The past two weeks have been a reminder that trauma does not leave us. It is not something that we can just pack away and forget about. The earthquake that shook the ground beneath me brought back memories of a war zone that I had left behind. Memories of bombs exploding, buildings crumbling, and people screaming for their lives.
The earthquake, the horror, seeing and feeling the death of the people, and just thinking of those who might still be alive under the rubble numb me and make me unfunctional.
When I lived in the war zone, I was one of these people. I had empathy. I was afraid for others’ lives and mine all the time. But when I left Syria, I was overwhelmed with guilt. How do I leave all those behind me? What makes me different from those wishing to leave? Why am I leaving for a safer zone, but they are still stuck in there, living in danger?
I couldn’t sleep, and I couldn’t eat for a long, long time. I curled up into a severe depression for a year and started to hide away from those with whom I felt guilty. My friends, my family, and my dad, who stayed alone.
I eventually stopped watching the news altogether. It was a coping mechanism that gave me temporary relief from my guilt, but it didn’t address the underlying issue. As time went by, my guilt faded, but it would always come back, triggered by major events, videos, or movies about Syria.
I have grown, learned about mental health, about trauma, and read and listened to many, many lectures. I had to hit rock bottom before I realized that I needed to start healing. It’s been almost a year that I’ve been in therapy, working on my war trauma and childhood trauma. And lately, I have been feeling better, but there’s always something that I need. Whenever I am overwhelmed, I hide. I disappear. It’s not a wish but, rather, a need.
But two weeks ago, we were all shaken while sleeping, and before I even saw the news, I woke up in the middle of the night. My bed was shaking, and my daughter was next to me, she woke up, and we both hugged, but someone, a meter away from me, could probably, hear my heartbeats. It was scary. It was something that I had felt and experienced before. So, my brain right away signaled, “We’ve been there before. Would you like to run?”.
I was numb, I couldn’t move, and I’m generally now better as a mum with my reflexes, but that was not a parenthood-related reflex where I fight. That was my war-zone-trauma-related reflex. So my body just acted the way I used to, fright!
The next morning was disastrous; the news started coming, the horror, the videos, the photos, the tears, the fear, all the mixed and overwhelming emotions. So that was not just an earthquake? that was a deadly earthquake!
So people die at night while sleeping; people do just go to sleep and never wake up! Or wake up with heavy, heavy weight on top of them. These things also happen outside the war zone, so what to do now, brain?
I sat there, rethinking the concept of safety. Is there really a safe place, after all?
Are we just a haunted nation? Death keeps following us around?
For a week, I struggled to function. I needed to be strong for my daughter, but my anxiety was overwhelming. She sensed my fear and hugged me, telling me “don’t cway, mummy, don’t wowey”. I wish I could tell you what mummy had to go through and what she goes through every night while she’s hugging you and singing your favorite lullaby, “I love you, you love me … we are happy family”, was all that I was thinking of.
Since the 6th of February, every night, I sleep, knowing that after years of feeling that I’m finally safe, I’m out of the war zone, that none of that is probably true, and no, I am not safe where I am.
Because just a few hundred kilometers away, people vanished under the rubble, thinking that they were safe, too, probably.
Every night since the 6th of February, I have been haunted by memories of sleeping on my bed next to the window in Aleppo, waiting for the glass to shatter and for death to come. For three years, I slept, knowing I might not wake up and that each day could be my last.
These past two weeks were so so heavy …
