I reflect rather deep these days. I'm curious. I have a lot of questions that many cannot answer. I look for patterns both current and past and I work on connecting dots. This is partly because of my neurodivergent brain, but also due to complex trauma that has trained my brain to look for all possible scenarios, not knowing what to expect. But what stings more than anything is the realization that we haven’t just missed the treasures around us—we’ve forgotten to even look for them. We're obsessed with ourselves. Not in the self-love kind of way—I'm talking about self-absorption. The kind that turns our eyes inward so tightly we forget the world around us even exists. And in that forgetting, in that blindness, we neglect the beauty in others, the wisdom of the past, and the silent screams of the Earth. I guess what I see in our world—what I can’t unsee—is patterns. I see humans repeating the same mistakes over and over again like we're caught in a script written long before we were born. We keep playing the same roles. The villain. The victim. The bystander. The savior. The oppressor. The rebel. Over and over, the wheel spins, and we call it history. Don’t believe in religion? Fine. Read a history book. You’ll still find the same cycles, etched in time like an ancient code that no one’s truly tried to rewrite. We rise. We fall. We rebuild. We destroy. We rise again. We fall harder. Then we ask, Why is the world like this? The answer is simple: we won’t change the damn pattern. We devastate countries in the name of power. We enslave people and pretend it's in the past while benefiting from the ripple effects today. We abuse children, emotionally, physically, generationally. We pillage the Earth like we’re never going to need it tomorrow. And somehow, we call this "progress." Sometimes I wonder if God is running an experiment to see how many generations it’ll take before we finally get it.  Spoiler alert : it’s not going well. But maybe it’s not about God. Maybe it’s just about us. Maybe we’ve been given all the tools: wisdom in scrolls, pain in our history, truth in our stories. Maybe the question isn’t, “When will God fix us?” Maybe the question is, “When will we stop choosing ignorance over evolution?” I think about ancestral trauma often—how so many of us are carrying pain we didn’t even create. We were born into broken systems and asked to heal what we didn’t shatter. And some of us—maybe you reading this—are trying. But even that trying gets lonely, because it feels like the majority don’t even see the system as broken. They think surviving is the same as living. It’s not. Living means noticing the blooms. Surviving means being too exhausted to care that they exist. Living means learning from the past. Surviving means repeating it because it’s all we’ve ever known. Living means breaking the cycle. Surviving means becoming it. The cost of survival shouldn’t be our humanity. Yet, here we are. So I’ll keep writing about it. I’ll keep speaking about it. And I’ll keep choosing to see the patterns—not to shame them—but to finally break them. Because someone has to. Let it start with us. Lets right the wrongs of humanity's unlearned lessons!

My mother—still living rent-free in the back of my brain—would probably call this “hippie shit.” That’s her phrase, not mine. That voice, the one I’ve been trying to unlearn for years, would dismiss everything I’m about to say before I even got the words out. And I’d be lying if I said that voice doesn’t still make me pause. Still make me second-guess. Still make me afraid of sounding “crazy.” But here’s what therapy—and my body—have made painfully clear: The mind and body are not separate. They are soulmates. Partners. One cannot be sick without the other suffering. This isn’t spiritual fluff. This is hard-won truth. This is lived experience backed by research, trauma science, and years of watching patterns repeat—first in myself, and now in the people I serve every day in the social work field. 🧠 The Science Behind the Connection: Trauma Is a Whole-Body Event Let’s start with what’s happening inside the body during trauma. When you’re exposed to repeated stress, abuse, neglect, or instability—especially as a child—your brain starts releasing cortisol, the primary stress hormone. This hormone is designed to help us survive danger: it keeps us alert, it helps us flee, it gets us through the moment. But what happens when the moment never ends? What happens when your childhood is one long emergency? That cortisol never shuts off. Your body stays in fight, flight, freeze, or fawn mode. And over time, this stress starts to deteriorate your immune system, alter your brain chemistry, damage your organs, and create the perfect environment for chronic illness. Chronic stress = chronic cortisol = chronic inflammation = chronic illness. It’s that simple. And that devastating. 🦴 My Body Knew Before I Did: The Cost Of Survival I was 35 when I was diagnosed with end-stage arthritis. End-stage. As in: the final chapter. As in: "your bones look like you’re 90." I’ll be 40 this month. Add to that two rare conditions, several autoimmune diseases, and a medical history so complex it reads like a medical mystery novel. But here’s the part that makes me want to scream: They didn’t believe me. My mother still doesn't. She claims I'm lying for attention. They passed my pain off as: “Drug seeking” “Anxious” “Hypochondriac” “Too sensitive” “Overreacting” “Female problems” I was not seen. I was not heard. I was not treated. And I’m not the only one. I’ve met countless women—especially those who grew up in emotionally or physically abusive homes—who carry this same story. Their pain wasn’t taken seriously. Their symptoms were written off. Their bodies were dismissed just like their voices had been dismissed their whole lives. Because when you grow up in dysfunction, you learn that being in pain makes you inconvenient. And doctors, sadly, often echo that same dismissal. 🌪 The Invisible Burden: Medical Trauma Is Real This pattern doesn’t just stop at childhood trauma. It continues into the medical system. I’ve seen it over and over again during my clinical internship and in my career: Children growing up in abuse who already have chronic illnesses at 10, 12, 15 years old. Teenagers who are on multiple medications without proper evaluation. Adults who are disabled by both their health issues and the gaslighting they’ve endured trying to get help. And so many of us—too many of us—who internalize the belief that it’s our fault we’re sick. That our pain is too much. That we are too much. Let me be clear: I’m not saying trauma causes every illness. But I am saying this: If you’ve had unprocessed trauma for a long time—if your nervous system has been in survival mode for decades—your body is going to speak up. Loudly. Eventually. For some, it’s constant colds or flus. For others, it’s autoimmune disease. For others still, it’s heart issues, migraines, digestive problems, fertility struggles, or even cancer. Sometimes the symptoms are vague and hard to diagnose. Sometimes they scream. But either way, the body is trying to say: “I can’t carry this alone anymore.” 🔁 Generational Trauma Becomes Generational Disease What’s especially heartbreaking is watching it play out in real time. Working in social work, I see children who are currently living what I lived. I see their health deteriorate as their trauma escalates. I see teenagers who are already experiencing severe medical complications—undiagnosed or dismissed, just like mine once were. I hear adults, disabled by chronic illness, tell me stories of trauma that would crush anyone. And again and again, I hear the same pattern: “They didn’t believe me.” “They said it was in my head.” “They said I was just being difficult.” These are the echoes of a system that has never fully acknowledged the trauma-illness connection. A system that still sees the mind and body as two separate things. But they are not. Your illness is not your fault. Your pain is not imagined. Your story is valid. 💬 If There’s an Illness, There’s a Memory This is where I might lose some people—but I’m okay with that. Because here’s what I believe, with every fiber of my tired, worn-out, still-standing body: If there’s a medical issue, there’s an emotion behind it. A memory. A wound. Your body is carrying things your mind wasn’t allowed to speak. You were told to be strong. So your back gave out. You were told to be silent. So your throat closed up. You were told you were too emotional. So your immune system turned on itself. You were told to stop crying. So now you don’t sleep, you don’t rest, you don’t heal. This is not metaphor. This is biological memory. This is nervous system overload. This is what happens when survival becomes a way of life. 🛑 What I Wish Someone Had Told Me Sooner Here’s what I want someone—anyone—to hear today, in case no one ever said it to you: You are not weak because you’re sick. Your symptoms are not a reflection of your worth. You are not broken—you are a body that adapted the best it could to unbearable things. You are not crazy. You are exhausted. And that is not the same. And maybe most importantly: You don’t have to prove your pain to be believed. 🌱 So What Do We Do With This Truth? We start by listening. We listen to our bodies instead of fighting them. We stop apologizing for being tired. For being in pain. For being someone who lived through something real and hard and invisible. We stop seeing healing as just something we do in our minds. Because healing lives in the gut. In the joints. In the nervous system. In the places we were told to ignore. We reconnect what was disconnected. We allow the body and mind to be what they always were: soulmates. Not enemies. Not strangers. Partners in survival. And maybe—just maybe—partners in healing, too. Poetry Collection: The Cost of Survival

For most of my life, I thought insomnia was just part of who I was—something broken in my brain, something to be numbed with pills. That’s what the doctors told me. They said my "Bipolar" was the reason I couldn’t sleep. That I must not be taking my meds correctly. That I just needed to try harder. But they were wrong. The truth was, my insomnia wasn’t caused by a chemical imbalance—it was caused by chaos. It came from living in a house where monsters didn’t hide under the bed; they sat at the dinner table. Trauma wrapped itself around my nervous system, and no sleep aid in the world could undo that. Not until I got the right diagnosis. Not until I started healing. I spent years heavily medicated, waking up soaked in urine, barely functioning, dragging myself through each day in a fog. I was constantly told, “At least you’re sleeping now.” But I wasn’t living. I was sedated. Sometimes, I stayed awake on purpose—nights felt safer than days. They said I was manic. No one ever stopped to wonder if something else may be causing my insomnia, since no medication every truly worked in a way I could actually live a life. My mother would tell others the meds worked "when she takes them," but in reality, they simply worked when I was taking them because I didn't have a voice. The second I had a voice, I was "out of control." Only one doctor ever told me I might not need medication. I wish I’d listened. But I was too conditioned to believe healing could only come in the form of a prescription. I never saw this doctor, or any other doctor again that said I didn't need my medication. Everyone around me, my mother especially, drilled in my head that I would need medication for the rest of my life. Now, years later, I sleep. Not because of pills, but because I’ve worked hard to heal the wounds that kept me awake for decades and gotten off all those pills, I no longer have the nightmares. I no longer even enjoy TV or other sounds before bed. I need dark and peace. I can hear a pin drop on the floor and it'll keep me awake. I’m busy, I’m active, I’m emotionally lighter. When I lay down, my body knows it's finally safe to rest. The only thing that really interrupts my sleep now is my cat licking my face in the middle of the night and knocking shit over. And honestly, I’ll take that kind of wake-up call over the ones I used to endure. It was the chaos that caused my insomnia, not a chemical imbalance. Just took my life going up in flames to figure it out.

It started with a feeling in my gut—one I couldn’t shake. He left his laptop open, and something told me to look. There it was. A message: “Time for some Netflix and Chill?” At the time, I didn’t even know what that meant. A quick Google search opened the floodgates. That phrase confirmed what I already knew but wasn’t ready to admit: he was cheating. I found dozens of messages—some with explicit videos—shared between him and other women. Messages full of flirting, sexting, and secrets. He’d been living a double life, and I had just stumbled into the truth. I sent a single text: told him it was over, told him what I thought of him, and took myself to the bar where I drank until the hurt felt fuzzy. Somehow, he found me there. We weren’t even engaged yet at the time, but I was already in too deep. When he came clean, he admitted to only one woman. I played along, pretending to believe him, but I knew better. I’d seen too much. Messages to women that read, “We have to cancel—my girlfriend’s coming over tonight. HAHA.” I wasn’t even a secret. I was a punchline. A couple of the women responded when I reached out. One denied everything. Another said she had no idea he was in a relationship. The betrayal didn’t just come from him—it came from every corner. The part that sticks with me the most is the hypocrisy. One of the women was Black, and knowing the kinds of things he said about Black people behind closed doors made the betrayal cut even deeper. His cruelty knew no limits. His mother once told me, “My son would never cheat on a woman—and he’d never hit one either.” That statement aged poorly. Yet in another sentence she'd say, "You have a son to think about." Looking back, I know exactly what she meant by that. I stayed longer than I should have. I wanted to believe the version of him he showed to the world—the one even his own mother believed in. But the truth was louder. It came in DMs, in denial, in peach schnapps at a dimly lit bar where I was trying to forget everything I knew about love. Poetry Collection: The Night I Googled Netflix and Chill

Lately, I’ve been on a journey — not with someone else, but with myself. I’m learning what it means to date myself. That might sound silly at first, but the more I lean into it, the more powerful it becomes. I’ve spent so much of my life searching for love and validation in others, but now I’m discovering the beauty of finding it within. I’ve begun doing small things that show myself care — buying flowers for no one but me, taking myself to dinner or a movie, writing love notes in my journal as reminders that I am enough. I even bought myself a ring that looks real, won't turn my finger green, and reminds me that I'm working on myself. Recently, I gave someone a chance. A man. It didn’t take long — just three days — for him to confirm the fears I’ve spent years trying to unlearn: the need to control, to fix, to dominate, to manipulate. But this time, I saw it for what it was. And I walked away. No begging, no second-guessing, no making myself smaller to make someone else feel big. That might sound small to some people, but for me, it was revolutionary. I’m not saying I’ve figured it all out, or that I don’t still feel lonely sometimes. But I am saying this: I no longer wait for someone else to make me feel valued. I’m building a relationship with myself. I'm learning to love the way I want to be loved — with patience, kindness, and intention. And yes, I listen to podcasts that help. Some hosted by people half my age. I don’t care. It’s never too late to grow. So, here’s to long walks alone. To solo dates and quiet mornings. To laughing at your own jokes and dancing to your own rhythm. To finally treating yourself the way you always wished someone would. Because when you date yourself, you stop settling for half-loves and broken promises. You start showing up for you. And that’s the kind of love that lasts. I'm learning to be the love that I needed.

There was a girl I went to school with, friendly to my face, but secretly, or not so secretly, hated me. Her mom was friends with my mother, and they lived close. Eventually, this girl ended up just two houses down from my mother when she had a family of her own. Life brought her back around. And like many people in our orbit, she became a target of my mother’s two-faced kindness. My mother helped her out from time to time, but always with a thread of judgment. Behind closed doors, she mocked her relentlessly—her past, her choices, even her healing. She laughed at her name change, calling it “stupid,” refusing to acknowledge the pain that led to it. “She was born with that name,” she’d say. “I’ll never call her anything else.” But I understood that choice. I envied it. I’ve wished so many times that I could strip my identity of both my parents’ names, remove the pieces of me that tie back to pain. To be able to rename yourself—to reclaim yourself—that takes courage. This girl also once had a relationship with a woman. My mother’s response? Cruelty disguised as humor. She called her slurs. Mocked her short hair. Dismissed her identity and her love as a phase or a joke. And she didn’t just say these things once and move on—my mother could stew in judgment for hours, picking someone apart like it was entertainment. What’s wild is that this girl isn’t some distant stranger. She’s someone my mother knew. Someone she claimed to care about. Someone she helped. And still, that never stopped the venom when no one else was around. This post isn’t really about that girl—it’s about the way judgment festers in a household and shapes how we see others, and ourselves. It’s about the hypocrisy of someone who can’t love unconditionally. And it’s about learning how not to become that same bitter echo. The cruelty you don't see if how people like me end up in the positions we're in. Please don't be so quick to judge someone's story based on what you see.

God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference. Living one day at a time, enjoying one moment at a time; accepting hardship as a pathway to peace; taking, as Jesus did, this sinful world as it is, not as I would have it; trusting that You will make all things right if I surrender to Your will; so that I may be reasonable happy in this life and supremely happy with You forever in the next. Amen.    A client directed me to this version, and I like this one too, so I thought I'd share it: God, grant me the Serenity to accept the people I cannot change, the Courage to change the one I can and the Wisdom to know that one is me The serenity prayer, however you utilize it, with spiritualty, God, or another higher power, can serve not just for substance abuse, but for life in general. This saying is on my wall, right in front of my computer, and I plan to add it to other areas of my home as well. If you or someone you know are struggling with an addiction, please follow the link below for help, support, and a listening ear. Sometimes the serenity prayer is all someone needs. https://drughelpline.org/

My inner dialog tells me, "Why bother?" "You’ll mess it up anyway." "Don’t even try." I was taught to give up before I even started. That success was for other people — not for someone like me. For over thirty years, that belief ruled my life. I'd put my heart into something, then freeze, give up, or never begin at all. And when I did try and failed? I was met with shame, mockery, and silence. But the last seven years have been a different kind of education — the kind I had to give myself. I’ve learned that mistakes aren’t proof of failure; they’re proof that I’m human. I’ve learned that falling doesn’t mean I’m broken — it means I’m learning. Trying again doesn’t make me weak or foolish — it makes me resilient. No one ever taught me how to self-soothe after mistakes. I had to learn not to scream at myself when I dropped the ball, not to crumble under the pressure of perfectionism. I had to become my own parent, my own comforter, my own encourager. And while I’ve lost relationships and missed out on opportunities along the way, I’ve gained something far more important: Hope. Hope that my story isn't over. Hope that my voice can help someone else. Hope that I still have time to build the life I was always told I didn’t deserve. So if you’re reading this in the middle of your own dark night — if you're hearing those old voices telling you to give up — I want you to hear this louder: You can try again. You’re allowed to fail. You’re allowed to start over — ten times, a hundred times — as many as you need. Because it’s not in the falling where we lose ourselves, It’s in choosing to rise again — every damn time —That we find out who we really are. Aaliyah said it best: “If at first you don’t succeed, dust yourself off and try again.” I’m living proof that’s more than just a lyric. It’s a way of life. No matter what you do, get back up and try again!

There’s a certain kind of pain that lingers when you know people believe lies about you—especially when those lies come from someone who once held your trust, your love, your childhood. When your mother is the one weaving the narrative, it becomes almost impossible to untangle her story from the one you’ve fought so hard to live and own. Recently, I found myself writing a poem, a plea really, to someone who I know only sees me through the lens of her voice—my mother’s. It was written not from a place of bitterness, but from deep grief. The kind of grief that comes from being misunderstood by people who were never supposed to misunderstand you. My son’s father and his family have chosen my mother, time and time again. She’s welcomed to birthdays, holidays, family gatherings—all in the name of compassion, I’m told. They don’t want her to be alone. And on the surface, I get it. She plays the part well: the loving, devoted grandmother; the poor woman who doesn’t know what to do with her troubled daughter and who "had" to raise her grandson. What they don’t see is how strategic that narrative is. How calculated. How she’s spent years planting the seeds, pushing my buttons in silence, knowing I’d explode—and that they’d only ever see the explosion. That was always her insurance: if the truth ever came out, I’d look unhinged, and she’d look innocent. And it worked. I’m not writing this to pretend I was perfect. I hurt people. I said awful things. I did things I regret. I broke someone’s heart—someone I I had to co-parent with for many years. And for a long time, I didn’t even understand how deeply I was playing out generational trauma. I thought I was just angry. I didn’t realize I was reenacting what had been done to me—what had been passed down like a curse from my mother and her mother before her. I know now that what people see as “just drama” or “just behavior” is often the product of survival. Of reactive abuse. Of fighting for breath in an emotional prison. And yes, I stayed stuck in that system for a long time—believing the lies she told me about myself, performing for her approval, begging for scraps of love she never planned to give. So I understand why my son’s father and his family choose her. She’s consistent. She’s polished. She doesn’t cause scenes. But that’s only because she doesn’t have to—she creates them quietly, then steps back and lets me take the blame. I don’t write this in hopes of changing their minds anymore. I’ve come to terms with the fact that most people from my past are exactly where they belong: behind me. The only exception is my son, who I will never give up on—no matter how deeply I’ve failed him. I didn’t heal fast enough to spare him the damage. But I’ll spend the rest of my life trying to do better. To the people who’ve chosen her over me: I don’t hate you. I see now that you’re just part of a story you don’t even realize you’re in. I know how powerful her charm is. I know how convincing her stories are. I know how much easier it is to believe the well-spoken adult than the messy, hurting daughter. But one day, I hope you’ll look closer. I hope you’ll see that truth doesn’t always look polished. That sometimes, the one who cries the loudest isn’t crazy—just desperate to be heard. I hope you’ll realize that generational trauma doesn’t end because one person decides to be quiet. It ends because someone decides to speak, to heal, to stop performing. And that’s what I’m doing now. I’m done performing. The truth isn't convenient. It never is.

April Fools’ Day has always brought a sense of lighthearted mischief into the world, where creativity shines through in the form of silly tricks and harmless surprises. Whether it’s a whoopee cushion tucked under a chair, a fake spider in the fridge, or a playful announcement like “I just bought a new car!” (that turns out to be a toy), it’s a day where laughter is the goal and everyone becomes a prankster—or a target. I love how even the most ordinary parts of life become opportunities for fun. Someone loses their phone, their keys, their shoe—and suddenly, it’s part of a joke. For just one day, the world seems a little less serious, and even small annoyances become a reason to laugh. That’s the beauty of April Fools: it reminds us not to take everything so seriously. And the best part? The biggest joke of all is just remembering to laugh at ourselves. Life is full of unexpected twists, embarrassing moments, and surprises that don’t always feel great in the moment—but if we can find the humor in it all, we’ve already won. Everything really can be turned into a story or a laugh—even a poem (as I often like to do). But today’s post? It’s just a reminder to embrace the joy, the jokes, and the childlike spirit that this silly little holiday brings. Poetry Collection: April Fools and the Art of Play

There’s something so timeless about revisiting a childhood favorite—like The Brave Little Toaster. It’s quirky, heartfelt, and filled with characters that somehow manage to reflect big truths, even through their small, appliance-sized stories. While watching it recently, I was inspired to write a fun little poem about a lamp and a toaster arguing over who matters more. It made me laugh, but it also reminded me of something deeper: we all have our own unique value—even if our "functions" look totally different. The lamp and the toaster were both right in their own ways. One brings light, the other warmth and nourishment. Neither is better; both are needed. And isn’t that a perfect metaphor for people, too? We spend so much of life comparing ourselves to others—thinking we're not doing enough, shining bright enough, or making enough “golden toast,” so to speak. But the truth is, we all contribute something meaningful just by being who we are. Watching The Brave Little Toaster again reminded me how much emotion and truth are packed into the simplest things. A group of household appliances searching for their place in the world… and somehow, it still hits me in all the right places, even as an adult. Maybe even more so now. So here’s to celebrating your inner toaster, or lamp—or whatever metaphor fits you best. You don’t have to outshine or outperform anyone else. Just do what you do. That’s enough. That’s meaningful. Poetry Collection: The Brave Little Toaster

I’m exhausted —exhausted by the constant judgment, the assumptions people make about situations they’ve never lived through, and the unsolicited opinions that come from places of ignorance, fear, or unhealed pain. The truth is, most people don't take the time to understand things that make them uncomfortable. It's easier to criticize than to empathize. But I’ve also had to look at my own judgments—the ones I picked up from society, from my environment, from the toxic systems I was raised in. Those biases didn’t come from nowhere. They were taught, absorbed, and reinforced over years. And now, I’m unlearning them. It's hard. But it's necessary. What’s even harder is feeling misunderstood. Feeling like you’re constantly explaining yourself to people who already made up their minds. Feeling isolated in your experience, when all you're trying to do is grow, heal, and become something better than what the world handed you. Still, I’m learning to let it go—not because it doesn’t hurt, but because I know where it comes from. Hurt people hurt people. And there’s a lot of hurt out there. More than most of us realize. So I remind myself: I’m not hurting anyone by chasing my goals, writing this blog, or telling my truth. If someone thinks my story is “too much,” or my words are “crazy,” that’s okay. That’s their stuff, not mine. This space isn’t about validation. It’s about growth. And growth is messy. It’s personal. It doesn’t always look good on paper or sound polished in conversation. But it’s real. It’s working. I’m changing— every day —and I don’t need a stamp of approval to keep going. I’m not trying to go viral. I’m not looking for fame. If even one post here helps someone feel less alone while I continue healing, that’s enough for me. That’s the real win. So to anyone who’s feeling judged, dismissed, or misunderstood: I get it. Let’s keep rolling forward anyway. Because at the end of the day, the criticism isn’t really about you. It’s about what others haven’t faced in themselves. Roll with it. And don’t stop.