Stopping the Spiral: How I was Able to Swim Through a Sea of Despair, Resentment and Bitterness
- It’s important to forgive ourselves for the ways in which we behaved while in survival mode because there is no right or wrong way to respond to trauma.
I’m a survivor. Not too long ago, I was kidnapped from a Hilton hotel by a large human trafficking organization and electrocuted with a car battery charger. I was taken to a neighborhood occupied by several registered sex offenders and paraded for others to see in the clothes of little girls who had walked those steps before me, and shown where my bones would be buried along a trail leading up Mission Peak.
By the grace of God, I managed to escape, after which I was hunted and had to hide underground in a den concealed by many trees with only leaves and dirt for warmth. It was the single most terrifying experience of my life and while it was happening, I made my peace and said my goodbyes because I didn’t expect to be here today.
After I was able to find the welcoming arms of safety and law enforcement, I faced a brutal journey of physical and mental recovery. My body had split open everywhere from the high-voltage electricity and several of my muscles had liquified and continued to ooze out of my body for months through open sores on my arms and legs. Some of my bones cracked. It took me several weeks to walk again and while I was going through the process there were times I lost faith that I would ever get out of the wheelchair and be able to use a toilet instead of a bedpan.
And then there was the PTSD, victim blaming, and victimhood resulting from the mental trauma that I had to navigate. I remember the terror and anxiety I faced when attempting to go to the grocery store alone for the first time several months after the incident because I didn’t know if my kidnappers would come back to put a bullet in my head and finish the job.
It took me some time to reintegrate back into society after surviving this atrocity. Initially, I isolated myself and lashed out verbally at others, and I lost so many friends and loved ones in the process-some of whom I had known for years. When we experience significant trauma, we feel singled out and unloved. We feel resentment and we may feel let down by our parents and members of our community who didn’t prevent the tragedy from happening.
Bitterness seeps in and when we spiral, we lash out at others in blind rage. It’s important to realize that when we push people away, it only serves to reinforce our distorted perception of reality and feed into our victimhood. When we experience atrocities that propel us into the depths of our darkness, that is when anger, ego, and paranoia create the reflection we come to see in the mirror of someone we can barely recognize as ourselves. When we bring negativity to others, it’s because we want them to feel a fraction of the pain that we feel inside, not because of the action they did to trigger us.
Because the trauma that I was navigating was so intense, for a time it was so painful to behave well and to treat people the way that I would want to treat them.
I’m so grateful and appreciative to my family for enduring the storm of my anger after my trauma, and I hope all families with trauma survivors understand that no one with anger and rage ever wants to feel that way. Because of the consistency, love, and support of my family, I was able to swim through the sea of despair, resentment, and bitterness that lingers long after an atrocity has passed. Experts agree that the best cure for PTSD is repeated social interactions with people with whom we feel safe.
Unfortunately, when navigating the chaos of PTSD, we tend to pick up some bad habits. For example, we become reactive and prioritize our needs before those of others. After we are able to survive and rise above a time in which we found ourselves toxic and broken, we now start to realize that part of what allowed us to survive the tragedy was putting our needs before those of others.
While in survival mode, often we respond to others with reactive behavior because we’ve been taught since childhood that reactive behavior is the way anything gets done in this world. As we start to reintegrate back into society, we find that these maladaptive coping mechanisms no longer serve us and we need to re-educate ourselves on appropriate social etiquette and learn to practice mindfulness with others.
It’s important to remind ourselves that healthy, happy people get by just fine when they don’t get their way, and it’s also important to forgive ourselves for the ways in which we behaved while in survival mode because there is no right or wrong way to respond to trauma.
When we feel angry about something, our feelings are usually an indication that something is unjust about a situation. It’s important to remind ourselves each morning that it’s never our loved ones that we want to hurt, and when we do hurt others, it only serves as a momentary comfort that is then replaced with a profound sadness after the temporary high subsides. Sometimes it can feel like a punch to the gut with a lingering hollowness that is the emotional hangover.
It’s important to remind ourselves that our families are not just a social unit, but spiritually speaking, they are a divine institution that is vital for our healing, nourishment, wholeness, mental balance, and ability to function as contributing members of society. Family is one of the most important things in life, and when we honor and respect our family members, we are honoring and respecting ourselves.
When I was in a really triggered place in my life, I was doing my best every day not to take things personally and not to react to others. Because the trauma that I was navigating was so intense, for a time it was so painful to behave well and to treat people the way that I would want to treat them at the end of the day. It took a lot of inner work and self-care to be able to be around others by learning how to navigate triggers, and it’s still an ongoing process.
The moment I get triggered, I am learning to take a step back and look at what’s happening. There are all these micro-steps within half a second in which we can choose to indulge, and it’s the same neurological pathway every time. I’m learning to consciously choose to reinforce a neurological pathway that is in alignment with my higher self, one that is not reactive, and it’s been serving me well. I know over time it will become hard-wired into my human operating system.
Part of playing chess and not checkers in the matrix is learning how to direct our anger into creating something beautiful, like a solution, a movement, or divinely guided actions that take us beyond the control and duality of this matrix and into birthing a new reality for ourselves.
I have channeled my frustration from my trauma into my book and podcast about codependency, non-physical domestic violence, and mental illness versus spiritual awakening. The Sophia Code helped me to integrate my trauma and navigate the roller coaster of emotions such that I could reawaken compassion within me for the human experience, myself, and for others by channeling the friction of the trauma into spiritual ascension.
As I now train to become a certified Sophia Circle Journey Leader, I welcome the responsibility and privilege to help guide others through their individual and unique life journeys through a grounded platform that facilitates spiritual ascension.
Dr. Suparna Saha is the author of “50 Shades of Domestic Violence: A Deeper Look at Social Etiquette and How We All Contribute.” She will be starring in the upcoming reality TV show “Miss Active Pear” on Apple TV as part of the series Rising Talents.