We struggle enough to talk about grief when someone dies. We don’t even come close to acknowledging the other things we can and should be grieving. As an abuse survivor, I still grieve for the childhood I never had, the close relationships with parents I never had, and the freedom to enjoy life that I didn’t have as a child.
That grief is long-lasting and painful. It’s also commonly the kind of grief that we don’t acknowledge or talk about, leaving many survivors to suffer with it alone.
It doesn’t have to be that way. It doesn’t have to debilitate us forever.
And maybe most importantly, we find others who get it. The kind of grief that comes with trauma is lonely. But it doesn’t have to stay that way. When we share our stories, something shifts. We are no longer invisible. We are seen. And when we’re seen, we heal a little more.
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