Check out the latest “Cheeky Dear Abby” article on Cheeky Chicago…

Dear Brooke,

Thank you,
Pulled to the past

Dear Pulled to the past,

Can we have a virtual hug please? You are an amazing beautiful brave gorgeous woman who has been through so much in such a short time–I’m so deeply happy and honored that you wrote in.

From your letter I can tell that you’re extremely strong (like, with a cape on) and a super woman-wife-soon-to-be-mom-and-everything-in-between kind of person. It seems time for someone to not only remind you that you happen to be human, but to also explain a little bit about what that might mean…

First of all, the good news is that you’re having a completely appropriate response to completely inappropriate treatment. The frustrating news is that just because you wish and work the pain out of your mind and your heart, it doesn’t mean your body is on board.

Here’s the deal: Being cheated on is a traumatic event, period. Not sure what happened, how it went down, etc. but this is a trauma no doubt. And as amazing and complex as our human bodies are, they don’t digest trauma the same way that they digest the rest of life. Trauma is just a different story.

Side note: you didn’t think your ex cheating on you was a trauma? Check this out… (Wikipedia my love, Wikipedia): “Trauma can be caused by a wide variety of events, but there are a few common aspects. There is frequently a violation of the person’s familiar ideas about the world…putting the person in a state of extreme confusion and insecurity. This is also seen when people or institutions depended on for survival violate or betray or disillusion the person in some unforeseen way.”

So ya, glad we cleared that up.

The thing about trauma is that unlike other memories and experiences, it’s not only stored in your mind and in your heart…the body remembers it as well. Our bodies have their own memory, and when undigested trauma is triggered (hearing about the person, knowing friends are supporting them, etc.) your body is triggered as well.

You may think about the past and get pretty upset, maybe even talk about it and feel those negative feelings etc. but when that sick feeling, that pit in your stomach, the loss of feeling in your legs, shaking in your hands stuff comes…Ya, that’s your body being triggered, and remembering. That’s your body literally, yes literally, “re-living the past”.

It seems like you’ve put in some amazing emotional work into moving past this devastating event in your life. I want, need, crave that you do one more thing: while loving yourself to pieces and being beyond proud of how you’ve emotionally moved forward, I ask you to give yourself- and your body-permission to not be fully past this…you are a human being after all.

It doesn’t mean you still have feelings for your ex. It doesn’t mean you aren’t in love with the life you’ve worked so hard for, and have right now in your beautiful present world. It just means that your body is still processing, and like any human body in trauma, it needs extra time and extra support to digest.

Your body has been holding you together, and she has not let you down. She even allowed herself to become pregnant while in the midst of this digestion process. Amazing. Do me and yourself a favor and thank that incredible body of yours ever day. Love her. Appreciate her. Your heart isn’t the only one that’s been through the ringer.

So, we’ve established that the trauma is lodged in your body…this knowledge and understanding and knowing will take you far in your healing. I love to say, ‘once we figure out where it comes from, it doesn’t have such a hold on us’.

But, let’s get real. You want to know how to get rid of it, like now.

Though I don’t have a magic wand (it’s on my wish list, believe me), two things immediately come to my mind. First and foremost, I want and hope and will support you in any way I can to make sure you have a weekly therapist that you love love love. Email me so I can help find someone in your area if you haven’t already.

Second thing that comes to mind. EMDR. My wonderful and talented friend Jill McCall MFT who specializes in EMDR therapy (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing), says “EMDR helps to move traumatic memory along the neurological paths of information processing so that it is more fully-processed than before and can be re-stored in a non-traumatic way.” So, pretty much the goal, right? EMDR is an amazing therapeutic technique for working through a trauma of any size. I recommend learning more (check out more information here), and considering it as an option as you move forward in your healing.

The conclusion darling? Talk therapy, maybe EMDR if you’re down to try it, and most importantly…permission. Permission to be the strong woman you are. Permission to have multiple layers to yourself. Permission to have a heart and a mind and a body who have all been through a trauma and deal with it differently. Permission to let your heart be present, even in the moments your body shifts to the past. Permission to be human.

Love love love,

Dear Soapbox Therapy Readers,

I’m proud and excited to introduce a new Soapbox Therapy feature, Soapbox Shares.

Starting today, one time per month, Soapbox Shares will feature an anonymous story, poem, letter, etc. written in from a reader. Not only am I passionate about speaking my mind, but I’m passionate about hearing what’s on yours…this is my opportunity to shift over, and share my soapbox…Love it.

Shouting your story from the rooftops (aka, on Soapbox Shares) will give you the opportunity to not only express yourself and share your thoughts, but will gift you the permission and the venue to practice asking others to see you for who you really are, and hear you for what your really saying. Love it even more.

This new monthly feature was inspired after the following author, speaker, and amazing beautiful gorgeous human being sent this piece to me. I joyfully share my soapbox with her and hope her intense bravery to bare her story inspires you as well.

The thing about expressing your story, your feelings, your pain, your journey is that it’s validating, healing, freeing and and and. I suggest trying it sometime…

Without further ado, I present Soapbox Shares:
……..

“I first started writing this piece during my senior year in high school while in therapy with Brooke. During my work with her, I began to talk about, for the first time, some major traumatic events I had endured as a young child. I’m now a college freshman, and I have proudly finished this piece.

But being able to share it this way and proclaiming it in a specific community like my circle of friends, organization and campus allows me to walk around without such a heavy burden that was weighing me down.”

NO
A simple word that is supposed to have power
Power to let someone know when I feel uncomfortable
Or when I feel something is wrong
Powerful enough to have them back off
Power to voice my feelings

But this word was useless for the eight year old girl who used it to scream for help
A quick shriek…Nnnn instantly stopped by his hands hovering over her mouth
A sharp kitchen blade forced at the edge of her neck
Complete silence surrounds her except for her scream of fear thundering in her head

The only living soul was the coward with his hand over her mouth and a knife forced onto her neck
This man with manipulative eyes, daunting at the little girl
Helpless to his fully masculine body, A man strong enough to toy with the girl’s fear and make her feel like death was upon her
This girl was beyond afraid, beyond distraught

This girl was me

At 8 years old and no one to call for help I told myself to never use the word no again
As I refused to feel like that again
Powerless, pathetic and useless
Controlled by a man who held my life in his hands…saying things that were slowly killing me

U are so pretty, too pretty he said
With his hands crawling down my face, trickling with tears of fear
The lower his despicable hands went, the more I felt that I was losing touch with my body, going into non-existence
You see…It’s true when they say that the person most likely to hurt you is the person close to you

He was close to me because he was my uncle
He was close to me because he baby sat me when my parents were at work
He was close enough to smell my fear
My hands shivering, lips quivering

Begging and crying on my knees that Mommy doesn’t go to work, faking a cold and a fever so that she would stay back, cuz I didn’t wanna have to stay with this devil incarnate

Yet still smart enough to know that he could take advantage of me and know that there weren’t any powerful words that I could use against him
And as he got closer and closer to me
The more the word NO and myself were dying

Throughout the year that he lived with me… He came in and did as he pleased. HIS pursuit of happiness…making me do horrifying things that dares to drive me crazy
Forcing in his male ego with the words coward, manipulative bitch, over-powering fucker tainted through my innocence and naivety

Quenching and tying my legs in a knot to keep him OUT, but he always found his way in…FORCED and VIOLATING what was left of my childhood
Trying to bury it in my past, it found its way out
Haunting my dreams, instilled with fear and pain beyond any physical suffering

It was no difference to be killed than to have a man from my family force himself into me
I pronounced the death of my existence after those memories
I sit there, defenseless on my behalf, hearing my family praise that fucker for being such a good babysitter and person at heart

To this day he is still known as that great man
Cuz he’s hidden in my secrecy
And this puts me back in a place of shame and fear…
Still with the word NO as powerless as myself

Too scared to voice the truth, that he’s not this great man they believe him to be
At the age 15 I was told that my aunt divorced him and I thought I wouldn’t see him again, a sign of relief

It wasn’t long till he showed his face again
Having a nice cold beer with my uncle one day
I didn’t know he was around until I walked downstairs from my room and saw him looking at me
And at that second… I wished that I were dead because memories flushed back into my mind

Things I tried to force myself to forget haunted my dreams and consciousness
I ran right back into my room doors locked under the bed hoping to dear god that he wouldn’t follow me
I was still powerless against him and I had just let him know that once again

So I stand here… With no words to say to my family, still a secret… full of fear and pain because he was just the first one
Just as manipulative, big boned and strong as the first
My cousin was crazy in the mind

Though I was even crazier, only 10 years old when I thought that I could tell him that a man had raped me
The most naïve move I could ever make

I might as well have told him that I was a vulnerable weak powerless little girl and that it was safe for him to rape me too
A degrading memory of his countless neglects to my tainted body
He was caught by his older brother who told my aunt

I thought that I was safe when he was caught and adults in my family finally knew what he was doing to me
It killed my sense of trust to have my ass beat right along with my cousin for being a stupid little girl

Let me say that one more time…. Little girl

My aunt allowed herself to believe that I was supposed to have the brains and the strength to fight off both rapists at the age of 8 and 10…
Now that I call pathetic ,intolerable and hopeless

And as every whip from that belt touched my skin she said that I was stupid, it was all my fault, that I liked it and that I was to blame
You know, I actually believed her
And as the whips kept coming I felt powerless and helpless after every whip

How dare she say that I liked it.. Now I believe that at a young age my mind was not prepared for such trauma and life-threatening ultimatums and it wasn’t my fault that I had fucked up people in my family
Coming from a childhood that neglected my body and spirit I realized that I continued to neglect my own body and self

Giving no attention and care to myself
A secret shielded for 11 years amongst other secrets
I was raped at 8 years old by my uncle everyday he babysat me
I was raped again by my cousin at 10 years old and molested constantly when no one was looking, I had to grow up with him and not say a word

I am 19 and can’t sleep sometimes because I am haunted by flashbacks that keep me up in fear

I pronounce my surrender to this battle cuz I can no longer hold this secret alone

……..
To be featured on Soapbox Shares please click here and write your poem, story, or letter in the question box. Everything is anonymous. Remember that sending your story in is considered official consent to post it on Soapbox Therapy. Thank you, and I look forward to supporting your story to be heard.

Love,