Trauma & Identity: How Hurricane Katrina Changed Me

Diantha
Diantha
Aug 31, 2018 · 9 min read
“woman wearing red mask” by Daniel Garcia on Unsplash

On August 29th, 2005, Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans, the place I called home at the time. It’s one of the worst things that’s ever happened to me and nothing before or since has made me feel so powerless.

This is my Katrina story:

Home Is Not Where You Live…

I live in New Orleans but I’m not originally from here.

I grew up in New England, raised in a tiny Vermont town where I never really fit in, and that never really felt like home. My first trip to New Orleans was for a college visit. I convinced my parents to let me go on a school tour, even though the idea of getting an education in the South horrified many of my New England family members. After three days in the city, I knew that this is where I was meant to be. For the first time, I felt like I was home.

I think John Goodman described this feeling best,

“If I could put my finger on it, I’d bottle it and sell it. I came down here originally in 1972 with some drunken fraternity guys and had never seen anything like it — the climate, the smells. It’s the cradle of music; it just flipped me. Someone suggested that there’s an incomplete part of our chromosomes that gets repaired or found when we hit New Orleans. Some of us just belong here.”

Hurricane Season

Prior to Katrina, I had experienced a handful of tropical storms and weak hurricanes. I was always told not to worry though because a major storm hadn’t hit New Orleans since 1965. People had become so relaxed about the weather that stocking up for “hurricane parties” was the standard for disaster preparedness. The city had been lucky for 40 years, but it’s only a matter of time before anyone’s luck runs out.

You know that saying, “God/life doesn’t give you more than you can handle?”

That’s total bullshit.

Life ABSOLUTELY gives you more than you can handle sometimes and there’s not a damn thing you can do to stop it.

Katrina was the 11th named storm and 4th hurricane of the very active 2005 season. First, it hit Florida as a category one. Then it moved back into the Gulf, strengthened into a massive category 5 storm, and headed straight for New Orleans. I evacuated with some friends the day before it hit and suffered through a 19 hour, bumper to bumper drive to Houston.

When I awoke the next day, I found myself in a new reality. Katrina had hit New Orleans as a category 3 storm and the city was actually spared the brunt of it. For a brief moment, I thought maybe we’d all be okay but then the levees broke. 80% of the city flooded, trapping thousands of people with no power, no phone service, no running water, and no easy way out.

We sat there watching helplessly as things spiraled out of control. Image after image of New Orleanians being airlifted off of rooftops, rescue missions to save people drowning in their attics, and the dead bodies of Katrina’s first victims. The initial relief efforts were a clusterfuck at best, and politicians were busy pointing fingers at each other instead of coming up with solutions to coordinate the rescue of people drowning in their sea of bureaucracy.

And things only got worse from there.

“Refugees”

It was a strange moment when I came to the sudden realization that, in the blink of an eye, I had become homeless, jobless, and almost everything I owned had been destroyed. My life as I knew it was gone and the people of my city were dying, missing, or scattered across the country. I couldn’t go back but I also had no idea how to move forward. I was a stranger adrift in the world, with no direction or destination in sight. It didn’t help when people began calling evacuated New Orleanians, “refugees,” like we weren’t even citizens of our own country. The shock set in pretty quickly and I lost my sense of time for a while.

I ended up staying in Houston for a few weeks, then I flew to DC to stay with my brother and wait until they started letting people back into New Orleans. During that time, Hurricane Rita (another category 5 storm) rolled through, flooding parts of the city for a second time and further delaying my ability to return home.

As I struggled to pull my life out of an overwhelming sense of limbo, my welcome at my brother’s house began to wear out.

I love my brother but he’s what you might call “empathetically challenged,” and he became frustrated by my indecisiveness about what I should do next. He couldn’t see my devastation for what it was and my being there was becoming an inconvenience to him, so I had to go. So I hopped on a plane and went to stay with my parents in Vermont.

The Road Home

Finally, by the end of September, the mayor gave us the green light for reentry. When I told my parents my plan to return to New Orleans, my mom responded with, “I want to see a disaster zone!” So, I bought a car and some supplies and off we went, me, my mom, and a very unhappy cat, on a 3-day road trip adventure to the disaster zone I called home.

We finally arrived on Oct 4th, 2005, and my first sight of New Orleans was a violent reality check. The city had been ripped apart by wind, water, and people, with piles of debris everywhere, buildings on top of cars, abandoned boats in the middle of the street, and a lingering smell of floodwater and death. It was like coming home to find the love of your life lying on the kitchen floor, beaten, raped and barely alive. The damage was overwhelming and the road to recovery would be long and painful but there was no question in my mind that I was where I needed to be. I wasn’t going anywhere.

New Orleans was still a ghost town at that point and was mostly populated by relief workers. The National Guard with their giant guns were there as well, paroling the streets in humvees and enforcing the mandatory curfew from 6pm to 8am. Fortunately, the apartment I had been staying at didn’t flood and had power when we arrived. I had only been staying there for the summer though, so almost everything I owned was in storage and got destroyed by the flooding. It wasn’t a concern of mine at that point though, because all that mattered was that I was home. My mom stayed for a few days and then left, and I joined in the disaster relief efforts.

Reunited & It Feels So Good

It was lonely at first since no one I knew was back yet, but people slowly began to return. I was happily reunited with some friends but I found that even bumping into pre-Katrina acquaintances was like reuniting two long lost family members. New Orleans has always been a friendly place but this was different. Strangers would walk up to each other on the street and have some version of this conversation,

“Hey welcome back! How’d ya make out? How’s your family? Want me to show you what’s open? Need any help gutting your house? I know some people who can help if you want. Here’s my number, let me know if you need a job because everyone seems to be hiring. Doesn’t it feel GOOD to be home? Now what did you say your name was again?”

There was an air of hope in New Orleans and we started to come together in a way that transcended barriers like class or race that had kept us apart before. Even though people were saying we were crazy to rebuild, the truth is we would swim home if we had to because in New Orleans,

“We dance even if there’s no radio. We drink at funerals. We talk too much and laugh too loud and live too large, and, frankly, we’re suspicious of others who don’t.” — Chris Rose

We survived hell and high water and our city was still standing. We knew what it means to miss New Orleans and we were ready to prove to the world that even though we were down, we were not out. And to do that, we had to do what we do best and throw the greatest damn free party on earth.

Come On Take Me To The Mardi Gras…

It was almost Carnival season but it had only been six months since Katrina. The city was still in bad shape, the local government was pretty much bankrupt, less than half the population had come back, and many of the floats had been damaged by the storm. So, people started talking about canceling Mardi Gras 2006 which has only happened a handful of times in the city’s history.

To people who misunderstand this uniquely New Orleans tradition, canceling Mardi Gras may have seemed like a reasonable thing to do in the wake of such a huge disaster. But this is the exact opposite of what we needed.

Mardi Gras is so much more than some drunken, hedonistic party involving half-naked women flashing their breasts for beads. It is our single most defining cultural event, drawing together our music, food, attitude, character, artistic expression, and love of satire. Mardi Gras is about crawfish boils and king cakes, neighborhoods and families, crazy costumes for both people and pets. It’s about Rebirth Brass Band and Professor Longhair, school marching bands and dance squads, all-night jazz shows, second lines, and Mardi Gras Indians under the Claiborne bridge.

Mardi Gras is the culmination of everything New Orleans and we desperately needed it to remind us of who we are, and why we celebrate our love of life even in the midst of tragedy. Fortunately, this was a Fat Tuesday that even a hurricane couldn’t stop. Mardi Gras 2006 was our middle finger up to Hurricane Katrina and a healing moment for all of us. It’s also still, by far, the greatest Mardi Gras I’ve ever been to. There were fewer parades than usual, the routes had to be modified, and the crowds were smaller, but the energy was euphoric. Even though so much had been lost, this was proof that the spirit of New Orleans was still very much alive and we would rebuild.

Laissez Les Bons Temps Rouler

That was thirteen years ago. A lot has happened in my life since then but I often think back to that post-Katrina time and what it taught me.

Sometimes I wonder what my life would’ve been like if it never happened or if the levees had held. Would my life have been easier? Perhaps. But I wouldn’t be who I am today without it. Because in the end, I think it’s how we choose to face the worst moments in our lives that really ends up defining who we are and what we’re capable of. The storm destroyed the life I had been living and it decimated the city I love, but I chose to stay instead of leaving. In doing so, I found myself tested in ways I never imagined and forced to endure suffering I never thought myself capable of enduring. But I also found a deep connection and sense of community amongst those of us who chose to return. We stood united together as New Orleanians, stronger than the force of nature that tried to take us down and unwilling to abandon The City That Care Forgot.

Hurricane Katrina is one of the worst things that’s ever happened to me, but living in the disaster zone of its aftermath ended up being one of the happiest and most fulfilling times in my life. It turns out that I’m grateful for all that the storm took from me because it created space in my life for so much more. Now I’ll leave you with these final words of wisdom,

“What has been may be what is, but what will be cannot possibly be known. We live the moment. Laissez les bons temps rouler — Let the Good Times Roll!”


Thank you for reading this unusually long and personal post, the hurricane always stirs up a lot of emotions for me. I look forward to your comments and please feel free to share transformational moments from your own life if you’d like. Be sure to follow me on Medium if you want to get updates about new posts! You can also holla at me on Instagram @diantha504 or on Twitter @dianthaboardman. If you enjoyed this piece, I bet your friends would too so please share :)

Diantha

Written by

Diantha

Leadership Coach | New Orleanian | Smarty Pants | General Goofball

Welcome to a place where words matter. On Medium, smart voices and original ideas take center stage - with no ads in sight. Watch
Follow all the topics you care about, and we’ll deliver the best stories for you to your homepage and inbox. Explore
Get unlimited access to the best stories on Medium — and support writers while you’re at it. Just $5/month. Upgrade