Hey y’all! (I can’t believe I now use y’all unironically) Lately, I have been laughing at myself because initially when I created this blog, I intended on posting weekly and sharing all sorts of things/photographs I’ve created with you. But, life came at me pretty hot and heavy–leaving the creative side of me dim. It flares up every now and then, but usually never enough for me to actually get on here. However, I still stand by the fact that I have been a relentless writer on and off since I was a child, and have a lot of creative pieces that I figured you might like to read; AND that I still use my camera to take some neat (amateur) pictures. Even though there is a part of my soul that is screaming to create, I still have to be gentle with myself and honor the amount of stress I am carrying. I know I will once again reach a point in life where I can write and not feel like I’m suffocating from my own reality. Kind of like how I feel now.

Now for the heavy stuff. Alright guys (guys is a gender neutral term), I’m going to get real with y’all. If you have read any of my posts, or follow my IG, you may have noticed that I’ve danced around some topics of trauma. I had a very traumatic experience that changed my life forever–and is the main subject in a lot of my writings given the heaviness of that night and the events that followed. I was raped on a work trip. The only memories I have are of it happening, and that I could not defend myself when I realized it was happening. It absolutely crushed me and initiated the biggest identity crisis I have ever had because I was supposed to be this big bad SOF medic…right? There was a time period after it happened that I cried myself to sleep every night for about a month. Sitting alone in a quiet room would be deafening. Something in me was lost that night.

The chaos and internal turmoil didn’t last too long because I completely swallowed everything to pursue my career. I didn’t seek mental health treatment. I only went to the doctors just for testing and then carried on with my life. It worked well for a little, but if theres anything I’ve learned over the past few years, it’s that the body keeps a score. And that shit was living inside my bones, no matter how badly I tried to pretend it didn’t. Or how much I used my job as justification as to why I didn’t need help.

I really want to share that story–in a creative and well written way. So, I am writing a first-person short story as a way to say what happened to me and hopefully illustrate raw emotions and thoughts that were going on during that time in my life. I will be publishing it in a 3 or 4 part series. Or maybe I’ll panic at the last second and not share it at all. LOL we will see.

I reached a breaking point for keeping my mouth shut recently. Carrying the weight of that happened to me, on top dealing with work place harassment, discrimination, sexual harassment, and slander ultimately became too much to deal with on my own so I started speaking out. I guess consider this the beginning of my “speaking out” phase. I’m sure you’ve gathered that I have been carrying around some weight. In no way am I trying to say that my weight is any heavier than others. In fact, I have realized that when we show our weight to others, we all end up carrying it together which ultimately helps us drop it off at some point.

I was feeling so chaotic and unsafe in my own body, then I had to show up to a work place where I was sexualized, scrutinized, and shoved into this box they wanted to put me in because I “had too strong of a personality”. My dignity and womanhood being a joke to many began to feel very dehumanizing. For a moment, I actually felt like I was going insane. Just a few months ago actually, I was able to go to an intensive therapy program for Military Sexual Trauma victims (survivors? idk I don’t consider myself either honestly. but thats a different conversation) funded by the Wounded Warrior Project. It was being there that actually reopened me back up–intensive programs are not for the faint of heart. While I was there, my nervous system was so shot that I wasn’t sleeping, eating, and was waking up not breathing. I could barely even pencil in my eyebrows since the stress gave me such bad tremors. My nightmares came back too, along with fits of rage. I snapped several times at other women there and was so irritable at other times it took everything I had not to flip a table. What was also pretty funny and serendipitous in a way, is that while I was there I also found out my ex husband (who I was married to at the time) had been spreading the narrative that I lied about being raped. I was crushed because he saw how broken down I was after and even cried with me. I mean he was never the most virtuous man, but him going to that extent to lie was a new low. I decided that there will be a section of my short story dedicated to describing his role in my demise back then–which has actually been fun and therapeutic to write about.

But ANYWAYS when I left, I did feel like the trauma was far away. It was actually kind of nice. However, I came back from that program on a friday and was back on another trip on a sunday not realizing that I would need extensive follow up care (that I would come to find out later). I went on back to back work trips, which I would normally love, but instead I cracked. My symptoms never went away (especially the nightmares), I was also getting more hostile and irritable; so I reached out for help. I feel SO thankful for my amazing therapist who has had my back through everything while my own leadership failed me. I will be talking about my experience on a popular podcast pretty soon so I wont get into that full story right now. All I will say is that the best thing I have ever done is continue to push back on the ones that were trying to put me down, and to continue to advocate for myself. I recommend for everyone to choose their fights wisely, but don’t ever stop fighting.

Okay the heavy part is over. Yes that was me mostly venting, but also organizing some thoughts that I will be discussing in the future. I will be talking about being raped while in the service, my experience as a woman in a SOF organization, and other experiences that I believe others can gain insight from. I’m very excited about it all! 🙂 I have been receiving such positive messages from family, friends, and acquaintances lately. While I hold them dear to me and screen shot every little kind thing, I still have trouble believing them sometimes because of how badly I’ve been beat down the past couple years. I consider all the kind and random messages I get little reminders from the universe that I am doing okay. So thank you so much for them. If you’ve made it this far into my post. Thank you. ❤ XD xxoo

Ps. I recently had an MRI of my brain and they found damage to my left frontal lobe. Which is also the part that regulates mood and cognition. I have a TBI/Neurology specialist appointment coming up so hopefully I can begin some type of treatment. After finding it out I felt nervous for a second, but then I became curious. Curious if there’s a correlation with my symptoms/headaches to whats going on with my brain. Some of my symptoms have gotten so bad that I would be crying to my boyfriend and tell him with tears running down my face, “this isn’t me, something is wrong with my brain”. Now I kind of feel like I will be getting some answers? We will see. Either way I’d love all the prayers/good vibes.

Always with love, Jade.