Defiance, anger and hatred. These are the emotions I felt as a little girl. I would run into the woods to get away from people who constantly corrected me, lectured me and shouted at me. I didn't know how to get out of it... I felt a huge frustration and emotional overload. My dad was cruel. He physically attacked my mom. When I witnessed this, I defended her. Or I was used as a defensive shield. Either way, violence was committed against me too. When I was about 7 years old, I killed a cat. The decision was clear - to hurt someone, to get out my anger and frustration. Because why should only me be hurt? When I stood up to my dad because I couldn't stand the constant humiliation and breaking, I got even more. There was no one to provide me with safety. The strategy that emerged from this long-term situation came very quickly.  Since it didn't work to vent my anger on someone else or confront the aggressor, I chose freezing - apathy towards the aggressor and an excessively active life - escape from my own emotions, which were suppressed and I couldn't deal with.

I was born.... After birth, I was immediately taken from my mother...no body contact, no love, no warmth, no acceptance, no oxytocin. Cold and strangers.

When I was 5 years old, I was with my parents at my uncle's wedding. I fell in love with the guitarist who played and sang at the wedding. I sang, danced and played drums with him on stage. I feel happy and safe in the memories. It's interesting how this memory covered a very traumatic situation that followed and that I had repressed, but my body stored the emotions I was experiencing. As a teenager and adult, men playing guitar always seemed amazing to me and made me feel safe, although in real life it was different. It was just my nervous system filtering out that a man playing guitar meant safety. The situation that followed affected my life on many levels. My parents were drunk and my mother decided to take me home from the wedding. My father refused and refused to let me go with my mother. A tug-of-war over my little body began. Each one held one of my arms and pulled me to the other side. This terrible experience was interrupted by me detaching myself from my body. Total blackness and waking up in my grandparents' bed.