Generational Trauma
“You can love your roots and still choose to grow in a different direction”
Generational trauma is a pattern that repeats through a family line, often before anyone realizes it's happening. The hope is that each generation can recognize the cycle and begin to unlearn it. But the roots aren't always personal — often they're systemic, shaped by community, society, and the conditions families are living within.
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This isn't really about "dealing with" generational trauma so much as building awareness of it — it's lived experience, not just a concept.
Part of the work is holding duality: honoring the pain caused by the people before you, while also honoring your own experience, even when they're the source of that harm. Families often respond differently to this — some hold on to secrets, some stay in denial, others choose to change course entirely.
Everyone has their own reasons for the pattern they choose, and it's rarely just one layer deep.
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Unhealed trauma doesn't only show up physically — a lot of it is physiological, and PTSD symptoms are a good place to look to see how trauma can manifest in the body. It can also contribute to real illnesses and autoimmune conditions over time.
This connects to the ACEs framework (Adverse Childhood Experiences), which shows how social determinants of health and socioeconomic status can both contribute to these early experiences and shape health outcomes well into adulthood.
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There's no single rule here, since everyone has their own experience of what feels harmful or uncomfortable. In general, avoid crude remarks, microaggressions, and racist, sexist, or otherwise discriminatory language.
Word choice also matters in specific ways — for example, "died by suicide" instead of "committed suicide." A lot of it depends on the person and the situation, so listening matters more than following a fixed script.
Our Process Together
My approach is eclectic, not one-size-fits-all. For some, that means connecting with nature or unlearning inherited patterns; for others, it's narrative therapy — rewriting your own story — or movement work to release what the body's been holding. There isn't one way to heal trauma.
Meet You Where You Are
We work on calming your nervous system through grounding, breath, and movement when stress peaks, alongside reparenting — offering yourself the compassion, safety, and validation you may not have received growing up.
Regulate & Reconnect
Through art, storytelling, or healing circles, we explore where your patterns began — recognizing your pain as rooted in history, not personal failure — and begin challenging inherited beliefs, like perfectionism or emotional suppression, that no longer serve you.
Understand & Rewrite the Story
