#trauma #healing #disassociation #jadedsavior #jssubmissions

Tonight I wear the face of a stranger.

Steps feel like floating, letters I’ve recited since I was 5 years old are from a different language.

My skin feels so thick on this body that’s supposedly mine, if I could climb out of it, take it off, it wouldn’t be so heavy... maybe it would feel like my lungs could finally get enough air in them.

​Trauma wears many faces.

​​And when you’ve walked the path of trauma long enough, you start wearing a few faces of your own.

Some days I am confident, some days I am scared, some days I relive the pain I broke free from on repeat as though I was still in that moment. And some days, I am nothing.

Today is one of those days.

One of the days where I won’t hear the words you say.

A day where I won’t read the words even I write.

A day where whispers are loud as screams and every light burns my eyes, and my brain tells me they aren’t real, so it doesn’t hurt so much.

They tell “normal” people that dissociation is like the times you drive your car, and you get home, and you can’t remember the drive.

Maybe that’s what it means, for “normal” people. But for those of us who can’t remember what was said moment to moment, where years of our life are missing and we’re told we probably couldn’t handle remembering, even now. (...)

I guess that’s my “normal”.

On days like today, where silence is solace and the touch of a fingertip makes me feel naked.

I give myself space.

I let what’s real and what’s not melt away as I lay down my head.

And hopefully, tomorrow, I’ll wake up wearing my face.
​

Devan Gann is a graphic designer, writer, and mother from Tennessee.

Click here to follow her and learn more about her journey.