you will do what is best for yourself and your children.
Thank you for commenting here. I have a difficult relationship with this, too, and of course, the memory of my father, whom I still love. His remorse was as deep and relentless as his rage. He was trained to be that way through relentless humiliation at the hands of his dad, then his stepdad, then the culture at large. It's horrible, horrible, horrible. Patriarchal control is not good for men either. I'm sorry your dad lost control of himself in front of your kids. That must have been terrible.
I hear you. The sympathy I feel for men under patriarchy threatens to overwhelm the accountability to which I know I must hold them. I don’t know why I’m speaking in such formal Elizabethan language — maybe it’s a way to distance myself. But my dad was abandoned by his mother at 10yo and left with an abusive alcoholic father who forgot to feed him. I was trained to feel bad for him and excuse his own abuses because he “had a hard childhood.” I don’t mean to dismiss the very real pain that men go through. But I do mean to stop excusing what they do with that pain. They certainly don’t have a monopoly on bad childhoods.
You have beautifully articulated what I’ve been thinking for some time now. A week or so ago it was all really getting to me and I said out loud “FFS I just got out of an abusive marriage and now I have to deal with all the same crap on a national scale?!?!” I’m over it and not freeze/fawning anymore. I’m pushing 60 and too old for this shit, and I have an example to set for younger generations. Adults need to adult and stop enabling this toxic behavior.
Exactly right. I'm 67. Enough is enough. I'm sorry you experienced an abusive marriage, and glad you got out. Full stop on the toxic behavior. I'm with you on that too.
I love this description of dissociation: "I used to be the dissociation champ. I could pop out of my body at a moment’s notice. For the first 50 years or so, I followed my body around like a helium balloon attached by the slimmest of filaments. I watched what happened, commented mentally on conversations, and when it was my turn to speak, I decided whether my thoughts were fit for human consumption or not. If they passed muster, I’d send an electrical impulse down the filament, and what I thought came out of the mouth."
You nailed it. so glad to have discovered your writing. I loved drinking my morning tea and reading this post.
You're wrong about one thing. That I didn't want to hear it. I want all the understanding I can get because even growing up in a home full of abuse, none of this makes sense to me. STILL. Thank you for the insightful essay. You are right, and I am with you.
Thank you. I know that’s the voice in my head that wishes I’d just stay safe. “People don’t want to read about your childhood.” I also know there’s no such thing as safe. Safety is an illusion. The time to act is now.
We want to hear your story because so many of us lived it, too. The details differ, but the trauma is similar. I’m still working through it. Will always be. Yes, the time is now. It is hard to shake people from their stupor. That illusion of safety is very comforting.
Perhaps you will always be, but I don't know about that. Mostly, I live in joy, a deep vibration that almost has a sound. When something comes into that to be surrendered, I do it gladly. While I'm suffering the loss of that story, I'm usually resentful and snarky, but that clears in a few days, and I'm back to joy. Once in a blue moon, I'm able to watch the story release while I stay in the joy. It doesn't matter if I can do that or not. It all comes out the same in the end. I wish you unshakable joy. If that's not possible, then I hope that you notice the joy when it comes and see that the joy is louder. Joy is the space to be your Self.
This is a beautiful wish. Thank you. I do notice the joy when it comes. Always, I think. And as you described, it's like a sound. A ping. Sometimes for no reason at all. I'll be walking down the hall and ...ping... out of nowhere. But not nowhere. Deep inside. I love everything you shared here and appreciate it greatly.
That's so beautiful Wendy. "A ping." The joy that comse for no reason at all, joy without cause, is reality. You are already there when that happens. Nothing has ever touched that. I'm so glad we met.
There is so much to chew on here. I relate fully to your recent inability to disassociate after a lifetime of letting it take over. You can't go back once you get how destructive it is.
This was so powerful Susan and I thank Nan Teppet for tagging me so I could get right over here and read this ferocious, gorgeous piece of writing! I want to say first of all, to your childhood trauma, holding space for that in sorrowful witness. And for having to learn disassociation, and then, after all your work to feel into your body, having the trauma rise up in that dentist’s chair—thank you for sharing all of that so vulnerably and for tying it into
Domestic abuse, patriarchy, the Dysfunctional cruel Daddy state that is our (dis)United States. I felt every word of this in my body. Because I suspect that’s how you wrote this. Sending big hugs!
Oh, thank you Amy. That means so much to me. The topic took me on a wild ride this whole week. I’m glad I’m willing to feel, but this week, it was a lot. It was hard to post it, too, which is another reason I value your comments so much.
Thank you for putting into words what so many feel and for trusting yourself to share it. I can imagine what it cost you. I hope you find ease this weekend.
Thank you for writing this, Susan. I hope your mouth has recovered, the infection all cleared! And oh yeah, I experienced something similar when I had Lasik eye surgery. I had no idea at the time that for people who had experienced trauma, being told you cannot move, especially your eyes, while at someone's mercy can be a major trigger. It ended up being a months' long ordeal and I lost my eyesight for a while.
Yikes! I’m fine now. Stronger for having the experience and writing about it. I’m not sure I would tolerate my eyes well, though. Might take a lot of prayer. I hope you are fine now, too.
Sadly, that's so true. If things happen for a reason, it's because the shadow of the United States is so dark, this reconing was what happened. Shadow possession is not reasonable. It's non-rational, and I'm afraid, it's also perfectly matched to the horror of our unconsciousness. These arcs of culture can be hundreds of years long. Or not. I hope not, but I don't know. It's not just the US, either.
You are so right. I have to wonder what the long-term effects will be, and I wonder if I will live long enough to see them. IF there were ever a "things happen for a reason" thing, none of what is going on now is reasonable.
Thanks so much. Sorry if it was like a gut punch for you. I just wasn't able to soften it after the week I had. Part of my fear of posting it was hitting folds with that "oof."
Thanks for your thoughtful reading and generous comments.
First, I'm sorry you experienced patriarchal violence at the hands of your mother. Mothers can be true believers and mete out corrections every bit as much as fathers can. I was always more likely to emulate my father than allow a man to abuse me. Fortunately for everyone, the bottom fell out, and I was forced to deal with the issues of safety that arose from the violence in my home through the experience of homelessness rather than recreating my parents' marriage. I had refused, so circumstances took a different shape, as they will.
The US Constitution is all the things you say, but more, too. It has been consciously perverted by people who want to drag us back to pre-1920, before the time when women won the right to vote. Since Roe v. Wade, think tanks like the Heritage Foundation (and others) have been working to change the meaning of very plain words. They succeeded with the 2nd amendment (the right to bear arms), and the blood bath that results does not move them. Then they perverted the 1st Amendment about the separation of church and state, and free speech, in Orwellian Newspeak. In it's day, the Constitution did liberate - from the rule of kings, and yes, it is not perfect, as no one then or now is perfect. But that is no reason to abandon it. There is an amendment that would have prevented Trump from running again (he's guilty of insurrection), but it was not enforced. Part of the reason the Constitution is not enforced is that the Supreme Court has been corruptly appointed and routinely bribed - as part of a decades-long plan (thanks, Mitch McConnell!). They have made one corrupt decision after another, one of the worst being Citizens United, which allowed secret money to influence political campaigns by claiming money is speech when clearly, money is just money. Newspeak. This is why a white South African was able to spend 288 million to purchase a presidency. And that's just one example. No document can survive an assault like that. I would add that though the document reflects its time, other countries were also caught in their times. We were rising above the times until 50 years ago. The backlash is vicious. But now, the rich, and not just ours, are trying to carve the whole world into "Spheres of Influence" which transcend countries. Germany has their fair share of right-wing activists working toward this goal. I hear they are great friends with our JD Vance.
Some institutions and corporations are fighting back, and no, we will not get out of this without them. Governor Mills of Maine fought and won the battle to continue to allow trans youth to compete in sports. The Trump admin. punished her by withholding funds and making it so hospitals could not report births and funeral homes could not report deaths - an extreme hardship on families. She said: See you in court. He lost. Harvard is fighting back, and now many universities are joining them - banding together. That's safety in numbers. Not all rich white men support what is happening. Some corporations, like Costco, refused to do away with diversity, equity, and inclusion policies, and no harm has come to them. Others, like Target, bent the knee and are now in serious decline because people refuse to shop there. Target may not survive that decision, especially after tariffs really kick in. So I don't think my call to action is inappropriate at all, In fact, we need to call attention to it and demand more. The unchecked religious structures you refer to are not the fault of the Constitution, but of its perversion, just as the perversion of Free Speech stretching to include political lies about immigrants eating pets. Our problem isn't Trump. He is merely an accelerator of chaos - which is helpful to all the evil actors.
I read an article the other day that scolded liberals for not waking up to the fact that people regretting their vote is only 2%. But this is in the first 100 days. There has never been any voter remorse in the first 100 days before, and that number is growing. 2% of millions is a lot of people. And it's only the beginning. That said, time is not on our side.
The last point I want to address is Darwin, who was also a product of his times. The dominance problem you refer to precedes him. It's in the Bible, which is why Darwin didn't question it either. He was raised on it. It's the foundation of all three Abrahamic mythologies. And for me, as a student of myth, this is the problem. Our god complex is the problem. Trump has been so hollowed out, there is little left of him other than his Yahweh complex, and that is what people voted for. Because they have been frightened so much, they think only a strong man can keep them safe. Bad actors are manipulating this for political power and wealth. They know exactly what they are doing in mythologizing him, and by disempowering our institutions simultaneously. Yahweh is a jealous, angry war god who hates women, nature, and indigenous people. His lust for power mirrors their own. He wants, after all, to insist he is the only god, which is ridiculous. The human psyche is full of such powerful archetypes. They imagine their god told them to "take dominion." And so they do. By any means necessary.
Oof, what a powerful read. Incredibly thought-provoking analogy that rings true and resonates for me.
Susan, I want to thank you for sharing so openly — your words, your body’s memory, your experience of helplessness and recovery. I read them here in Germany, and while our histories are different, I resonate deeply with the pain beneath the surface, the silence that so many of us were taught to keep, and the systems that held it all in place.
I agree that the family suite often reflects how we are living together. I, too, am a survivor of physical abuse — yet in my case, the more violent one was my mother. It has taken me years to come to understand that her violence emerged not from evil, but from her own trauma, her own overwhelm, her own unlived life. That doesn’t undo the harm — but it allows me to see the wider system she was caught in.
And it’s that system — the scaffolding beneath both family and state — that I hear echoing through your piece. What struck me most was the recurring presence of helplessness, not just personal but structural. Because what we see in homes echoes what’s embedded in institutions: a strictly hierarchical and patriarchal baseline, sustained generation after generation.
From here, the U.S. Constitution reads not as a living framework, but as a relic. Yes, it has been amended — but never fundamentally modernized or rewritten to reflect the reality of how people live together today. It was created by men who lived in a time when Descartes had just declared, “I think, therefore I am,” when Darwin’s theories reinforced survival through dominance, and when democracy was still an experiment — not yet rooted in solidarity or inclusion.
That Constitution didn’t liberate. It enshrined exclusion. It preserved slavery. It denied more rights than it granted. And today, its continued reverence prevents meaningful transformation.
What’s more, the proliferation of unchecked religious structures, including homeschooling within highly rigid or isolating belief systems, makes it possible to raise generations within closed loops of ideology — often disconnected from the broader fabric of civil society. That, too, reinforces control.
So when I read your powerful call to plead with lawmakers, judges, media and firms to act, I understand the urgency — but I also feel the weight of history. Asking those in power to correct this means asking them to give up the very structures that grant them power, wealth, and control. And from everything I see, this system functions exactly as the founding fathers designed it to: to benefit the white, Christian, and wealthy — and to fuel the American Dream through the exploitation of everyone else.
There is no solidaric component built into this system. No true shared responsibility. That’s not failure. That’s design.
They will not help you.
You have to help yourself.
And — ideally — each other.
Your voice matters, Susan. It’s needed. Not because trauma should define us — but because naming it clearly is the first step to not passing it on.
xoxo Jay
P. S. Susan, I'm so sorry to read of your pain, past and present. But what a kickass move to transmute it through your writing! Amnesty International Secretary General Agnès Callamrd says, "For resistance to deliver it must be dispersed and decentralized." I see you being part of that.
Thanks for this too. We are all stronger than we think.
"We are not centered in our animal bodies, so we make terrible decisions or become incapable of taking decisive action. Both responses are destructive to freedom. Our trauma causes shock waves to pass through the collective culture without resistance, as if this were normal. We either aren’t doing anything to stop the authoritarian takeover..." Wow! You and I are in sync with our posts this week, Susan. We must stand up and resist authoritarianism. There is no time to waste. And by the way, I am responding as your neighbour, a Canadian. Increasingly, we live in an age where global suffering enters our homes and we must not turn our backs.
Thank you for being such a great neighbor, too. Thanks for reading, commenting and getting it so deeply. I’m off to find your post and read it. Can’t wait.
I thought my father was a “nice” man because my mom has always said so. Everyone has always said so. But last week when he pounded on my front door (we’re neighbors) and raged at me for 10 solid minutes in front of my kids — I remembered. I remembered the times when I was a little girl and lived in his violent, terrifying castle, and my enabling mother went along with whatever he wanted and told me I was the problem. And not knowing any different way of being, I believed it. But finally, the “nice” guy veil burned away and I see a tyrant willing to terrorize his children and then grandchildren to maintain his power.
Whether they show their rage openly because they’re protected by the good ol’ boys or whether they hide it from everyone but their family, authoritarian men are nothing more than patriarchy’s foot soldiers. Your essay states this truth beautifully.
I get that in my bones. It is absolutely essential they be held accountable and be expected to control their emotions. The men who are out of control in our culture should have been in jail long ago. The fact that we were incapable of doing that brings us to the problems we have now. I never had to navigate these waters with my dad because he died when I was 17. That’s a whole different ocean from the one you are in. You are in charge now, though, and can set whatever limits you think are appropriate. Just in this conversation, I know that you will do what is best for yourself and your children.
I’m sorry that you lost your dad when you were young — different oceans, indeed. Thank you for the conversation.
I really enjoyed meeting you. Thanks so much.
Thank you for commenting here. I have a difficult relationship with this, too, and of course, the memory of my father, whom I still love. His remorse was as deep and relentless as his rage. He was trained to be that way through relentless humiliation at the hands of his dad, then his stepdad, then the culture at large. It's horrible, horrible, horrible. Patriarchal control is not good for men either. I'm sorry your dad lost control of himself in front of your kids. That must have been terrible.
I hear you. The sympathy I feel for men under patriarchy threatens to overwhelm the accountability to which I know I must hold them. I don’t know why I’m speaking in such formal Elizabethan language — maybe it’s a way to distance myself. But my dad was abandoned by his mother at 10yo and left with an abusive alcoholic father who forgot to feed him. I was trained to feel bad for him and excuse his own abuses because he “had a hard childhood.” I don’t mean to dismiss the very real pain that men go through. But I do mean to stop excusing what they do with that pain. They certainly don’t have a monopoly on bad childhoods.
You have beautifully articulated what I’ve been thinking for some time now. A week or so ago it was all really getting to me and I said out loud “FFS I just got out of an abusive marriage and now I have to deal with all the same crap on a national scale?!?!” I’m over it and not freeze/fawning anymore. I’m pushing 60 and too old for this shit, and I have an example to set for younger generations. Adults need to adult and stop enabling this toxic behavior.
Exactly right. I'm 67. Enough is enough. I'm sorry you experienced an abusive marriage, and glad you got out. Full stop on the toxic behavior. I'm with you on that too.
I love this description of dissociation: "I used to be the dissociation champ. I could pop out of my body at a moment’s notice. For the first 50 years or so, I followed my body around like a helium balloon attached by the slimmest of filaments. I watched what happened, commented mentally on conversations, and when it was my turn to speak, I decided whether my thoughts were fit for human consumption or not. If they passed muster, I’d send an electrical impulse down the filament, and what I thought came out of the mouth."
You nailed it. so glad to have discovered your writing. I loved drinking my morning tea and reading this post.
Thanks Laura. I was glad to find you on ST also. Until the other day, I didn’t know you were here. Well met. I’ve respected your work for a long time.
You're wrong about one thing. That I didn't want to hear it. I want all the understanding I can get because even growing up in a home full of abuse, none of this makes sense to me. STILL. Thank you for the insightful essay. You are right, and I am with you.
Thank you. I know that’s the voice in my head that wishes I’d just stay safe. “People don’t want to read about your childhood.” I also know there’s no such thing as safe. Safety is an illusion. The time to act is now.
We want to hear your story because so many of us lived it, too. The details differ, but the trauma is similar. I’m still working through it. Will always be. Yes, the time is now. It is hard to shake people from their stupor. That illusion of safety is very comforting.
Perhaps you will always be, but I don't know about that. Mostly, I live in joy, a deep vibration that almost has a sound. When something comes into that to be surrendered, I do it gladly. While I'm suffering the loss of that story, I'm usually resentful and snarky, but that clears in a few days, and I'm back to joy. Once in a blue moon, I'm able to watch the story release while I stay in the joy. It doesn't matter if I can do that or not. It all comes out the same in the end. I wish you unshakable joy. If that's not possible, then I hope that you notice the joy when it comes and see that the joy is louder. Joy is the space to be your Self.
This is a beautiful wish. Thank you. I do notice the joy when it comes. Always, I think. And as you described, it's like a sound. A ping. Sometimes for no reason at all. I'll be walking down the hall and ...ping... out of nowhere. But not nowhere. Deep inside. I love everything you shared here and appreciate it greatly.
That's so beautiful Wendy. "A ping." The joy that comse for no reason at all, joy without cause, is reality. You are already there when that happens. Nothing has ever touched that. I'm so glad we met.
So am I, Susan. ❤️
There is so much to chew on here. I relate fully to your recent inability to disassociate after a lifetime of letting it take over. You can't go back once you get how destructive it is.
Tremendous post. Thank you for sharing it here.
Yes. That’s right. There’s no going back. Thanks for you close reading and your kind support.
I feel all the layers here. From the childhood microcosm of domestic trauma to the macro-level we face today. It all reflects back and forth.
The intersection of medical trauma with everything else we carry in our bodies—I feel this too. 🙏🏻
Yes. So much is there, yet it always seems to connect back to the same cultural mind set. I hope we wake up in time.
This was so powerful Susan and I thank Nan Teppet for tagging me so I could get right over here and read this ferocious, gorgeous piece of writing! I want to say first of all, to your childhood trauma, holding space for that in sorrowful witness. And for having to learn disassociation, and then, after all your work to feel into your body, having the trauma rise up in that dentist’s chair—thank you for sharing all of that so vulnerably and for tying it into
Domestic abuse, patriarchy, the Dysfunctional cruel Daddy state that is our (dis)United States. I felt every word of this in my body. Because I suspect that’s how you wrote this. Sending big hugs!
Oh, thank you Amy. That means so much to me. The topic took me on a wild ride this whole week. I’m glad I’m willing to feel, but this week, it was a lot. It was hard to post it, too, which is another reason I value your comments so much.
Thank you for putting into words what so many feel and for trusting yourself to share it. I can imagine what it cost you. I hope you find ease this weekend.
I am. It’s all good.