The internet’s obsession with making meaning from trauma and violence is reflective of our culture’s drive to make meaning out of trauma, before ever even processing or feeling our way through the traumatic experiences. I had just finished being cross-examined by the defense a few moments earlier after being sworn in overnight— the courthouse had to close in the middle of my testimony the day before. My mother— my own mother— turned to me and said in a cheerful tone, “well, maybe now you’ll become an attorney too!”
As if I needed more expectations and more pressure and more tasks to accomplish and LAW SCHOOL while trying to recover from trauma and violence!
As if I would want anything to do with the US criminal justice system after this!
As if I would want to spend the rest of my life reliving the retraumatization I experienced by the United States’ criminal “justice” system and trying to convince other already-traumatized victims to go through the same thing!
And what an oxymoron it is! Putting the words United States, system, and justice in the same sentence. Ha. As if!
But my mother’s desperate need to make meaning out of my trauma was nothing new to me. Most people tried to do it. They had been doing it my whole life. It was only ever for their own comfort though, never for me or mine. It actually made me uncomfortable to see these people trying so hard to make sense out of senseless acts of violence. If I mentioned I moved back in with my parents because some guy tried to kill me, I was met with, “well, why would he do that?”
As if there were an acceptable answer to that question! Did they want me to say I provoked him? Would that have been an acceptable reason to try to kill me? What would make an acceptable reason to try to kill me that would make that information more palatable to you? Would it have been acceptable if I insulted him? Would it have been acceptable if I fucked him? Would it have been acceptable if I was drunk or high? Would it have been acceptable if I was a sex worker? Would it have been acceptable if I didn’t let him fuck me? Why does anyone try to kill anyone? What answer were you expecting? And how could I know the answer to that? I’ve never tried to kill anyone— so I wouldn’t know what motivates anyone to try! Is it uncomfortable to not know? To be left in the dark? Welcome to the club.
I understand it’s human nature to try to make meaning out of the meaningless. Entire religions are built on the human desire to make sense of the senseless— but that’s a topic for another time. And yet, because I experienced it, I know that it was senseless. I mean, I was literally there for the whole thing. There is no deeper meaning here. This didn’t happen for any greater good. This is exactly what it looks like: a traumatized man made poor choices in a world that makes it incredibly and dangerously easy for traumatized men to make poor choices. I and the trauma and fallout I experienced as a result were just collateral damage from his decisions.
A butterfly flaps its wings in the Amazon Rainforest; a tornado touches down in Texas.
A society enables child abuse, toxic masculinity, and gun ownership; an emotionally dysregulated man uses his gun and attempts murder.
If A, then B. That’s all there is to it.
The human desire to make meaning from trauma is understandable. Experiencing something hard, painful, or unwanted is easier when you know it’s for a greater good. I mean, no one would sign up for a pap smear if it wasn’t a screening measure for cancerous or precancerous cells! But pap smears serve a greater good, so people willingly endure the discomfort, and sometimes even pain, of one. Not to compare trauma and attempted homicide with pap smears, but I guess that’s exactly what I am doing!
If there is no greater reason or motivator behind the trauma or violence one endures, it can make for a pretty bleak outlook for the survivor. Even more so when that survivor has never known a life absent of trauma and violence. It is traumatizing to sit with the senseless reality of your trauma while being surrounded by people who are obsessed with trying to make meaning out of the meaningless. At times, I felt like I was living a level of reality that many people could not, or perhaps would not, access. It was scary to feel alone up there, even though I wasn’t really alone up there anymore. As luck would have it, there were a couple people willing to travel up to that side of reality to meet me where I was at.
But that side of reality isn’t the most aesthetically pleasing— the side where things don’t have to make sense. Not everything can be packaged up neatly in a box and clearly labelled for easier understanding; there’s a whole lot of shapeless, meaningless piles of shit up there. And the problem with denying meaningless, senseless shit is that it denies the survivor’s reality as a result. Instead of being met where I was, I had to meet people in my life where they were. I had to put on a show for them; pretend the trial went well, pretend incarcerating an individual won’t put them at higher risk for committing harm again thus putting me at higher risk too, pretend like I wasn’t worried about him seeking revenge or wanting to finish what he started, pretend that it all worked out like everyone wanted (needed) it to. Because if it all worked out, it wasn’t for nothing. It wasn’t meaningless if everything worked out. But nothing worked out, not even to this day, five years later.
It was all pretend. It was all exhausting. I was pretending because I, too, wanted so badly for this violence to have happened for some larger reason that would have made it worth it. But at a certain point, I couldn’t pretend any longer. I wanted to heal, but I couldn’t do it in an environment that thrived on emotional repression and disconnection. So, I had to leave that reality— the one where things are packaged up, categorized neatly, and filed away in efforts to never be seen, heard, touched ,or felt again.
Leaving that reality largely meant deleting my social media accounts. I did away with TikTok, then SnapChat, then Instagram, then FaceBook. At some point I deleted my Twitter, back when it was still Twitter. I also blocked people. I blocked the ones who weren’t able to see violence for what it is— which is senseless. I blocked the ones who constantly leeched off me for entertainment, wanting to experience my trauma second-hand like a true crime documentary fanatic disconnected from any real sense of empathy, and the ones who constantly denied my life by pretending the violence I endured never happened since it didn’t fit into their narrative of the world. It was only once I felt firmly rooted in my reality and my truth that the real healing finally began.
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