Ask the Questions - Pt.1 Trauma Aware?

There have been times in my life it has been hard to speak my truth, I'm sure you can relate. It is a vulnerable place to be. We may not know the right words to use, don't want to step on anyone's toes or out of fear for the answer itself. Maybe we don't use our voice out of a trauma, known or unknown.

I invite you to explore and express your questions. One of the first questions when starting this journey is, would I like help navigating this experience? If the answer is yes, then you must go about finding someone who is aligned with you. How does one do this you ask, well you ask questions!

To help find your community you can focus on what brought you to this medicine. There is a time where we hear the call. You know what I mean if you are on this journey, to understand ourselves and those around on a deeper level. You want a different outcome in your life when nothing else has worked. You've heard about what this beautiful fruit can do for us, our way of life, our mental health.

Before I begin working with someone I like to connect for the opportunity to have any questions asked. The type of questions help me figure out how to be best of service to you. Something to ask your navigator is, what is there experience with this medicine, are they trauma aware/informed. It may be difficult to ask if you haven't practiced it before but it is important.

As for myself, I found this medicine about 15 years ago now. I was using mushrooms recreationally then very quickly realized there is something deeper going on. At the time I was in verbal therapy. This lead to being diagnosed with 6 different *hiccups, i.e. mental disorder(I don't like the word disorders anymore), which were being treated with medications. During the 3 years, there was also methods of EMDR and ECT for a time.

One day I discussed my new journey saying how much it was helping, how I wanted to stop everything and explore this amazing fungi that was actually having a positive reaction. Of course I was told absolutely not, go figure! I decided to anyway. Through using this medicine and asking myself questions, I found out my hiccups probably stemmed from trauma. I was then able to dissect my traumas and actually process the root. There was mental, sexual, physical abuse which was all coming to surface through my work with this medicine. Needless to say it was a lot to handle on my own.

The thing I've realized with this medicine is, we are very complex. Our emotions, habits, patterns can all be formed from trauma. Our trauma is like a dandelion, you can pick the leaves and cut the stems, you can weedwhack and mow all you want; but if you don't dig deep in the soil and pull it out at the root, you'll never get rid of the dandelions. Being trauma aware and informed is key when looking for a community. Identifying what some of your hiccups and or traumas might be, then asking your navigator if they have any experience with them can really help when deciding who to walk with you on this journey.

With Love,

Ileah Taylor