Raw & Real: Week One - The Things I Shouldn't Have Had To Survive
- gremlinqueen2025
- Jul 9
- 4 min read
Updated: Jul 15
“I’m healing with fire. And they don’t get to hide behind my silence anymore.”
⚠️ Content Warning: This post contains graphic references to domestic violence, sexual assault, and child abuse. It is not softened for comfort. If you are in crisis or healing from trauma, please take care while reading. Help is available at thehotline.org or by calling 1-800-799-7233.
Nobody Should Have to Live This Shit
There are things in life we expect to be hard.
Grief. Accidents. Losing a job. Watching loved ones age and die.
And yes, those things are traumatic—I’ve lived them too.
But what I’ve survived?
That’s a different fucking category.
This is the kind of trauma that lives in your muscles.
That wakes you up in cold sweats.
That makes you jump when someone reaches too fast.
That makes your heart stutter in your chest when a man raises his voice—even if he’s not yelling at you.
That steals your ability to feel safe in a room with the door closed.
This isn’t sadness.
It’s not grief.
It’s not a rough patch.
It’s war.
And my body remembers everything.
Let Me Be Clear
They don’t get to hide behind my silence anymore.
David. Howard. Chris. Jeremiah. Tyler. James.
You were the violence.
The molestation.
The years of domestic abuse.
The manipulation.
The rape—again, and again, and again.
The bruises for no reason other than control.
The gaslighting.
The shattered bones.
The broken psyche.
The pressure to stay quiet.
The fear you installed deep in my bones.
You were the screaming that made me flinch.
The hands that taught me to hide.
The stomach aches.
The hair loss.
The eating disorders.
The panic attacks.
The dissociation.
The trauma-induced shutdown.
You were the reason I learned to disappear in plain sight.
Why I apologized for existing.
Why I questioned whether I was even real.
You were the reason I forgot who the fuck I was.
But now?
I’m remembering.
And I’m naming you.
You don’t get my silence.
You don’t get to fade into footnotes.
You don’t get to be protected by the shame that never belonged to me.
I’m healing with my voice.
I’m healing with fire.
I’m healing in a way that scorches every lie you ever told about me.
Nobody should have to survive this kind of trauma. Nobody should have to wake up every day and fight for air like they’re still drowning in the shit someone else put them through. And yet, we do. Not because we’re brave or resilient or warriors—but because we don’t have another fucking choice. Survival became the only language our bodies spoke. It became instinct. It became religion. And that is not something to be celebrated—it’s something to grieve.
I shouldn’t have to spend years peeling back layers of trauma that weren’t mine to carry. I shouldn’t have to choke down panic just to get through a grocery store. I shouldn’t have to rewire my brain to understand that love isn’t supposed to hurt. I shouldn’t have to coach myself through touch. Through conflict. Through intimacy. I shouldn’t have to wrestle with a version of myself I never got to fully become because somebody else decided they had the right to destroy her.
And yet, here I am. Doing it anyway. Crawling my way through recovery with bloody hands and a voice that won’t fucking shut up anymore. I am smashing every lie they built into me, burning every mask I wore just to make it through. And I am not healing gently. I’m breaking things. I’m screaming into the spaces they once controlled. I’m tearing down every wall I built for protection and rebuilding something wild, something sacred, something real.
Because I deserved better.
We all did.
Every single trauma survivor deserves so much more than what we’ve been handed. More than survival. More than endurance. We deserve peace. Safety. Wholeness. We deserve a life that isn’t dictated by someone else’s abuse. We deserve a chance to breathe without fear crawling up our spines. We deserve softness that doesn’t come with strings attached. We deserve to wake up and not brace for the worst.
And to the cowards who made us this way?
You don’t fucking win.
Not now. Not ever. You don’t get our silence. You don’t get our forgiveness. You don’t get our stories wrapped in bows to make yourselves feel better.
You get called out. Loudly. Publicly. Relentlessly.
We may be bruised. We may be cracked wide open.
But we’re still standing.
Still rising.
Still fucking here.
This isn’t just survival.
It’s a reckoning.
And if the truth makes you uncomfortable?
You are part of the problem.
You’re Not Alone
If you saw yourself in any part of this post—if you’re still in it, still surviving, still fighting to breathe—please know this:
You are not weak. You are not broken. And you are not alone.
You do not have to carry this in silence. You do not have to justify your pain. And you sure as hell don’t have to wait until it gets worse before you ask for help.
There is support. There is safety. There is life after survival.
🌐 National Resources (U.S.):
National Domestic Violence Hotline📞 1-800-799-SAFE (7233)💬 Text “START” to 88788🌐 www.thehotline.org
RAINN (Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network)📞 1-800-656-HOPE (4673)🌐 www.rainn.org
Crisis Text Line💬 Text “HELLO” to 741741🌐 www.crisistextline.org
Suicide & Crisis Lifeline📞 Dial 988🌐 988lifeline.org
International Resources Available Here:
If you’re reading this outside the U.S., you can find a list of international crisis and trauma resources by country.
If you don’t know what to say when you call—just say, “I don’t feel safe.”
That’s enough. That’s always enough.
Your life is worth protecting.
Your healing is worth the fight.
And your story is not over yet.
And if you need more-
I'm here and I will stand with you.
Message me - here, Insta, Threads.
My email is: gremlinqueen2025@gmail.com
I will hold you AND scream over the noise.
Because you deserve support.
You deserve help.
You deserve love.
And we are not going to be silent anymore.
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