Shhh…

I walked through life—my whole life—pretending all the bad things that happened to me didn’t bother me. That they weren’t affecting me. That they didn’t happen. It was survival mode. Since I was a little girl, I started doing that. And I kept doing it. Just kept shoving it all in the bin and moving on.

Firstly—who the fuck was I gonna tell? Secondly—nobody wants to hear it. Especially if it’s happening inside the home.

Seriously—who the fuck was there to tell? You would've gotten in trouble just for opening your mouth in the first place. I’m Gen X. We were told to stuff it down. Shhh. We were told that what was happening wasn’t happening.

They said, “It’s nothing. It’s all in your head.”

But it wasn’t nothing. And it wasn’t all in my head.

I carried on this way my entire life. I left home at 14 ‘cause I hated life. I hated being alive. I hated who I was. I was looking for a reason to live. A reason to want to live. A life I didn’t hate.

If you’ve known anybody who left home at 14 in the 80s—out there in the streets—it goes without saying— a lot of fucked-up shit went down with that person. 100%. And it did.

And all the shit from my childhood—my teens—I just stuffed all that shit down like I was taught. Shhhush! It was all in my head. In the bin it went. I carried on pretending it didn’t bother me.

I had my daughter at 18—and boom—there came my reason to live. Someone I could nurture. Show what love is. Unconditionally. And someone who would finally, maybe love me back.

After Kayla was born, well—some more shit happened to me. Different shit. And I didn’t have it in me to sit around crying about it. Ain’t nobody coming to save me. I pushed that shit down too—pfft—that was nothing. And kept on keeping on.

This went on throughout my entire life. It was like I had a magnet for bad situations—’cause I’ve been in a lot of them. But I carried on pretending they weren’t bothering me. That it was no big deal.

I never even thought about those situations or altercations after they happened. I stuffed it down and kept going.

I thought I was bad. Unbothered. Tough.

Not until two years ago—when I was told I had to have open-heart surgery.

A few months before that, a series of events took place in my life—I lost the place where I operated my business. I was betrayed by someone I worked with at the salon—someone I was close with—someone who called herself my bestie.

I was also betrayed by my brother. And then some.

And finding out I needed heart surgery—how I felt about that—I tried to stuff that down too. But guess what? That bin was maxed out. Filled to the brim. As I pushed down, it pushed back. And it exploded in my face. Every incident. Every altercation. Abuse. Rape. Violence. My way of life.

It all came flashing in front of my face—and I had a full-on mental breakdown. I didn’t know what the fuck was going on. I was crying, hard—spewing things out of my mouth—I was losing it.

I shot my doctor a message, telling her all the things. The things I’d never spoken before that day. And she said, “You have PTSD.” And I was like—what? I have PTSD? I wasn’t in the military. What the fuck?!

My daughter was there that night. I can still see the look on her face, clearly— before she walked out that door. And I hadn’t seen her again until 18 months later.

I didn’t really study or pay attention to PTSD or know what the fuck it even was. We were outside playing—in the ’70s and ’80s. Shit, we weren’t pulling anything up on Google or YouTube. A lot of Gen Xers weren’t privy to meds or even getting diagnosed with PTSD, anxiety, or ADHD back then. Gaslighting—what’s that?

My PTSD made itself present. Known. Like, “Hi—over here! Remember us?” Waving all excitedly and shit. I went into some corner of my brain. It was survival mode—but a different kind of survival mode than the one I’d been in my whole life.

My subconscious took over. And everything I did from that day forward was on autopilot. All the pre-op stuff. The surgery. It’s like it was me—but it wasn’t me.

A lot of shit went down with the surgery and after the surgery. When I woke up from it—I didn’t know who I was. I lost my identity through that whole process. And still I tried to act like I was OK. As I was trying to figure it out—trying to gather all the pieces of my life, of me, that were scattered all over the place—I was offered a psychiatrist.

Well, actually—there was an incident in the hospital. A psychosis situation and that’s when Psych and Zoloft came on the scene. Mental breakdown number two. I couldn’t get it out of my head— why my daughter would just leave me like that.

When the time came to go to that appointment—which was five months or so after the surgery—I was numb. Still running on autopilot. Still in that corner of my brain—but only way deeper.

Images of what happened to me throughout my life—the shit that had been stuffed in the bin—were circling above my head like a carousel.

But that’s all it was doing. I wasn’t able to focus on any of it. I couldn’t ground anything. I didn’t understand anything. Just dark, horrifying visions.

I sat in front of the psychiatrist—and let me tell you; nobody has ever been in need—mentally, physically, emotionally, or visibly—as much as I was.

Sitting across the chair from her. I was so happy to finally have my moment. Where someone was gonna hear me out. And possibly get me. Or help me, at the very least.

I was desperate for help. I was desperate to be heard. I was desperate for understanding.

You know what I got? That psychiatrist—barely paying attention, looking at her screen, rocking her foot, flipping her shoe on and off—told me the best solution for me was to go back to work.

I hadn’t even told her one thing about myself. All she knew is that I just had open-heart surgery, and a mental breakdown due to PTSD. I mean—she had to know, right? It had to be in my chart.

She never asked me one damn question about any of it. Not the breakdown. Not the PTSD. Not what happened at my workplace, and even though my subconscious had taken over—I knew in whatever was left of my fucking heart—that was all kinds of fucked up.

She gave me a prescription and sent me on my way. She dismissed me. She might as well have told me to go fuck myself. And I cried. And I cried. Because what was I gonna do now?

There it was—I got the help I asked for. And she didn’t wanna hear it. She didn’t wanna hear my story. She didn’t wanna hear anything.

I was broken—with a capital fucking B. I was completely lost.

So after that shit-fuck of an appointment—I just said fuck it. I went to the bar and drank my face off. And I continued to do so for the next several months.

At some point—after the Wake-Up Call—it became vividly clear to me—I was fucked. And I was on my own. If I wanted to come out of this fucked-up place I was in—if I wanted to find myself again—it was on me. I had to get myself together. Somehow. Some way. By myself.

What I’m about to say next is something everybody needs to hear…

You know when your friend talks to you and uncovers some deep shit? That person—your friend—is telling you because they need to be heard. They need to be seen. They need to let it out. You might not understand what they’re telling you. You might not get it—and that’s OK. But you can listen. That’s all you have to do. Listen to your friend. Acknowledge her pain. Allow her to release it. You can be a good friend.

Because what that person, your friend is in need of when they start talking, when they finally have the courage to start talking—is someone to listen. To hear them. To hug them. To tell them everything’s gonna be OK. To know that another person knows—that they’re not alone anymore. That they have someone in their corner. I know, because I was them.

I wasn’t a good listener as a friend. Not at all. How could I listen to anybody else’s shit when I had a bin full—jam-packed with my own shit? Trauma. I didn’t listen to anybody. I wasn’t capable.

But you know—I hope this podcast, Truth Serum, will bring awareness into friendships. Just like I hope this blog post will. Because listening? That’s a huge component of friendship that’s missing these days—besides loyalty—it’s listening. Hearing your friend out.

Being a friend is a lot more than going to the bar, going to a festival, or going on vacation together. Everybody needs a friend. A friend who will listen to you when you're hurt. Ask you what’s wrong, especially when it’s visibly obvious that you’re upset.

So you don’t have to stuff it in a bin. So you don’t have to pack another layer on—to hide, just to survive whatever has happened to you. So you can spare yourself a stuffed bin and the risk of walking around with PTSD unknowingly, until it makes itself known.

That shit ain’t pretty. And that shame isn’t yours to walk with.

I’ve been around a lot of women. And when I identified with someone who was broken like me—even though I didn’t acknowledge it at the time—I did. I immediately recognized it and I was drawn to them.

I was able to listen to them. I was able to share some of my experiences with them—not to preach, but as a warning—hoping that they wouldn’t end up like me.

These days—you know how it goes—as soon as you start talking about your shit—something that happened to you—even when you’re one-on-one with that friend, the moment you start to tell your story, the other person butts in like, “Well, this is what happened to me…”

So what happens then? Your story doesn’t get told. And their story doesn’t get told. Because your friend just shut you down.

What could’ve been a very liberating, sacred moment—went to shit. What could’ve been a powerful—freeing—release just died in the room.

Two stories that mattered got dismissed because nobody was willing to listen.

“Let’s do another shot.” So I can drown it out—the pain. So I can forget about what’s eating me inside. And stuff it down some more.

Guess what happens when you do that? Your soul takes a hit. Your soul is left still bleeding inside. Taking a backseat—hoping that maybe—just maybe—that opportunity will come by again, and actually be honored.

If that person you call a friend doesn’t wanna listen or you don’t trust them enough to keep it to themselves—then ask yourself—why are you hanging around them? Maybe take some time out—alone—to reflect on that.

Do some soul-searching. Slow down. Trust that the people who are good for you, the ones who truly want to hear you—will find you.

I’m not telling you this is what you should do, I’m telling you this is what you could do.

Something meaningful.

Because we need each other. I just gave you a classic case of what the psychiatric system in Canada is like. If anything, that session pushed me deeper into the dark hole I was already in.

A lot of people who call themselves friends are in a dark place—and it’s easy to stay there when you're surrounded by darkness. I know—I lived my whole life in it. And when I finally came out of the darkness, all of the people who once called me ‘friend’—poof. Gone.

Gen X had it rough. I’m not saying the Millennials didn’t—or the Boomers—but a lot of the Millennials speak on social media, on Facebook, about everything that bothers them. Everything that caused them trauma.

And let’s keep it real—the shit Millennials call trauma is the same shit Gen X would get a smack in the head for. And they post it. Speak about it. Publicly. Announce it on social media.

They don’t even know why they're doing it outside of creating an audience. To gain followers. Not realizing—the whole point of speaking—of getting it out, getting it off your chest—is to become liberated. To break free—from what’s living inside you.

I know so many people who post their whole lives on social media, and they get likes and they get comments. A lot of those comments are the darkness feeding into the pain that already exists. The darkness—it loves that shit. It waits for that shit. And it ain’t hard to get in when the door is wide open. It’s called “feed” for a reason.

The world can be a cruel place. And if you don’t emotionally, mentally have it all together? You’re putting yourself at risk. I’m sure you’ve seen the documentaries—and if you haven’t, watch one. You should. See what's really happening with social media and today’s youth.

The ones posting—they aren't healing. These people are still broken. They're not liberated. Still carrying what was never fully seen, heard, or released as they walk with it every single day. I see it. I happen to know many.

Posting your story on Facebook might get you likes—but most people are just watching. Not listening. Not really hearing you. It’s sad to admit, but you’ve heard it before—some people like to see other people suffer.

They feed off it. Gossip about it. Find joy in it. And the ones who do? They’re the ones suffering the most—deep in their own pit of darkness, and they may not even know it.

Stop that shit—seriously. This world could be a mentally healthier, better place. It’s fucking possible. I just told you how.

Give your friend the ten, fifteen, twenty minutes they deserve from you without interruption—to help them break free from whatever the fuck is killing them inside.

I can see it clear as day. And if you’re reading this—if your eyes are open—I know you see it too. This generational “stuff-it-down” bull shit curse? It’s been running wild through our bloodlines long enough—too long.

There’s a message in what I’m sharing with you today—more than one, actually.

Take it in.