I have to admit, while watching this seasons The Chi season 3 on Showtime, I have found myself being trauma triggered. The storyline around this Southside Chicago community and primarily the plot as it pertains to the character of Kiesha, has left me in an endless stream of tears every Sunday evening.
Kiesha is kidnapped and as her family struggles to find her, not sure if she is dead or alive, we the viewers are privy to the fact that she is alive. She is being held as a sex slave in the very neighborhood she lives in.
What triggered me, is the commitment to find Kiesha, played by the character Ronnie. Ronnie is a homeless veteran who has killed in the name of love and now struggles to find peace, forgiveness and a reason to live. Finding Kiesha, hopefully, will be his redemption.
The increased number of young girls who are being kidnapped and sex trafficked right in front of our eyes, is disheartening. I want the world to care. For young black girls, it seems that even less people care. Watching Ronnie care, made my heart sing. In this fictitious world, it made me have hope in real life that all of our trauma will matter. I have never been sexually violated, but still trauma sits at my souls door, constantly nagging at me to nurture it with unhealthy doctrines that hold me captive to things I did, before I knew better.
For me, Trauma is losing your mother to a drug overdose and only dating drug dealers as a young woman. Trauma is your father being absent and constantly believing that EVERYONE would be absent. Trauma was giving myself away to people I knew couldn’t measure up, simply because I convinced myself I wasn’t worthy of someone good. I am sure we can all profess an assemblage of trauma triggers. I know my trauma seems insignificant in comparison to what the Kiesha’s of the world endure. And maybe that is why with each new episode of this season I cried. I cried knowing that my pain, although deep for me, could never measure in weight to the trauma filled pain of the thousands of young girls, forced to kills their souls in order to live in hell on earth.
Ronnie is my hero. He spoke to the little girl in me that needed to believe and see someone care, specifically about black and brown girls. He represented the new allegiance being awakened in the black diaspora to love ourselves and each other. He represented what NOT giving up looks like. He represented the beginning of healing.
Trauma is real. You can feel it. You can see it. It shows up everyday, everywhere, in everything.
One of the major reasons self care is so important to me, is because it helps create an internal safe space of self love that will allow you to actively seek therapy, unpack the raggedy baggage of trauma and heal. Imagine healing with clear directions for the continued journey of living a full and peaceful life. That doesn’t come without trauma triggers, but it comes with tools. Now go heal.
