My Bones - The Dance With Trauma
This piece is a thematic writing I did after journaling one morning when I felt particularly troubled back in December of 2024.
You would think that something terrible had happened but no. Not anything out of the usual. It's simply the well worn pathways in my mind replaying again. It's now May 28th, 2025 and with the tragic passing of my brother, it seems that the dance only goes on and on. I'm grateful for my faith and that I can pray amidst the struggles I face. On the other hand, I'm just glad that my brother is no longer stuck in the suffering, in the dance we've known all too well that echos from the past. If any of you are struggling with your mental health, please don't wait to get help. There are good therapists who can help you. It may take time to find the right fit but don't give up on the first or even the second or third try. There are support groups like Celebrate Recovery, trauma specialists who know how to administer emdr, Youtube Channels, and so many books on the subject of trauma and mental illness. There are so many current resources now than what there used to be. Putting in the work is painful but important. Also know that as you put the work in, it probably won't fix the symptoms, it may just help manage them but at least you can have realistic expectations instead of beating yourself up for being unable to "fix" yourself or your mind. If you are struggling today, just know that you aren't alone. I really know what it's like to feel debilitated by your inner experiences. To feel so tired of the daily fight that not everyone can see. If you relate to this, I'm so sorry, and I hope you have support around you. We're all in this together.
Much love fam,
Amanda
Written Word
I grow weary of the dance with trauma.
The dance of climbing to the top and falling back to the bottom again.
I wince in pain through gritted teeth as I aid the old injuries reawakened. Each micro fracture in my structure cries out over and over again like a record on repeat. Defective, defective, defective. I’ve seemingly lost everything precious to me in this moment. All the good I gained as I made my way to the top of Mountain Recovery. The joy and light that drove me forward is now traded for the heavy burden of hopelessness. It’s so heavy. I’m so tired of carrying it up the mountain.
My voice quivers. “Please…don’t make me climb this mountain again. I’m so tired and weak, I don’t have the strength to do it again.” My tear stained face grimaces. The mountain casts a bigger shadow than ever. I feel a dread circulate my body at the thought of getting back up because I know that every climb will end up back here. To succeed is to eventually fail.
Every time I fall, I become a shell of who I am. And who I am is so intertwined with the trauma, I don’t know where it ends and where I begin. I don’t know which bones are mine. These are bones that I don’t recognize as human but they’re all too familiar.
I feel as though my bones are not my own. They were made for me. My origins turned my bones brittle. They easily break with all of the micro fractures embedded in my structure. I didn’t choose to be made this way. To be misshapen. These sharp bones injure others magnifying my shame. And when the injuries happened I was punished by those I loved. Punished for the sharp brittle bones they created.
Over the years I’ve danced between gratitude and hatred for my bones.
“Thank you for protecting me from my origins” I quiver in a whisper.” Tears of gratitude fall with the relief of a survivor. A life that was just saved from the horrors that lurk in the dark shadows of the past. But in the painful fall when someone gets hurt by my sharp edges, I wince. “Damn you bones and damn me for being the bearer of them.” Deep down I know that it isn’t my fault I live with these bones, but I hate myself for them. I hate me.
I’ve danced between gratitude and shame of who they made me to be. At times I feel like a monster that shouldn’t be loved. A shame that drives me into the shadows for fear that others will see the alarming images that make up my structure.
I hold my hand over my face in a feeble attempt to hide my monstrosity. I look away and shudder.
“Don’t come too close!” “I don’t want you to get hurt!”
At times I can forget the horror that shaped them. Like a lens of joy that lets in the light and grants a gratitude to have survived. But…eventually the lens grows dark and cold again. It seeps in like icy air on wet skin. And I see what they made me to be. A monster.
Through my lens the familiar monsters appear in the corner and vanish. They pop up in and out of my vision swiftly as imagined threats. Familiar monsters only I can see. I look around deliriously. My eyes widen, my heart pounds in my chest faster and faster until I panic and lose my footing. I lash out in self injury clutching my chest as though the monsters are crawling inside of me. I claw at my flesh as if it will somehow free me of the agony if I can pluck the monsters out from inside of me. But as I clamor at my flesh, I tumble back down the mountain of recovery.
I know the light will return to my lens and let the beauty back in. That the imagined monster’s will stop taunting me in the corner of my screen.
But until then, I wrestle in the dark looking in the mirror with my broken bones staring back at me with the new fractures from the last fall. I don’t know where the trauma ends and where I begin. But I know one thing for certain, I am what they made me to be.