Showing UP for Sophia: What is Resilience?

“Kids are resilient — they can bounce back from anything.”

I’ve heard these words often. I’ve repeated them myself, especially to myself. I meant them without question. Until I started having conversations about healthy relationships with youth who were kept in cages.

Our society refers to these structures as juvenile detention centers — a facility in which inmates are forcibly confined and denied a variety of freedoms under the authority of the state as a form of punishment after being convicted of crimes. Quite a sentence for youth who don’t have fully developed brains until the age of 25 — the development of the prefrontal cortex affects how to regulate emotions, control impulsive behavior, assess risk and make long-term plans. In addition, the cerebellum affects cognitive maturity, but unlike the prefrontal cortex, the development of the cerebellum appears to largely depend on environment, as Dr. Jay Giedd at Rady Children's Hospital in San Diego told PBS.

Showing UP for Sophia: Duets & Debuts

“Wow, he really hurt you, didn’t he?”

I looked at her puzzled, “John?”

“Have you dealt with it? Let it go?”

That was last week. Since then, I’ve dealt with it. But not without a little help from my friends — real and surreal. For days my activities revolved around crying my face off to music, one song in particular, paying close attention to the shit talk that arose as I listened, and breathing through the passages of pain.

I listened and wrote, forgetting facts about Covid-19 and wiping tears and snot from face to sleeve. I lost my appetite, wanting to feed myself answers instead. Why was I hurt? Why was I being led to find the answers in music? Why was I unable to stop listening to the song?

Showing UP for Sophia: Oh April, What a Fool I Was

As a survivor of child abuse and sexual assault, April 1st not only starts month-long awareness campaigns for both causes, but commemorates my three-month sobriety. I share my story to raise awareness that victims and survivors of these types of traumas are more likely to use and abuse alcohol, at times losing their lives and closest relationships.

I started drinking soon after I was raped. I was fifteen and was told booze made you feel good. I didn’t know what that meant.

Showing UP for Sophia: And Like That, She's Gone

I have work to do, but I can’t stop crying. I have to get it out first. I have to be with this. I have to feel it all. Even when my breath tightens, even when my legs can’t stop shaking, even when I have to pause typing for every word to cry. I have to understand why I feel like such a failure. I have to know to go forward. Deep down I already know what it is, I’ve just never named it. Only shamed and blamed it in others.

This is my mid-life crisis. This is where I see all of my shit. Where I face my shadows, the darker parts of myself that I don’t want you to know. So why am I telling you now? Because I’m done hiding.