You tell me: “Hold your head up and be strong.  Cuz when you fall you gotta get up, and move on.”  Until you’ve walked where I’ve walked, it’s just all talk!  Til it happens to you, you won’t know how I feel. 

I recently listened to Lady Gaga’s powerful song “Til it Happens to You.”  It strongly resonated with me regarding a few past life struggles.  Maybe you can also relate.

Don’t rush your journey.  There are no short cuts to your recovery or to your healing.  No one else knows how you may be struggling in this moment.  Celebrate every step forward.  Don’t be hard on yourself when you take two steps back.  Recognize your strength.  Acknowledge your vulnerability and authenticity.

Allow yourself to not always be perfect.  You can’t hold yourself together forever, as hard as you try.  Believe me; I know this first hand.  Collapse to the ground.  Lie flat on the floor.  Feel the earth supporting you.  It won’t let you fall through.

Sometimes it may feel as if you are holding yourself together with a thin, worn piece of string…  Just smiling for everyone else…  So that no one feels uncomfortable.

A friend once told me that my time to vent about a traumatic event in my life had come to an end, because a year had passed.  One whole year!  How dare I joke or mention it in passing.   I should have already been over it because 365 days had elapsed.

But there is no timeline or deadline as to when we should feel better, or when we have fully processed through something.  This can take years, depending on the circumstances, or if we are truly addressing the event or issue.

“Til it Happens to You” also made me think that as women we are expected (sometimes on a daily basis) to accept sexual harassment and discrimination, and sexual assault.  And not only accept it, but to keep silent, with a wide smile on our faces.  And if someone does speak out, they are mocked, dismissed and called names.  As if anyone else truly knows what they endured.

I was called weak because I didn’t enjoy being stalked and threatened when I had the audacity to run for public office as a 26 year old.  I was told to “just get over” it when I lost the election and fell into a dark hole of situational depression after putting every ounce of my bones into my campaign.  As if anyone else wouldn’t have also fallen apart.

I was dismissively told that my life was “so much better” after my ex-husband, and former partner of 12 years, came out of the closet.  People said I didn’t “need him anyway,” as if I should simply accept these overly used clichés and become completely whole again in one week.

I was also advised that it didn’t behoove me to point out severe gender inequities in my workplace, or to speak up when sexually harassed by multiple political officials.  I still haven’t told many close friends or family, out of fear that no one would believe me.  Or, worse, that my feelings would be dismissed as no big deal.

And why was I told all of this?  Who exactly did I need to be strong for?  Why was there the need to maintain a happy, silent face?  To make someone else feel comfortable?  And when a show of strength is forced, is it actual strength, or just an act for some insta-motivational meme?

You won’t begin to recover or move towards a path of healing before you fully feel through your trauma, and let your body treat and acknowledge it.  Simply walking around smiling and pretending to be strong only prolongs the inevitable.  Allow yourself to be sad, allow yourself to be angry, allow yourself to speak and think and journal.

And remember to say to yourself, or to anyone judging or rushing your process:

Til it happens to you, you won’t know how I feel…