My Life Spilt In Two When Repressed Memories Surfaced

I remember standing in my kitchen in those first months, screaming that this better not take too long. I told the universe I needed it wrapped up in six months. I had no idea what I was asking. I had no idea what it would cost.

Of course I thought six months would be enough! When something ruptures your reality like that, the psyche wants a ‘survivable timeline’, the six-month wrap-up, because we have no idea that we aren’t just healing.

Trauma integration is not an event. It’s a reorganization of identity.

So much of my life was reorganized from that moment. Not just externally. Internally. Identity. Safety. Work. My nervous system. My sense of reality.

There were years I questioned my own mind. Years I worried my system would never feel strong enough to hold me again.

Today I can say something different.

I am more solid in what I know. I can feel uncertainty without falling into denial. I can feel fear without disappearing.

If I could speak to that version of me in the kitchen, 9 years ago (so strange that I remember her and this moment SO clearly) I

would tell her this:

You are going to be okay.

You are going to be loved in ways you cannot imagine yet.

You are going to stop dissociating.

You are going to become more present to life than you have ever been.

You are going to stop numbing.

You are going to stop choosing bad men.

You are going to find work that feels more meaningful than applause.

You are going to sit with people in the murkiness and say me too.

You are going to hold hands in the dark and help others find their way out.

I am proud of how hard she fought for her mental freedom. For her peace. For her joy. For love.

And I also know what it took. What it cost her. I thank her from the bottom of my heart (ugly tears inserted…) I am so friggin grateful for all she endured these years to heal. For going to hell and back and bringing me back, home to myself.

There is grief in that. There is fatigue in that. Transformation is expensive. It costs certainty. It costs relationships. It costs the version of you that did not yet know.

I used to want my old life back.

Now I understand I was never meant to go back. I was meant to become.

Nine years later, I am not the woman who stood in that kitchen. I love her so very much but I am glad we outgrew her. I am glad we got to where we are today. I am someone more regulated, more present, more honest, more loved, more embodied.

And yes, sometimes tired.

But deeply alive.

If you are in your own kitchen moment right now, screaming for it to be over quickly, I see you.

You will not be the same on the other side.

You will be stronger in ways you cannot yet measure.

You will be happier in ways you don´t yet understand.

You are a badass demon slaying warrior and don´t ever forget that.

And one day you will look back with compassion for the woman who fought so hard to be free.

Love kx