Growing up Audhild

Where to start? What is better than a proper introduction! I am…me! I’m kidding I go by Audhild. I am a mother, wife, daughter, sister, and…warrior. I am still wondering, how I go about talking about all the things I think need to be said. I call myself a warrior because I am healing from the aftermath of abuse. I didn’t have a childhood, I lived in a war zone. Not the Afghanistan type but the kind that is created by the people who are biologically programmed to protect you. That’s right my parents were in a domestic abuse relationship. This is heavy for the first post. I want to talk about domestic abuse, childhood trauma, and even life today. That is my plan for this blog.

Warrior….What is a warrior? The Google definition is “a brave or experienced soldier or fighter.” when people talk to me about my past they always refer to me as a “survivor”. By definition in a way they would be right, here I am, I am alive. Although, I don’t agree with being called a survivor. I have physically survived my trauma to tell you about it today, but not in a mental sense.

When a person is continuously subjected to trauma, the chemicals in the brain change. The brain enters a state of fight, flight, or freeze. Adrenaline is pumped through the body to respond to the threat. When this happens every day it causes the brain to get stuck in that survival mode. The long-term effect makes it harder to regulate the stress hormones. The hippocampus is the part of the brain that handles long-term memories. continuous trauma also affects the hippocampus causing problems with memory retention. Along with the prefrontal cortex the place where the brain processes decisions and impulses. In all, the entire brain is greatly changed by long-term trauma.

The most important years for brain development is childhood, more specifically infants up to five years old. These are the years when the brain is at its most vulnerable. When a baby is subjected to trauma and abuse it causes the above to be lifelong. People who are born into these homes struggle with self-esteem, anxiety, depression, social situations, and relationships. We create entire personalities in survival mode. I know much of who I have been. In social places, I act based on what I think is necessary. I do this to avoid being screamed at again. I also get uncomfortable when I see people fight and will avoid conflict by any means possible.

I survived my childhood physically, yes. The mental lifelong changes I unknowingly created while in survival mode, tell me different. The child I was did not “survive”. I fought every day to live to the next day. On my worst days, I still fight. I battle the flashbacks and the thoughts of getting hurt so someone will care. I worry about when my husband will leave. I watch people’s movements, words, and tone. I am not a survivor, I am a warrior.

Today I go to therapy every week. I am healing one day at a time. I work hard every day to give my children the safe and loving home I never had. They don’t know it but they are teaching me how to love and be loved. I did not realize how much they had picked up the best pieces of me. They have also picked up some of the negative ones. I am consciously making efforts to change, making them and myself better than I was. I still have a long road of healing but I know I am better than my parents.