When Walking Away Becomes Survival
Trigger warning: trauma, abuse, suicidal thoughts. Please take care while reading.
There’s a moment that no one really prepares you for - the moment when something you love, something you’ve fought so hard to be part of, becomes unbearable for your body to carry.
On paper, everything seemed okay. I’d had kind responses, reassurances, and thoughtful explanations. But behind closed doors, my body was in chaos. I wasn’t sleeping. My heart hammered through my chest like I was constantly running from a threat. Tears came daily, uninvited. Seizures shook me. I lived in a fog of collapse.
It took me far too long to recognise it: I was trapped in a prolonged emotional flashback.
That’s what living with C-PTSD does to you. It doesn’t politely knock on the door and ask to come back in. It storms in, uninvited, dragging your nervous system back into the fire, reminding you of every time the world broke you and told you that you were too much, not enough, or just plain wrong.
The Weight of My History
I grew up autistic, ADHD, PDA, but undiagnosed. A childhood littered with abuse of every kind. I never really had a childhood at all. By nine, I had an eating disorder. By my teens, I was suicidal.
At sixteen, after my GCSEs, it all collapsed. I spent five years in and out of psychiatric hospitals - including PICU, under constant observation. I was labelled “complex,” “difficult,” a “revolving door patient.” Professionals told me I would never change.
And inside those wards? I was abused all over again.
By the time I left, my nervous system was fractured beyond recognition. I live every day with a body wired for threat, a mind that doesn’t easily let go of danger. I carry the scars of being told, over and over, that I was broken.
So when situations today echo even faintly of exclusion, intimidation, or dismissal - even when unintentional - my body reacts as if it’s life or death. Because once upon a time, it was.
What People Say vs. What’s True
This is the part that cuts deepest: when people see my pain and call me negative. Pessimistic. Too sensitive. Not trying hard enough. They tell me to think positive, to just let it go, to stop being dramatic.
Walk a day in my shoes - in this body, with this history - and then tell me how to live my life.
The truth is, I am not negative. I am alive because I’m the opposite. I am relentlessly hopeful. If people really knew everything I’ve been through, they’d wonder how I am still here at all - never mind alive, fighting, building, writing, performing. If I didn’t believe in the possibility of a better world, I would not still be dedicating my life to creating one.
Survival has never been about pessimism. It’s been about optimism so fierce that it keeps me breathing, even when I don’t want to.
The Breaking Point
So why step away now?
Because continuing was killing me. Because I reached a point where my body and mind couldn’t distinguish between the present and the past. Because survival demanded it.
There was part of me that wanted to stay. I wanted to “push through.” But the truth is, when survival is on the line, pushing through can cost you your life. And I came too close to that again.
Walking away wasn’t weakness. It was survival.
Choosing Survival, Choosing Hope
I share this not to shock you, not for pity, but because so many of us live in bodies like mine. Fragile, fierce, complicated, broken-open by trauma but still determined to keep going. Too many of us get dismissed as dramatic, attention-seeking, ungrateful, negative. And that dismissal kills.
C-PTSD is real. It infiltrates every cell of your body. It shapes every breath you take. It makes even love and belonging feel dangerous sometimes. And yet, here I am - still choosing hope. Still choosing to believe that survival can become power.
Stepping away hurt. Music and connection mean everything to me. But sometimes survival has to come first.
A Note If You’re Struggling
If you recognise yourself in my story, please hear me:
You are not broken.
You are not a burden.
You are allowed to step away.
If you’re in the UK and struggling, you can call Samaritans on 116 123. If you’re elsewhere, please check local crisis lines or call emergency services if you’re in immediate danger. You don’t have to do this alone.
Survival isn’t weakness. It’s the foundation of something stronger.
