No Regerts

(Except, like, all the regerts)

I was recently talking to a woman, a stunningly creative, articulate, inspirational woman, who is also a survivor. She was in deep pain, grieving over time lost to her trauma. For being absent from her children in moments, because of spinning in her own pain.

Because your brain and body get hijacked, and you’re not there. And everyone around you can feel it. (Linds used to tell me she felt like I was underwater and she couldn’t reach me.)

And it’s time you can’t get back.

I don’t need to tell her story or the details of her specific triggers. But what stood out to me, was that the triggers were totally different than mine, but the reaction was almost exactly the same. Something in the present pinged the memory, like a mirroring DNA strand, that’s not the same, but similar enough to pull you back underwater.

Ugh, the pain of those moments. And then, the shame. Regret. Deep self-loathing. Blowing up relationships. Causing conflict. Lashing out. Rage misplaced.

I knew I was out of control, knew I was spinning on an axis that I didn’t understand. And then, I would hate myself for the destruction I was causing but I was still unable to change it. I couldn’t fully get my arms around it.

What is it about me? I wondered.   

See, there it is again, evidence that I’m bad.

Evidence that I was worthless, unlovable, you name it.

Acting this way reinforces the beliefs that the trauma gave you in the first place and it is HARD to get yourself out of that.

It took so much healing to realize that it wasn’t me who was acting that way. I mean, it was me, and I had to take responsibility for myself, even though what happened to me wasn’t my fault. But it wasn’t my core self. It was a reaction. It was my hijacked trauma brain desperately trying to find solace and safety. It was a nervous system in disarray. It was all those old feelings that I couldn’t process back then, coming forward, hoping to be metabolized somehow.

But, fuck, some of those moments of reaction and chaos still make me cringe. The danger I put myself in, simply thinking it was funny. Like I was so worthless, I could play with my life like betting on a round of poker. Treating my body like a piece of trash, it didn’t matter how or where I was discarded. Anger at men I loved because they were associated with something toxic from the past, and I couldn’t figure out what was current and what was old. Spinning on an axis that I didn’t create, but that I also didn’t understand. Damn, it was confusing.

Hearing this beautiful woman, I had such compassion.

How do we find it for ourselves? How do we hold ourselves accountable, and take responsibility, while still allowing compassion to wash over the actions that came from trauma brain and body?

I’d love to have a philosophy of no regrets, of everything happens for a reason. But when you’re acting from a place of trauma, that’s just simply not the case. You don’t act how you want to act. You aren’t operating from your true self. There’s a dissonance between who you are and how you show up. You lose time. You lose love. You are damaged, and therefore, sometimes, you damage others. It sucks. And yes, you can heal, and make meaning from it all, and be a bad bitch coming out the other side. (And actually, you were a bad bitch then too.)

But grieving for what, or who, was lost, is also okay. Frankly, it’s necessary.

Sometimes I think about how much time I spent trying to heal myself. How much money. How much energy. How much focus. How much was dedicated to suffering and trying to heal. Suffering and healing. Healing and suffering. Getting a hold on myself was my life’s (secret) core mission.

Did I accomplish things as I worked to heal myself? I sure did. But it’s only natural to wonder what more could I have done if I hadn’t been traumatized. Who would I have been? Would I be farther along in my life now?

And yet, here I am, with so much more to offer because of these fucked up experiences. They’ve touched every part of me, for better and for worse. As fractured as I was for all those years, there is still no me without them. Now that I’m (mostly) whole, I can’t understand myself without acknowledging both the suffering and the healing.

It’s hard to hold both. The grief for what is lost and the gratitude for what has been gained. It’s not about silver linings. It’s about holding all of yourself. It’s about trying to make meaning from an incomprehensible experience, and then? Trying to give back.

No regerts, all the regerts, and everything in between.