Whether because the winter was so brutally and endlessly cold, or because I spent many weeks of it in my room with a twisted ankle, I felt like it had been a million years since I had seen the park, when in fact I had been here a few weeks ago.
What was going on with the year? Was it only April? Or was it more accurate to say that it was ‘already’ April? Was the year flying past or dragging by? One certainty: the daffodils didn’t care.
The purple starflowers didn’t care, either.
At the recommendation of my therapist, I’ve been reading a book called ‘The Body Keeps the Score,’ which is about the way trauma, in its many forms, if left untreated, can wreak havoc on our minds and bodies, years and decades after the fact. Trauma comes in many forms, from war wounds to sexual abuse to natural disasters. Not all of it is carried out with malicious intent, although the symptoms can be similar: suffering and fear and insecurity and (sometimes) shame and (sometimes) anger that we carry into our lives in the wake of the trauma. Some trauma victims feel like they are never really alive unless they are ‘reliving’ the trauma, but there is also evidence that ‘processing’ the trauma — remembering and acknowledging it — can allow us to ‘move past’ it as our minds and bodies heal.
Reading the book, I keep asking myself if I’ve been exhibiting symptoms of unresolved trauma. In many ways, at least on paper, I don’t fit the mold; I have a good job, a stable romantic relationship, and many friends, some of whom I’ve known for decades. Except for my twisted ankle, I’m healthy. But since my oldest brother disowned me two years ago for reasons he has yet to explain, I’ve spent a lot of time living in my head, trying to figure out why he did it. I believe that I’ve been traumatized by him, but as I peel back the layers of my past in therapy, I’m increasingly convinced that growing up closeted traumatized me in ways that I’m still trying to figure out and, hopefully, process.
When I remember my childhood, I can identify with many elements that are characteristic of other children who suffer abuse or neglect: not trusting any adults in my life (or really anyone), feeling alone, being ashamed of my thoughts, fantasizing about killing myself at a very young age. Unlike many queer kids, however, I was able to hide my desires and my shame under a mask of conventional success. So far, however, the author of the book I’m reading hasn’t mentioned this variety of PTSD — meaning that suffered by the kid who grows up feeling deathly afraid of even the slightest expression of physical attraction (for or from any gender) — even though I feel confident that it affects large swaths of the population. But I’m sure he would agree that hiding trauma doesn’t heal its effects. Exposing the trauma isn’t easy either. Sometimes it’s difficult to acknowledge the depth of hatred gay people have to shoulder in our society, and how this hatred is expressed by those who are supposed to be ‘closest’ to us, including members of our biological families. This isn’t exactly news to me; I’ve spent much of my adult life assessing it. The difference is that, rather than trying to change society, I’m thinking about how to change the ways I interact with it.
There is one way forward, and I am taking it.
This spring, the color returns to my world.
