“Trauma” is a big word—it can come from a single event or many events in our lives. I like Resmaa Menakem’s definition:

A thing or things that happened either too much, too soon, too fast, or for too long without something being attended to by something reparative or healing.

Resmaa Menakem

By this definition, trauma could mean: losing a caregiver at a young age; growing up in poverty; experiencing an assault as an adult; or going through intense medical procedures.

However, trauma can look like so much more—we also all live under systems of oppression that weigh on us every day. Some groups experience more low level trauma due to oppression, sometimes called insidious trauma.

I work with folx to contextualize trauma they experienced and find agency in their world. I believe we’re bigger than oppression.