Use Your Damn Skills

Eh, maybe you’re right— maybe you’re not “ready” for trauma recovery. 

And— that doesn’t especially matter. 

No one’s really “ready” for trauma recovery. No one feels ready for it, anyway. 

Many of us don’t even know what the hell trauma recovery looks like until we’re in it. 

All we know is, there’s more to life than this. There has to be. 

Acknowledging that— that you want to feel and function better— is enough. 

Very often, Trauma Brain tries to tell us we don’t yet “deserve” recovery. 

We haven’t “earned” it. All we’ve done s suffer from our post traumatic stress. How can we “deserve” recovery when all we’ve done is get our ass kicked? 

It’s this weird game Trauma Brain plays with us, wherein it tries to convince us that we “should” be doing “better” than we are in order to “deserve” relief or support. 

Wanna know when we most need support? When we’re suffering the most. 

Not when we’ve “earned” it. 

Not when we’ve “tried hard enough.” 

Why do we get so stuck on whether we “deserve” recovery? 

Because we’ve been conditioned to believe if we’re suffering, it’s because we’ve failed. 

We’ve failed to be “tough” enough. 

We’ve failed to be “smart” enough to somehow avoid the suffering. 

Why should we “deserve” relief and support, when we’re such a “failure?” 

Of course— this is all fake news. Spin. Propaganda. BS (Belief Systems— but the other kind of BS, too).

If everyone had to wait until they’d “earned” trauma recovery by feeling and functioning better on their own— no one would ever get into trauma recovery. 

Recovery is not something we “earn.” 

Yes, it tends to go better the more we work at it. But that doesn’t mean it’s an “accomplishment” that we “earn” by working hard at it. 

The people who need recovery the most are those who feel we “deserve” it the least. Including me. Especially me. 

Don’t get in your head about whether you “deserve” to feel and function better. 

Remember: all you need in order to be “eligible” for trauma recovery is the desire to not let trauma run or ruin your life anymore. 

That’s it. That’s the price of admission. 

You’re gonna have days in trauma recovery when your heart’s not in it. I do. 

You’re gonna have days in trauma recovery when you doubt your ability to do it, even for one more day. I do. 

You’re gonna have days in trauma recovery when you honestly believe that meaningful recovery doesn’t actually exist. 

(I don’t have that. I know recovery is real. I’ve seen it. I’ve experience it every day.)

And you’re gonna have days when you feel you flat out don’t deserve support, or relief, or recovery. 

Let that doubt exist. Don’t push back against it. Don’t overreact to it. 

Let that doubt exist…and recover anyway. 

One day, one minute, one skill, tool, philosophy, one BREATH at a time. 

I’ve seen the future, and there is a “you,” in recovery, on the other side of this doubt. 

“Not caring what they think” is easier said than done. 

Everyone tells us we “shouldn’t care what they think.” 

Everyone tells us that, to build real self-esteem, we have to be completely self-reliant. That we have to only work about what WE think of ourselves— not “them.” 

But it’s never quite that simple, is it? 

The truth is, we do have to care what some people think, at least some of the time. 

Very few of us are in a position where we can completely disregard EVERYBODY’S feelings and opinions about us. 

For that matter, very few of us truly want that— to just not care about others’ feelings. 

Many of us were hurt by people who did not care about our feelings and needs— and we don’t want to be like them. 

I’ve never been a fan of the “don’t care about what anybody else thinks” advice. 

I don’t think it’s realistic. I don’t think it’s practical. And, frankly, it’s not the kind of person I want to be. 

I know what people mean when they say it, I think. I think when people encourage survivors to “not care what anyone else thinks,” they’re trying to free us from stressing out about others’ expectations. 

It’s true that many trauma survivors have a counterproductive, often painful, habit of defining our worth based on what others think, feel, and need. 

It’s true that trauma survivors very often neglect our own feelings and needs in order to cater to others’ feelings and needs, especially if “fawn” is our go-to trauma response. 

It’s true, in other words, that an important recovery task for many survivors is keeping others’ feelings and needs in perspectives, and not sacrificing our own feelings and needs to mollify someone else. 

But does that mean we have to completely sacrifice our sensitivity to others’ feelings and needs if we want to recover? No. 

A core trauma recovery skill almost every survivor, including me, needs to work on is interpersonal effectiveness. Wrapped up in this skill are the twin skills of assertiveness and boundaries. 

The truth is, we can— and should, in my opinion— care about what others think about us, what they feel and need…but we need to have boundaries with how we’re willing to respond to all of it. 

And, in order to enforce our boundaries— remembering that boundaries are limits we place on ourselves, not anyone else— we need confidence that we have and will use our assertiveness skills. 

Yeah. Those can be daunting tasks for many trauma survivors. Many survivors had a reaction just reading those two sentences. The words “boundaries” and “assertiveness” come with a LOT of surplus meaning for many survivors. 

Here’s the good news: we don’t have to completely give up caring what other people think, or feel, or need. That’d be unrealistic and uncomfortable for most of us, including me. 

Here’s the tough news: if we’re going to continue caring about what others think, feel, and need, we need to have our boundaries and assertiveness skills in working order. 

Otherwise we’re just asking to live in a perpetual “fawn” state. And most everybody reading this, I suspect, is mighty sick of that. 

Back to the good news, though: we don’t have to learn or perfect boundary setting OR assertiveness skills all at once. 

We learn and refine these skills just like we learn and refine any skill. 

Say it with me: one day at a time. 

Trauma wants to starve you. 

It wants to starve you of resources. 

It wants to starve you of self-esteem. 

It wants to starve you of any memory that isn’t awful. 

It wants to starve you of physical energy. 

It wants to starve you of meaningful contact with other humans. 

And, yes: it wants to starve you of the physical fuel you need to live. Literally, food. 

Remember: the trick trauma plays is that it gets us to do the thing to ourselves. 

It gets us to talk to ourselves like our bullies and abusers talked to us. 

It gets us to behave toward ourselves like our bullies and abusers behaved toward us. 

And, yes: it gets us to starve ourselves. Literally. Physically. 

We are not going to recover from trauma while starving ourselves. 

We are not going to feel or function better if we’re running on empty. 

Trauma recovery is about repairing and rebuilding our relationship with ourselves. We are not going to do that while simultaneously starving ourselves. 

Trauma recovery is about dealing with our tiggers and trauma responses wisely and skillfully. We are not going to engage our wisdom or use our (damn) skills if we’re literally too hungry to think. 

Trauma recovery is built on self-awareness and self-acceptance. We are not going to increase our self-awareness while remaining unaware of our body’s and brain’s need for fuel. 

It’s not a coincidence that trauma and eating disorders co-occur so frequently. They operate in very similar ways, and they feed off each other. Er, so to speak. 

Both trauma and eating disorders try to tell us we need to take up less space. 

Both trauma and eating disorder try to convince us that what we do not deserve nourishment we naturally, normally require to survive or thrive. 

Both trauma and eating disorders try to convince us that we can solve internal emotional problems with external means. 

Both trauma and eating disorders lie to us. They lie to us all the time— but their lies about food, eating, and self-nourishment are particularly pernicious and destructive. 

Yeah. It’s uncomfortable to nourish, nurture, literally feed ourselves, in trauma recovery. 

It’s going to stir up all kinds of feelings that we have very often worked hard to bury. 

Many trauma survivors feel guilty when they try to eat in a way that meets their nutritional needs. 

Many trauma survivors feel shame that they even HAVE nutritional needs. 

If you’re reading this, you probably know, better than most, that realistic trauma recovery requires us to embrace a certain amount of discomfort— and eating is absolutely one of those things. 

You can recover from trauma. Yes, you. But you need to be thinking straight to do it. You need to be physiologically functioning well enough to do it. 

And that means eating. 

Eating enough. Eating regularly enough. Eating what you need to eat to meet your nutritional needs. To literally operate your body and brain. 

I know. Easier said than done. Just know that you are not the first, last, or only trauma survivor to struggle with the eating thing. 

But also know that realistically addressing the eating thing is worth it. 

You are worth it. 

You are literally worth feeding. 

Do not help trauma starve you.

You don’t owe anyone an apology for having feelings. 

You don’t owe anyone an apology for having reactions. 

Human beings have feelings and reactions. All human beings have feelings and reactions. 

Yet, trauma survivors habitually feel all kinds of shame for having feelings and reactions. 

Not only do we get to have feelings and reactions— we need to remember that many of us have been through some pretty f*cked up situations. 

Whether what we’ve been through was a little f*cked up or a lot f*cked up, what we’ve experienced often falls outside the range of “normal” human experience. 

You very much get to have strong, complicated reactions to f*cked up experiences that humans were not built to process. 

And yet— we’re often told we don’t get to have those reactions. 

We’re often told, implicitly or explicitly, that the feelings we’re having are “wrong.” 

We’re often judged and shamed for our feelings or reactions, because they don’t happen to align with what somebody else thinks we “should” feel or how we “should” react. 

I’ll spoil the suspense: our nervous system could literally not care less how anybody else thinks we “should” feel or react. Our nervous system is in the business of emoting about and reacting to what’s in front of us. 

Sometimes we get into our heads about how we owe people apologies for our feelings and reactions, because either we think or they’ve communicated that our feelings and reactions inconvenience or hurt them. 

It is entirely possible that someone might find our feelings and reactions not to their liking. It’s entirely possible someone might be inconvenienced by what we feel or how we react. 

That doesn’t mean you are “wrong” for your feelings or reactions. 

So much of the damage trauma inflicts upon us is rooted in invalidation. 

Abuse and neglect fundamentally invalidate our personhood. We come through the experiences of abuse and neglect literally feeling less like human beings, who deserve love and safety. 

When someone communicates to us that our feelings or reactions are “wrong,” they are also invalidating our personhood— because, again, emoting and reacting is what humans do. It’s what all humans do. 

You do not owe anyone an apology for being human, reacting like a human, having feelings like a human, behaving like a human. 

You do not have to “earn” the “right” to be human. 

You do not have to apologize for your feelings or reactions being strong or complicated— especially when what you’ve been through was complex and painful. 

For my money, trauma recovery is built on two principles: self-awareness and self-acceptance. 

We need self-awareness because it’s hard to change how we feel and function without being aware of how we feel and function. 

We need self-acceptance because it’s hard to change anything if we don’t accept that it exists exactly as it is, right here, right now. 

When we’re constantly apologizing for normal, universal human experiences— that we didn’t choose, by the way— like feeling and reacting, we’re kicking our self-acceptance right in the stomach. 

I know. It’s a hard habit to break. That “fawn” response dies hard. 

But it’s worth trying to unravel. It’s a pattern worth interrupting, worth scrambling. 

Because you don’t owe anyone an apology. Not for things you didn’t choose. Not for things, like feelings and reactions, that have been built into every human since the beginning of time. 

Very often we talk about the bummers of trauma recovery— and believe me, trauma recovery is full of profound bummers. Largely because trauma recovery is mostly about grieving losses. 

But there is a sub-project involved in trauma recovery I really love: reclaiming art and entertainment that our trauma and abusers stole from us. 

Very often trauma survivors lose, for a large chunk of our lives, art and entertainment that our nervous system associates with a traumatic experience or an abuser. 

We can’t sand to hear the song that was playing on the car radio right before the crash. 

We can’t stand the TV show that our abuser liked and quoted. 

We can’t stand the movie that we remember our abuser taking us to see. 

We can’t stand the music an abuser wrote or performed. 

It very often sucks, because, for as reactive as our nervous system can be to art and entertainment we associate with trauma or abuse, the art or entertainment itself is often kind of great. 

It’s a dilemma many trauma survivors know all too well: we actually LIKE a piece of art or entertainment that our nervous system has become overwhelmingly reactive to, and we’ve thus had to limit our exposure to. 

As we work our trauma recovery, we learn to disentangle art and entertainment from what happened to us or people who have hurt us— but it doesn’t happen by accident. 

The reason why our nervous system is reactive to certain art and entertainment isn’t necessarily because of anything to do with the art or entertainment itself— it’s because of what we’ve been conditioned to believe that art or entertainment means. 

Our nervous system has been conditioned to believe that hearing a certain song means that our abuser is near. 

Our nervous system has been conditioned to believe that a certain TV show being on means that we might be back there, back then— and vulnerable. 

Our nervous system has been conditioned to believe that playing certain music means we’re still in a relationship with an abuser. 

Our nervous system has been conditioned to believe that a certain verse of a certain song means we’re about to crash— because we vividly remember not getting to hear the next verse of the song. 

Changing our feelings about and reactions to art and entertainment we associate with trauma or abusers is all about changing the meanings we associate with it.

And the good news is: people change the meanings they associate with things all the time. Every day. 

Have you ever changed how you felt about a political party or a religion? 

Peoples’ political and religious beliefs tend to be entrenched, and people tend to be passionate about them— and yet, people change political parties and religions every day. 

How does this happen? It happens when meanings change. A church that used to represent sanctity and safety now represents complicity and denial. A political party that once represented values we aligned with now represents corruption and deceit. 

Many trauma survivors experience a shift in meaning when it comes to therapy or recovery: whereas therapy or recovery once represented “weakness” or “craziness,” now it represents strength and hope. 

We can similarly change the meanings we associate with art and entertainment. 

It starts with exposing ourselves to the art or entertainment in question— but in tiny increments, and with skills, tools, and support at the ready. 

Sounds like a lot of work just to get to listen to a song, right? I suppose it is— but I think it’s worth it to reclaim our right to enjoy and find meaning in something. 

Trauma and abuse rob us of many things— and some of those things, like our innocence or our childhood, may be lost forever. 

Art and entertainment don’t have to be. 

Trauma recovery asks us to do a lot of things that are hard, and the payoff to which isn’t immediately obvious. 

Reclaiming our art and entertainment has a very observable upside.

Art and entertainment will never be not-important to humans— and detoxifying them, reclaiming them, can be an important milestone on our trauma recovery journey. 

Many survivors struggle with how much trauma symptoms and responses complicate activities of normal, everyday living that many people take for granted. 

One thing that trauma very often complicates is grocery shopping. 

Grocery shopping is the kind of thing that we often tell ourselves we “should” be able to do easily. After all, generations of adults have had to grocery shop, right? It’s a very normal activity of adult life. 

Thing is, trauma responses don’t care what we “should” be able to do, or what “normal” is. 

The truth is, grocery shopping can be really stressful for a lot of adults, whether or not they’ve experienced trauma— but it can be particularly complicated for trauma survivors. 

Grocery shopping usually means we’re going into a place, a store, where there are likely to be a lot of other people. Trauma survivors whose symptom picture includes agoraphobia or social anxiety— which are both very common struggles for survivors— can have trouble with this aspect alone of grocery shopping. 

On top of that, grocery shopping very often requires us to make dozens of decisions within a condensed period of time— which is something many survivors, whose symptom picture includes decision anxiety or paralysis, can struggle with significantly. 

Grocery shopping also hits on a trigger many trauma survivors feel particular shame about: financial anxiety and money management. 

Many survivors have a complicated, stressful relationship with money— and grocery shopping provides all sorts of opportunities for that stress to get activated, from spending money in the first place, to decisions about brand name vs. store brand products, to decisions about coupons and discounts.

On top of all THAT, buying food can plug right into a trigger may trauma survivors struggle with every day: decisions about what to eat and planning ahead. 

Many of our trauma symptoms and struggles come out around food. Food, meals, snacks, and eating in general are well known to be stressful for trauma survivors, who often have painful associations around eating, body image, and family meals. 

Take all of these very common triggers for trauma survivors, and add to them the fact that grocery shopping is one of the “never ending tasks,” like laundry and personal hygiene, that many survivors particularly struggle with when we’re experiencing bouts of depression— and you begin to understand why grocery shopping is often way more than a mere “activity of daily living” for survivors. 

There is exactly zero shame in struggling with grocery shopping. Grocery shopping tends to stir up multiple triggers and stressors for trauma survivors that many people who haven’t experienced trauma never even have to think about. 

What can we do to make grocery shopping less fraught for us in trauma recovery? 

I’m a big believer in tag teaming this particular task— having a buddy, either there with you in person or in your earbuds on the phone, with you as you shop. 

If a buddy isn’t available for you, I’m big believer in having a playlist or an audiobook in your ears as you shop— so you have an auditory anchor that you can focus on while you do your shopping. 

I’m a big believer in planning out as much of a shopping trip as possible beforehand, so you’re making as few on-the-spot decisions as possible when you’re actually in the store. To that end, I’m a big believer in shopping lists— ideally a list you add to throughout the week as you discover you need things, so you’re not left scrambling to think of stuff right before you go. 

(I’m a big believer in lists and time management generally as trauma recovery tools— but more on that later.) 

If anti-anxiety medication is part of your trauma recovery program, there is zero shame in taking a touch of it before you go grocery shopping— its very purpose is to help you tolerate anxiety and function while stressed. 

And absolutely do not be ashamed to have to take a break— or even a nap— after you go grocery shopping. Remember, for as “normal” an activity as everyone seems to think grocery shopping “should” be, for trauma survivors it is putting our nervous system through the wringer. There is no reason why, when you get home and put away all your stuff, you shouldn’t take a bit to recover. 

The most important part of managing grocery shopping for trauma survivors is to resist the urge to blame and shame yourself for struggling with it. 

You did not ask for a trauma history; you did not ask for trauma symptoms; and you did not ask for something as supposedly “simple” as grocery shopping to be so complicated. 

We are never gonna blame, shame, or bully our way to grocery shopping, or any other activity of daily living, being simple or easy when we are struggling with trauma responses. 

You know the drill: radical acceptance; radical compassion; breathe, blink, focus. 

Trauma survivors tend to get a lot of pressure to “tell our story” as part of the “healing” process. 

Survivors are very often told that to tell our story is “brave”— and, yes, telling our story can take extraordinary courage. 

We’re often told that we “need” to tell our story in order to help other survivors— and, yes, telling our story can often help other survivors feel not so alone, not so broken, not so weird or gross. 

In some settings, we’re told that we “have” to tell our story in order for a person or institution to be held accountable for their actions— and, yes, it is often difficult, if not impossible, for some people or institutions to be held accountable without the first hand stories of survivors in the mix. 

However, as with almost everything in trauma recovery telling our story can be complicated. It’s almost never as simple as “telling your story is a good, brave, necessary thing to do.” 

The essence of trauma, especially complex trauma, is that we have had our agency— our ability to choose and act— stripped from us. 

We’ve been conditioned to believe that we have little or not autonomy— that our choices simply don’t mater, because we don’t matter. That’s what our trauma conditioning tries to tell us. 

In trauma recovery, it is overwhelmingly important that we repair and restore our sense of agency, autonomy, and choice— and it is overwhelmingly important that our agency, autonomy, and choices are respected by the people we choose to let in to our recovery. 

There is no “have to” about whether, when, where, and to whom you tell your story. 

There are lots of valid reasons why you might choose not to tell your story at a particular time, in a particular place, or to a particular person. 

Those who tell us that we “have to” tell our story are not respecting our agency and autonomy. Because telling our story is a choice— a choice anyone truly invested in our recovery is going to leave up to us and respect. 

Many complex trauma survivors have lived our entire lives bing told where and when it was acceptable to speak. We’ve had hundreds of decisions about whether we were going to speak or not speak made for us. 

Our trauma recovery cannot include others telling us whether and when to speak or not speak— and that includes telling our story. 

It is not trauma informed practice for a therapist, or anyone else, to start out a relationship with a trauma survivor expecting them to tell you their story. 

Some survivors may not be in a place, safety- and stability-wise, where they CAN tell their story. 

Some survivors ma not want to make telling their story, especially publicly, part of their healing. 

Most importantly, however, no part of trauma recovery can or should be imposed ON a survivor. 

Trauma recovery is all about restoring agency and dignity to survivors— and that means extending them the opportunity and support necessary to tell their story if they choose…but respecting their wishes and their timeline when it comes to whether and when to tell their story. 

There is a cultural narrative about the power of breaking silence to heal— and, yes, many survivors can find telling their story a healing experience. 

But many trauma survivors feel pressured to tell their story before they’re ready or in settings in which they’re not truly comfortable— and that is antithetical to sustainable trauma recovery. 

It’s real important, as we recover from trauma, to not get swept up in any narrative that yanks our agency away from us. 

It’s real important, as we recover from trauma, to feel that we have meaningfully regained control of our lives— including our story. 

It’s real important, as we recover from trauma, that we feel we are making choices— real choices, consequential choices, choices that could be made differently if we wanted to make them differently. 

Tell your story if telling your story is what you need to do— but just as importantly, what you WANT to do. 

What you want and need matters. 

This is the bedrock of realistic, sustainable trauma recovery. 

Confrontation, of any kind, can be really hard for trauma survivors. 

There’s no need to deny it. Confrontation can really trigger us. It really triggers me, anyway. 

For a long time, i was very ashamed to admit that. 

After all, boys and men in our culture aren’t supposed to be “triggered” by confrontation. We’re supposed to love it. 

Our myths and legends often revolve around confrontation. Our movies invariably revolve around confrontation— on land, on sea, in space. 

For a very long time I figured the reason I was averse to confrontation was because I was inadequate. 

That’s the story we’re fed, right? If we’re “tough” enough, if we’re “strong” enough, if we’re adequate enough, we don’t fear confrontation— we CONQUER confrontation! Right? 

But there I was. I did not like confrontation. It made me sick to my stomach. It kind of still does. 

So I bought into the narrative that I had been fed— I was inadequate. I mean, I already thought I was inadequate for many other reasons, thanks to my trauma conditioning— what’s one more? 

What I didn’t know then, and what I want you to know now, is that getting queasy about confrontation is something many trauma survivors experience. 

It’s not just because we fear pain or effort. Hell, pain and effort are daily features of most trauma survivors’ lives. 

For many survivors, it’s more that confrontation pushes a specific button: we’re “in trouble.” 

After all, why would we be involved in any confrontation, if we weren’t “in trouble?” 

Confrontation means we might get yelled at. 

Confrontation means we might be mocked or shamed. 

Confrontation means we might get humiliated— maybe in front of an audience. 

All of those are very specific triggers for many complex trauma survivors— and, strangely, for many of us, those experiences might actually be more aversive than getting roughed up in some sort of physical battle. 

Confrontations happen in many ways and forms in everyday life. 

It could be your boss wanting to talk to you. 

It could be a romantic partner leaving the message on your voicemail, “we need to talk.” 

It could even be a social media dustup (which is actually what made me think to write about this tonight). 

Whatever the context of the confrontation, you need to know that you’re not weird, broken, or alone if you struggle with the very idea of it. 

Some trauma survivors can be so triggered by the idea of confrontation that we even avoid having conversations we know we need to have, with people we like and trust. 

That’s not you being “crazy.” That’s your nervous system responding to things that actually happened to you once upon a time. 

It’s also not you being “weak,” “cowardly,” or “dramatic.” Our triggers are our triggers. This anxiety we survivors feel about confrontation isn’t a reflection of your character or courage. 

When we get triggered by the idea or occurrence of confrontation, we need to remember to return to the basics of anxiety management: breathe, blink, focus. Watch your self-talk. Talk yourself through the unhelpful beliefs and thoughts that are kicking your ass. Be there for yourself. Have your own back. 

You know— all that trauma recovery stuff we’re doing on the daily anyway. 

Because this is your trauma recovery— and no anxiety about confrontation is going to derail it. 

When we have abuse, neglect, or other trauma in our history, we’re going to feel lots of things that just aren’t true. 

We might feel worthless. Not true. 

We might feel at fault. Not true. 

We might feel gross. Not true. 

We might feel inadequate. Not true. 

Trauma conditioning enables this thing called “emotional reasoning,” where we assume that if we FEEL something strongly enough, it’s obviously true. 

The problem with that is, trauma conditioning very often lies to us, about us. 

Then it will jack up the emotional intensity of what we’re feeling to obscure and distract from the fact that what it’s told us is a total pile of horsesh*t. 

All that intensity can be confusing, though. After all— why would we so strongly FEEL something to be true, if it wasn’t true? 

For that matter, how could something NOT be true, when every fiber in our nervous system is screaming that it’s OBVIOUSLY true? 

This is just what trauma does. This is why conditioning is conditioning— why they call it “brainwashing” and “programming.” 

Remember: every zealot, every fanatic, that has ever believed something that you consider to be absolutely erroneous, absolutely “crazy,” has had that same sense of certainty in their bones. 

They, too, cannot IMAGINE how something they believe SO STRONGLY, something that FEELS so true, could possibly NOT be true. 

And yet— they’re frequently wrong. Impressively, breathtakingly wrong, even. 

We need to remember that the damage trauma does to us is not just in the shock and pain caused by any one traumatic stressor— it is in the conditioning, the programming, that we endure around and after the traumatic stressor. 

Complex trauma s complex because it doesn’t happen in an instant— complex trauma is a collection of beliefs, reactions, and behaviors that are conditioned in us over time and in relationships. 

What does conditioning do? It skews how we view the world. It shapes what we think are appropriate, or even possible responses. 

Conditioning makes us overemphasize certain things and deemphasize, or even disregard, other things. 

Over time, we become so CONDITIONED to believe certain things— and to believe other things are “impossible”— that it all just FEELS very real. 

Those feelings are not facts. Those feelings are the byproducts of conditioning. 

How do we know if we’re doing bullsh*t trauma-conditioned emotional reasoning? Well, if you’re making global assertions about your value— or, usually, your lack of value— you might be doing bullsh*t trauma-conditioned emotional reasoning. 

If you’re kicking the sh*t out of yourself for nebulous reasons, you might be doing bullsh*t trauma-conditioned emotional reasoning. 

If you’re finding ways things that happened TO you were “actually” your fault, you might be doing bullsh*t trauma-conditioned emotional reasoning. 

Mind you: our feelings matter. It’s not that our feelings themselves are always bullsh*t. We should pay attention to our feelings, value our feelings, use our feelings to ask good questions. 

But feelings are not reliable guides to reality— especially when they’ve been conditioned by traumatic stressors and relationships. 

I know, it’s hard to push back against things that FEEL very real and very overwhelming. 

But sometimes, to realistically recover from trauma, the name of the game is sitting with a feeling— instead of assuming it’s accurate and acting accordingly. 

Easy does it. Breathe; blink; focus. 

For many survivors, the hardest trauma recovery tasks revolve around giving ourselves things. 

Giving ourselves permission to feel what we feel. 

Giving ourselves space to feel what we feel. 

Giving ourselves forgiveness for not knowing what we didn’t know, and not being able to do what we couldn’t do at the time. 

Giving ourselves time. Time to heal, time to grow, time to not know, time to rest. 

Why is it so hard to give ourselves things, when we’ve been through trauma? 

Trauma conditioning often convinces us we don’t “deserve” things— and we can’t give ourselves things we don’t “deserve.” 

After all, what did we do to “earn” any of this “recovery” stuff? 

The thing about that is, the very statement reveals it’s flaw: why should we have to “earn” recovery? 

So man of us grew up believing that our worth was based on our performance. 

So many of us grew up believing that we had to “earn” the very oxygen we breathed, the very physical space our body consumed. 

Many of us, right now, feel guilty for existing— because we haven’t “earned” the “right” to exist. 

We judge our lives to be “failures”— therefore we don’t deserve to continue living. 

The truth is, we don’t have to “earn” the right to exist— or the right to recover from trauma. 

If we exist, we have a right to exist. 

If we are human, we have the right to try to feel and function better. 

We have the right to try for a better life. 

You DO “deserve” to exist— you don’t have to “earn” the “right” to the oxygen you breathe or the physical space you take up. 

You do not have to “justify” your existence by creating and living a life that “they” would approve of. 

But all that sounds not-real to us, doesn’t it? 

I can say all that— and in our heads, we can still hear the voices of our bullies and abusers, notably parents and teachers, telling us that that all may SOUND nice…but the reality is, of course we have to work had to not be a “disappointment.” 

So many of us feel like a disappointment, a failure, before our feet even hit the floor in the morning. 

You need to know that that’s not reality. That’s programming. That’s the sum of our trauma conditioning, the attitudes and beliefs and conditioned reflexes I call “Trauma Brain.” 

Trauma Brain does not tell you the truth about who you are and what you deserve. 

Trauma Brain exists to reinforce the messages you got from bullies and abusers once upon a time. 

We can struggle to wrap our head around this, because goddamn, do those messages feel real. It feels very REAL that we’re a “failure.” It feels very REAL that we’ve “wasted our life.” 

Listen to me: struggling is not “failing.” 

Being in pain does not make you a “failure.” 

So you’re at a point where you’re struggling. That has exactly zero bearing on your worthiness. Or your value. Or you “right” to live or recover. 

See through it. 

Look past it. 

Return to the certainty, the absolute certainty, that you and I are as valuable as any human being has ever been. 

You have a right to live. 

You have the right to create a life you like. 

You have the right to not be defined by things that have happened TO you, or things people have said TO you. 

You have the right to recover. 

Yes, you. You reading this. I don’t mean hypothetically or in the abstract. You, as a person, as a survivor, as a human being reading these words right now. 

You have the right to recover. 

And you can. 

And you will. 

I’ve seen the future— and this all works out.