Transcription
You weren't raised by trauma. You were shaped by what no one ever said. The pain didn't start with you, but it got quiet with you.
Your parents didn't hug you. They didn't say, "I'm proud of you." They didn't apologize even when they knew they were wrong. And so, you learned to hold your breath instead of speak. You learned that emotions were weakness and love had rules. You survived in houses where silence was the loudest thing.
And then you had kids or partners or you finally looked in the mirror and asked yourself, "Why do I love people who don't see me?" This is what generational trauma actually looks like. Not just violence, not just yelling, but children who flinch at kindness and don't know how to receive softness without suspicion.
You weren't broken because somebody yelled. You were broken because no one spoke. That's what they gave us. And now we're left with the pieces. Trying to put together a version of love that we've never seen. Learning how to feel after decades of being told not to.
They left us with wounds and called it tradition. We're bleeding truth now. And they're uncomfortable because it's loud. These men ain't. And the legacy they inherited, we're not passing it down.