The Woman I am Becoming
From Survival to Reclamation: A Journey of Healing and Self-Discovery Beyond Trauma
The Woman I Am Becoming
There is a woman I am becoming.
For years, I thought becoming her meant becoming stronger.
I didn't realize I had already been strong.
I had survived things I never imagined I would have to survive.
I am a survivor of Military Sexual Trauma. I am a survivor of domestic violence. And I am a survivor of a relationship that lasted more than two decades with someone whose narcissistic behavior slowly taught me to question my own reality, my own voice, and, at times, my own worth.
For a long time, survival was enough.
I learned how to keep going when I was hurting. I learned how to smile when there were things happening beneath the surface that no one could see. I learned how to function, show up, take care of responsibilities, and keep moving forward even when a part of me was exhausted from simply trying to make sense of what I had lived through.
But eventually, surviving was no longer enough.
I wanted to live.
More than that, I wanted to know who I was beyond what had happened to me.
That became one of the most important journeys of my life.
Because trauma has a way of making you believe that your story is the worst thing about you. It can make you believe that your scars are your identity and that your past gets to determine the size of your future.
I refuse to believe that anymore.
My story is part of me.
But it is not all of me.
I am not what was done to me.
I am the woman who kept going.
I am the woman who found her voice again.
I am the woman who learned that silence may have helped me survive certain seasons, but my voice would help me reclaim my life.
And reclaiming my voice has not always been easy.
When you spend years being told—directly or indirectly—that your feelings are too much, your memories are wrong, your boundaries are unreasonable, or your needs don't matter, you can begin to distrust the very instincts that were trying to protect you.
Healing meant learning to listen to myself again.
It meant asking difficult questions.
What do I want?
What do I need?
What feels safe?
What brings me peace?
What am I willing to accept?
And perhaps the most powerful question of all:
Who am I when I am no longer living in survival mode?
I am still discovering the answer.
But I know this much: she is not the woman I was taught to be.
The woman I am becoming does not apologize for having boundaries.
She does not confuse love with sacrifice.
She does not mistake control for protection or manipulation for affection.
She understands that forgiveness does not require access.
She knows that saying no does not make her cruel.
And she no longer believes that being a good woman means enduring what is destroying her.
There is a freedom that comes with finally understanding that you are allowed to choose yourself.
Not selfishly.
Not spitefully.
But intentionally.
For so many years, I survived by adapting to what was around me. Now, I am learning to build a life that reflects what is within me.
That is a completely different kind of strength.
I am becoming protective of my peace.
Protective of my energy.
Protective of the little girl, the young woman, and every version of myself who deserved better than what she experienced.
I have compassion for all of them.
I don't shame the woman who stayed.
I don't judge the woman who didn't know how to leave.
I don't criticize the woman who made decisions from a place of fear, hope, love, or survival.
She did what she knew to do with what she had at the time.
And she got me here.
I honor her.
But I am no longer living her life.
The woman I am becoming understands that healing isn't linear. Some days, I feel powerful. Other days, an old memory can remind me that there are still places inside me that need tenderness.
I have learned not to mistake those moments for weakness.
Healing is not forgetting.
It is not pretending it didn't happen.
It is not becoming unaffected by the past.
Healing is being able to remember where I came from without allowing it to dictate where I am going.
And I am going somewhere.
I am building a life where peace doesn't feel unfamiliar.
A life where love doesn't require me to abandon myself.
A life where my voice is welcome.
A life where I can walk into a room without wondering whether I am enough.
A life where I don't have to earn the right to exist exactly as I am.
I am becoming a woman who knows her value even when nobody applauds.
A woman who recognizes red flags because she has lived through the consequences of ignoring them.
A woman who understands that boundaries are not walls—they are doors with locks, and I get to decide who has a key.
I am becoming a woman who no longer needs to prove her strength by tolerating pain.
That may be one of the greatest lessons my life has given me.
Strength isn't always staying.
Sometimes strength is leaving.
Sometimes strength is starting over.
Sometimes strength is admitting that something you spent years trying to save is something you need to release.
Sometimes strength is choosing yourself after years of choosing everyone else.
And sometimes strength is simply waking up one morning and realizing:
I deserve more.
Not because I am perfect.
Not because I have never made mistakes.
Not because my life has been easy.
But because I am human.
Because I am worthy.
Because I am still here.
There is something incredibly powerful about being able to look at your life and say, “You didn't get the final word.”
The trauma didn't get the final word.
The abuse didn't get the final word.
The person who tried to diminish me didn't get the final word.
My past doesn't get the final word.
I do.
And the words I am choosing now are different.
I choose peace.
I choose truth.
I choose boundaries.
I choose purpose.
I choose joy.
I choose myself.
Not the version of me who had to survive at all costs.
But the woman who is finally learning that she deserves to thrive.
I don't know exactly what the next chapter will look like.
But I know it will belong to me.
I know I will enter it with wisdom I had to earn, scars I no longer need to hide, and a voice that took years to reclaim.
I know there will still be hard days.
But there will also be laughter.
There will be new dreams.
There will be moments when I look around at the life I am creating and realize just how far I have come.
And perhaps that is the woman I am becoming:
Not a woman untouched by pain, but a woman transformed by the decision not to let pain be the end of her story.
A woman who survived.
A woman who healed.
A woman who reclaimed herself.
A woman who is still becoming.
And this time, I get to decide who she is.
I AM ME!!
— Robin D. Stokes
