Composting the Trauma
By KRISTIN SLYE, LMFT
When we experience trauma (and we will at some point because we are human), we have a choice. The first option is to ignore it. Yet, leaving trauma unprocessed is like carrying around a backpack full of steaming smelly crap and trying to pretend it’s not there. Sure, it can be done, but gross. Or, the second option is to compost it.
For a very long time, I did let my trauma rot. Childhood abuse, sexual assault at 13, a house fire where I lost everything; my backpack was full. It was foul and smelly and it went with me everywhere. Anyone who has ever actually composted soil will tell you, it takes tremendous work. After all that trauma, I was tired. I didn’t want to do the work. Yet, it got to a point in mid-30’s where I couldn’t live that way anymore. The pack was too heavy. I had also developed some maladaptive ways of coping with the weight of the backpack like bulimia. I had to do something about it.
I cherish a quote by Terri McCloud:
“She could never go back and make some of the details pretty. All she could do was move forward and make the whole beautiful. “
This was composting. I finally recognized that letting my past traumas go unprocessed was to slowly rob me of my light. So, I started the work of turning my stories over with a trusted therapist. I started to make small incremental changes in my life and subtle shifts in my thinking. I finally realized that the things that happened to me as a kid like the abuse and sexual assault were not my fault and I was a badass survivor, not a helpless victim. I started to allow my emotions to be felt, instead of numbing out all the time (this one was big). And I started to tell my story to reclaim my power and let go of the shame. The effort is on-going and never-ending and of course, life will keep throwing things on the compost heap.
Sometimes it feels like too much, but I’m committed to transforming the traumas that have happened to me to make the rich fertile soil for beautiful things to grow. I became a therapist out composting. Through doing the work, my traumas stopped being a heavy backpack full of crap and started to become the source for growth and healing.
It is my greatest hope that you can go forward and make the whole of it beautiful as well.