Hey there, it’s Kerri! Thank you so much for joining me on this latest episode of Invisible Wounds Healing from Trauma. This is episode 8 Early Childhood Trauma part 4. I’m so glad that we’re walking the path towards healing together!

So just a quick reminder, I’m not a clinician, counselor, or physician. I’m a Certified Trauma Support Specialist with lots of lived experience with trauma. Also, the information presented in this podcast is for educational purposes only and not meant to replace treatment by a doctor or any other licensed professional.

Also, as we talk about childhood traumatic experiences, this is NOT me giving parenting advice! I made a TON of mistakes as a parent, we all do, whether we have a trauma history or not! I’m taking information from published studies and readily available from reliable sources, like the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and others. I will also relate my personal experiences, what’s made sense to me and helped me, in the hopes of connecting my thoughts and feelings to something you may have gone through. As we go through this topic, it could get a bit triggering. If it does, stop listening, take a break and do some mindful belly breathing, or any of the other exercises we’ve learned, and come back when you’re ready.

Alright let’s dive in!

So in episode 7 we talked about early childhood trauma between the ages of 6 through 12. In this episode, we’ll discuss trauma from the ages of 13 through 18 years old. I had significant trauma in this age range. Young people at this age are already navigating a minefield of changes in their bodies and brain. Puberty hits, and the physical and biological changes can throw teens for a loop. Emotions can become out of control as teens are trying to find ways to assert more independence and push those boundaries! However, if a teen has experienced any trauma or multiple traumas, that already out of control feeling can completely explode into a wide range of behaviors.

At 13, I experienced so much trauma, starting with the sudden and completely unexpected death of my little sister. One day she was a healthy 1st grader and 4 days later she was gone. She was like my own child, I had raised her, cared for her, and protected her as best I could from the chaos, dysfunction, and trauma of our daily lives. Our already completely dysfunctional family, disintegrated utterly, it was everyone for themselves. We were in Morgantown West Virginia at the time, and my parents opted to bury her in their small Kansas hometown. I remember helping my mom pick out Erin’s favorite dress for her to be buried in. We had a viewing in Morgantown, then we flew to Kansas for another viewing, service, and burial. It was completely surreal; I remember very little of that time. It was also December, and while most of the rest of the world was getting ready to celebrate Christmas, we were shut down, cut off… We got back home, and the emptiness without my sister was overwhelming. Her room was right next to mine, and I would just go sit on her bed, wishing that all of this was a dream. A month later, exactly to the day that my sister died, my grandfather, my mom’s dad who lived with us, got suddenly very sick. I came home from school (I had just started back a couple of days before) and my parents were taking him out of the house to go to the hospital. I don’t know why no one ever called an ambulance… They told me NOT to go downstairs. Then they left. My bedroom was downstairs, and seriously? I’m not going to go “see” whatever it was they didn’t want me to see? I went downstairs, walked slowly down the hall. (TW HERE!)  I peeked into our bathroom... I had covered the walls of the downstairs bathroom “painstakingly” and lovingly with photos, articles, and posters of all of my favorite celebrities. David Cassidy was my favorite.  I looked around…there was blood splashed all over the walls, all over the pictures, all over the sink, and counter... 2 days later, he was gone too.

I described this in my first episode as the moment I fell to my knees screaming, and I felt myself break and shatter into a million little pieces. I had hit major trauma overload! Without readily available healthy adults to help me work through and process things, I had no way of knowing even where to begin to try and work through anything. At this moment, I completely shut down and made a sort of pact with myself. From now on, I didn’t give a damn about anyone or anything, including myself!

Teens with a trauma history will show many different kinds of behaviors, and I totallyI dove in headfirst! I went from being a fearful, shy, adult behaving kid to a rebellious, substance using, promiscuous, angry kid overnight. I was never taught boundaries or healthy limits, so I became completely self-destructive. We moved again in 1979 back to Ohio. Another move, another big change. I started my freshman year of high school and I purposefully sought out the partiers, the rebellious crowd! I did every drug I could get my hands on, drank alcohol daily, enough to give me alcohol poisoning many times over. I started skipping school. If I went, I would go to the girl’s bathroom, smoke, hang out with the partiers, get high or drink (We all did this every morning before classes started!) and try to go to classes. We had one teacher, our gym teacher who in the mornings before classes would burst into the girl’s bathroom to catch us smoking cigarettes. I ALWAYS got caught! The punishment for this was a Saturday morning detention. You’d go to school Saturday morning from 8 am to noon. I think I set a school record by having 25 Saturday detentions in a row! So typically, my school day (If I even went!)  was that I would just say screw it and leave school at some point and walk home! I skipped school for 6 weeks straight at one point, without my parents even knowing it. They only found out when I got hauled into court for truancy. I intercepted the mail and got court papers with a court date. The night before court, I told my parents that one of them would have to go with me. My dad went…. we spun a tale of me being really sick with something and that’s why I’d missed school. So, no consequences for me!

My dad continued to be gone a lot for work. When he was home, every night, he would drink to the point of passing out, even at the dinner table. Mom was still either sick at home or in the hospital. At 13, I began to run errands for her. I’d begun to learn how to drive, but not well. But she’d have me take the car, go to the drugstore to pick up her medications, ect. So naturally, I began to take the car to school every day. Remember, I was 13, and I had no license! My mom would protest but didn’t stop me. I began picking up my friends, we’d skip school, go party. One time, my girlfriends and I were all in the car. I drove up to our local mall only about a mile from my house. We were smoking a bowl of weed, passing it around. I parked next to the mall. The car was so full of smoke, you couldn’t see! Suddenly, there was a knock on my driver’s side window. It was one of our local cops! We all panicked; someone hid the bowl. I rolled down the window and smoke billowed out! It was like something out of a “Cheech and Chong” movie! Weed has a very strong and specific smell, I know the cop had to smell it! He told me I’d have to move the car, I was parked in a fire lane! I apologized profusely and said I’d move immediately! He gave me a “look” I mean he knew what we were doing but he never said anything about it. Again, no consequences!

Every weekend there was a party of some kind. We would all get together at someone’s house, yard, or field. We lived in a rural area. Everyone would bring drugs or alcohol, and I got completely wasted, to the point of blacking out or passing out. Sometimes the party was at my house, with my mom present. We’d all drink, get high, right in front of my mom. Her explanation to me was that she would rather me “do this at home” where she could keep an eye on me. One weekend, my parents were going out of town for some business thing for my dad, leaving me on my own. I immediately began planning a party! I got my boyfriend at the time to get a keg of beer, invited about 10 of my “crowd” and was so excited! It was planned for Friday night. Friday morning however, my parents announced that the trip had been canceled, and they wouldn’t be leaving...I told them that about 5-10 of my friends would be “dropping” by that evening. They were upset but didn’t make me cancel it! My parents went up to their room early. My friends began arriving at about 7pm. The keg was tapped, drugs and alcohol began to flow. More and more people began to show up, and I was loving it! Every time I looked around, more and more people showed up. There were people there I didn’t even know! It ended up with about 200 people inside and outside of my house! People were passing out drugs like candy, 2 people were dividing up a huge pile of marijuana on the stove in the kitchen. It was totally out of control! Suddenly at about 10 pm, one of my friends came to me and said there was a cop at the front door. Uh oh! I was tripping on acid (LSD)! I went to the front door and the cop said there had been noise complaints and asked if there were any adults present. When I told him my parents were home, he didn’t believe me! I went upstairs, told my parents, and my dad went to the door. He told the cop he’d get everyone out of there and the cop left. He then announced to everyone that they had to leave. People began leaving in droves! It was crazy. After they left, the house was a disaster, someone had “turfed” the front yard with a car...but again, no consequences for me. Oh, my dad would yell at me, but I just blew it off. They hadn’t been real “parents” up til now, and suddenly they were going to try? Nope, I wasn’t buying it!

I continued partying full tilt boogie. I would come home completely wasted, with my mom trying to figure out what I was on. It was like some weird form of Jeopardy beginning with the category “What’s Kerri on today?”

As I mentioned, I would drink to the point of blacking out or passing out. This was dangerous at parties, as I found out quickly. At 14 I was raped at a party. I had blacked out and woke up outside with someone I considered a “good” friend on top of me. I began to resist, and he pushed me back down so he could “finish.” After that, I began sleeping with almost anyone. I didn’t care anymore. For a short time, I was wanted by someone. Always afterward I felt “dirty” and ashamed, but that didn’t stop me.

My outrageous behaviors continued. I’d stay away from home days at a time. I’d come home, I’d get yelled at but again, NEVER any consequences. It was like I was setting myself on fire constantly in front of my parents screaming “I’m on fire, put it out, help me!” but nothing I did, no matter how outlandish, crazy or self-destructive I behaved got any real parental response.

Life continued, my behaviors continued, and got worse. My parents weren’t home, I was alone a lot! One day, at 16, I decided to kill myself. It was a calm decision, I was done with life. I took a big handful of some medication of my moms, laid down on my bedroom floor, and waited for it all to be over. It made me really sick, but it didn’t kill me. Suddenly, it came to me...I’d run away! That was the answer! I knew exactly where I wanted to go. There was a little island off the coast of Virginia that I loved, that’s where I’d go! I gathered some things Including a big road atlas (A big book of maps), took my mom’s car went to the bank, I had a little money, plotted my drive out on the maps, and took off! I was so excited, happy, relieved! It was an adventure! So 16-year-old me (still no driver’s license) drove from Ohio to Virginia. It took me 13 hours of straight driving, with lots of stops for coffee, but I made it. I pulled into the parking lot of a hotel I was familiar with and slept in my car. I slept in my car for about a week, while I looked for work. I told everyone I was 19, and they bought it. Soon, I had a job working at a very nice local bed and breakfast place cleaning. They gave me a room over an outboard motor shop they owned. In a few more days, I had a second job working as a waitress at a local seafood restaurant. I was serving alcohol and I was underage! My parents figured out where I was, but they didn’t make me come home! My dad came down to take the car back and he brought me my bicycle as a tradeoff. I began hanging out with the local partiers, all much older than me. I dated a guy who was the captain of a clamming boat, part of a fleet docked off the island. At a party at his house one night, I was gang raped by most of the men at the party, I lost count after a while...

Then one day, I met a man 9 years my senior, who would become my living nightmare. I mentioned in my first episode that he was the typical southern rebel “bad boy” and I fell for him instantly! He’d even been to jail several times, and that didn’t deter me. That just made him seem all the more dangerous and attractive to me! I was with him for the next few years, and it was a very controlling and violent relationship. It took me 5 times to leave him for good. I’ll go into more detail in a later episode when we look at the dynamics of Intimate Partner Violence.

When I left the last time, 4 months later, I had a burst brain aneurysm that should have killed me, but it didn’t. This was more added trauma. I suffer lots of headaches to this day, and every time I get one, I get anxious because subconsciously the pain triggers that memory of the God-awful pain I had when the aneurysm burst.

Throughout all of my teen years, all of the self-destructive behaviors, all of the abuse, what I really wanted, deep down in my heart of hearts, was for one of the adults in my life, to step up, and literally “save me from myself!” I behaved in the worst ways I could think of, and nothing made any difference, nothing changed. So, I had trauma on top of trauma, and continued to “re-traumatize” myself! Children need boundaries and limits beginning when they are little. They need to be able to understand where they begin and end in their relationships with others and to be able to find and navigate their place in the world. Consistent loving limits and boundaries are necessary in order to build healthy relationships, self-esteem, confidence, and resiliency. If a child touches a hot stove and gets burned, a healthy caregiver will soothe the hurt while gently making sure they understand that they shouldn’t touch that hot stove again because they’ll get burned again. I understand now that for whatever reason, my parents weren’t able to really “be” parents. My dad once told me as an adult that “your mother and I never should have married and had children.” What an awful thing for any child to hear! Even as an adult, that felt like complete and utter invalidation for both my own and my sister’s existence! In working towards my own healing, which I think will always be a work in progress, I can understand, and can sort of forgive them, but I can’t forget what happened and how it has affected me throughout my life. Also, despite what you read and hear, forgiveness is NOT necessary in order to heal from trauma! This is all still something I struggle with daily and has impacted all of the relationships in my life including the relationships I have with my own children.

As we are learning together however, we can gain knowledge, understanding, and can begin to have compassion towards ourselves. We can gently learn how to give that inner child in us that was so very hurt, the things they so desperately needed and didn’t get NOW, TODAY! We are learning new skills, small things we can use every day to rewire our brains and create those new healthy pathways. We can get back in touch with ourselves, to reconnect with the present, and build safety which we need so very much!

So, this is where I like to close us out with a new exercise that we can add to that “mindfulness” toolbox we’re building together! Remember, you don’t have to do this now, or at all if you don’t want to, but you might just listen and tuck it away in your mind for future reference.

Before we begin, I’d like for you to find something to hold, something with texture. It could be anything, something comforting maybe. Do you have a favorite “comfort” item? A favorite blanket, a stuffed animal (I have a TEDDY BEAR I LOVE!)  maybe you have a pet close to you. Take your time, bring that item, or being with you. This exercise is designed to bring you into the “present” moment.

Find a comfortable and quiet place to sit.

We always start with mindful belly breathing. Close your eyes or keep them open. Inhale slowly through your nose, your belly should naturally push out as you inhale, for a count of 5. Hold your breath for a count of 1. Slowly exhale out of your mouth, your belly should naturally move in as you exhale, for a count of five. Do this five times.

You can either close your eyes, or open them, whatever is most comfortable.

Begin by rubbing your fingers back and forth gently, over the item or being that you have with you. Connect to that “feeling” of your fingers rubbing over it. Connect to the feeling of that item or being under your fingers. Continue slowly breathing.

Describe either out loud or to yourself how that sensation feels? Is it smooth? Is it rough? Can you notice a temperature with this item or being? What temperature do you notice? Is it warm, cool, or neutral?

Does rubbing your fingers over this item or being, bring up any feelings for you? Is it a comforting feeling or sensation? Is it soothing to your senses?

If you’d like to, you could say while rubbing your fingers over or on this item or being, out loud or to yourself, “I am safe right now, in this moment.” Or you could say “I connect to my fingers and feel the texture under them.”

You can stay this way as long as you’d like to if it’s comfortable for you. You can also stop anytime you wish. When you’ve finished, bring your awareness back to your breath. Breathe slowly in through your nose and out through your mouth.

How do you feel? Do you feel calmer, more grounded. Or relaxed?

I hope these exercises are something you found helpful, and it’s more tools to add to our “mindful” toolbox that we’re building together. Whenever you need to go to that toolbox and pull out any skill we’ve learned in order to feel more grounded, safe, and connected, do it!! I have created a list of all of the techniques and exercises we’ve learned on my website invisiblewoundshealingfromtrauma.com and will add to it as we go along. I’m also going to begin demonstrating all of the skills, and techniques, and adding related content on my YouTube Channel Invisible Wounds: Healing from Trauma!

Thank you so much for taking the time to listen today, and please keep on listening! Wherever you listen, please like, subscribe, favorite, and follow me! What you think really matters to me too, so comment on the show, what you think, whatever’s on your mind. You can find me on Facebook at Invisible Wounds: Healing from Trauma, Twitter at Kerriwalker58, and my websites invisiblewoundshealingfromtrauma.com and enddvnow,com

Look for my new episodes dropping every Monday on all of your favorite podcast and listening apps!

Please take extra good care of yourself, and we’ll talk soon!