Unpack the Pain

Many people pack their pain in neat little boxes, store them away in the attics of their mind. They go about their day-to-day life with those things being out of sight and out of mind. The reality is they are yet there. No amount of suppressing or pressing them out of your mind will make them go away, Some folks’ mental attic is full to the brim. It’s reminiscent of a public storage container. In a lot of cases chalked full of memories. Often times those memories are unpleasant. Many people hold tight to the baggage of the past, never finding the time or the courage to unpack their trauma. In many cases, the memories are too painful to revisit.

In talking to folks in my circle or sphere of influence, I’ve found that many of them have lost their identity. They don’t know who they are separate from their trauma. It’s has become their new normal. They do not know how to live without the baggage from those events. For many, those events are what they pull out of their arsenal in conversations with others. Some use those events to gain sympathy from others. Others use the events to validate their anger, bitterness and dysfunction. At that point the pain becomes a crutch that allows those persons to limp through life.

At the time of writing this chapter, I am currently in the hospital recovering from a broken ankle. I’m presently going through rehab so I can return to a place of normalcy where I able to eventually put pressure on said ankle so I can walk again. In the meantime, I am unable to live my life fully as I choose. I don’t have the freedom to skip, hop, walk, run or dance. I’m wounded and in pain. Wounded and in pain, sound familiar? Both of our abilities to live our best life has been stymied by our wounds and our pain. We appear to be happy, but the underlying truth is we are living with the pain and pretending to be okay.

Unpacking trauma has been something I’ve been avoiding for a long time. Yes, I wrote my story in Damaged Goods: Damaged But Valuable, but God is requiring me to dig deeper and to tell more of my story. I was intentional in what I told before. I shared some very hurtful and painful truths. Now I’m being required to reach in that trauma box once again to unpack more of my life. I’m not sure if I can do it. Damaged Goods wore me completely out. There was so much darkness in my life while writing that book. Many days found me suicidal, depressed and unwilling to face the day. I don’t want to go back there. I don’t want to revisit that place. Unfortunately, I must.