The word Intersectionality and the concept of it is extremely new to me. When I learned the definition of it, I was wondering if it is actually a new concept or if the world just realized that we have been all playing these roles for the longest time. After a little bit of pondering I started to chart a map for myself. I locate myself as a South Asian, Indian American, multilingual 42-year-old brown-skinned Hindu woman from a patriarchal culture married to an equally brown Indian man, both of us immigrants, born into a middle-class blue-collared family, a mother, a sister, a daughter-in-law, and a complex trauma survivor. In addition to these, I also locate myself as privileged. I am well educated and married to a loving and supportive man who earns enough that I don’t have to work; furthermore, I locate myself as a homemaker, lawyer, trauma educator, peer supporter, and trauma recovery coach.

Picture credit iwda.org.au

After acknowledging the ways in which I locate myself, the next question I asked myself is how these factors have manifested in my life. If I had been living in India, would I be asking this question, or am I asking this question to myself because I reside in the US? In response to the last question, I would answer yes. In a world where a lot of us are judged on how we look, it is very important to me that I start to feel comfortable in my own skin. 

Growing up in a society that values male children more than a female child, I was, on the contrary, taught very early on in my childhood that I was privileged, and that my father didn’t distinguish between a male or a female. I believe this treatment is one reason I had a fawning response growing up. My father put constant pressure on me to always be the best; however, it was his own need to prove that his daughters are the best. He strived to prove that although he didn’t have sons, he had raised excellent offspring who were brilliant in every which way. Being born in a patriarchal society, a majority of Indian women have always been overshadowed by the men in their lives, and I was no exception. As a child growing up in a violent household where the man was dominant, my responses were mostly flight or freeze. As a teenager subjected to objectification and who was always taught that men need only one thing from a woman, I was always on guard but assault happened anyway. My gender is my dominant presentation to the world, which has changed from how I operated back in India. The gender factor of intersectionality manifested quite early on in my life due to the fact that I was a female child. In a culture where women are taught to be submissive no matter their education, I have always been stuck in fight-or-flight responses throughout my life. Had I not been a woman, I would still have to be responsible for the family, but the expectations would be a little less. There would have been pressure to study as a boy, but I would have not been exposed to the same injustices of a patriarchal society. But that’s another story, and since I cannot see the world within that dimension, I cannot fully address the unknown or the what ifs.

Picture credit www.cultureamp.com

As a brown-skinned Indian immigrant in the United States, I am privileged. I realize that I am in a very comfortable position because of the income our household makes. However, in recent times, I have been judged for my accent, and now I realize that I might have been hired in my first job due to the fact that I was a brown-skinned Indian. The stereotypical thinking that Indians care only about money and will work crazy hours no matter what the job probably is the root cause for this. A brown-skinned woman sitting at the front desk in an immigration firm says it all. No matter what qualifications I had, it didn’t matter for this job. I was paid a low salary, but since it was my first job, I took it anyway. I didn’t last long in that job because my mind and my body were in the fight and flight response the whole time I was working there. Being a mother and having to take care of a child and a home, as well as being a dutiful daughter-in-law, are aspects of Indian identity and womanhood that come into the forefront again and again.

The more I delve into how our identity is defined based on how we look, our skin color, our speech and our culture, the more I am fascinated by the world we live in. Treating trauma cannot be possible unless we look into an individual’s intersectionality. Though the trauma experiences of an individual are unique, the factors regarding why that trauma has manifested are collective. 

Guest Post Disclaimer: Any and all information shared in this guest blog post is intended for educational and informational purposes only. Nothing in this blog post, nor any content on CPTSDfoundation.org, is a supplement for or supersedes the relationship and direction of your medical or mental health providers. Thoughts, ideas, or opinions expressed by the writer of this guest blog post do not necessarily reflect those of CPTSD Foundation. For more information, see our Privacy Policy and Full Disclaimer.

Shravani Bojja

Shravani is a complex trauma survivor and is a Certified Trauma Recovery Coach. She is a Daily Support Call Leader for CPTSD Foundation. She is a group facilitator for PostPartum Support International and Parent Helping Parents. She is a mom of two teenage boys and loves gardening, reading and nature photography.

Intersectionality was added to the Oxford Dictionary in 2015 with its importance increasingly being recognised in the world of women’s rights.

The Oxford Dictionary defines intersectionality as “the interconnected nature of social categorisations such as race, class, and gender, regarded as creating overlapping and interdependent systems of discrimination or disadvantage.” Intersectionality is the acknowledgment that everyone has their own unique experiences of discrimination and oppression and that we must consider everything and anything that can marginalise people – gender, race, class, sexual orientation, physical ability, etc. First coined by Professor Kimberlé Crenshaw back in 1989, intersectionality was added to the Oxford Dictionary in 2015 with its importance increasingly being recognised in the world of women’s rights.

The word intersectionality and the concept of it is extremely new to me. When I learnt the definition of the term, I wondered if it is actually a new concept or if the world just realized that we have been all playing these roles for the longest time. After a little bit of pondering, I started to chart a map for myself. I locate myself as a South Asian, Indian- American, a multilingual 42-year-old brown-skinned Hindu woman from a patriarchal culture married to an equally brown Indian man, both of us immigrants, born into a middle-class, blue-collared family that includes a mother, a sister, a daughter-in-law, and a complex trauma survivor. In addition to this demographic scenario, I also locate myself as privileged. I am well-educated and married to a loving and supportive man who earns enough that I don’t have to work; furthermore, I locate myself as a homemaker, lawyer, trauma educator, peer supporter, and trauma recovery coach.

Picture credit iwda.org.au

My father put constant pressure on me to always be the best

After acknowledging how I locate myself, the next question I ask myself is how this location has manifested in my life. If I had been living in India, would I be asking this question, or am I asking this question to myself because I reside in the United States? In response to the latter question, I would answer yes. In a world where a lot of us are judged on how we look, it is very important to me that I start to feel comfortable in my own skin. 

Although I grew up in a society that values male children more than female children, in my home I was taught very early on in my childhood that I was privileged, and that my father didn’t distinguish between a male and a female. I believe this privilege led me to have a fawning response growing up. My father put constant pressure on me to always be the best; however, it was his own need to prove that his daughters were the best. He strived to prove that although he didn’t have sons, he had raised excellent offspring who were brilliant in every way. Having been born in a patriarchal society, a majority of Indian women have always been overshadowed by the men in their lives, and I was no exception. As a child growing up in a violent household where the man was dominant, my responses were mostly flight or freeze. As a teenager subjected to objectification and who was always taught that men need only one thing from a woman, I was always on guard but assault happened anyway. My gender is my dominant dimension, which has changed from how I operated back in India. The gender dimension of intersectionality manifested quite early on in my life due to the fact that I was a female child. In a culture where women are taught to be submissive no matter their education, I have also been stuck in the fight-or-flight responses throughout my life. Had I not been a woman, I would still have to be responsible for the family, but the expectations would be a little less. There would have been pressure to study as a boy, but I would not have been exposed to patriarchal injustices. But that’s another story, and since I cannot see the world in that dimension, I cannot address the unknown or the what if’s.

Picture credit www.cultureamp.com

As a brown-skinned Indian immigrant in the United States, I am privileged. I realize that I am in a very comfortable position because of the income our household makes. However, in recent times, I have been judged for my accent and now I realize that I might have been hired for my first job due to the fact that I was a brown-skinned Indian. The stereotype that Indians care only about money and will work crazy hours no matter what job probably is the root cause. A brown-skinned woman sitting at the front desk in an immigration firm says it all. No matter what qualifications I had, it didn’t matter for this job. I was paid a low salary, but since it was my first job, I took it up anyway. I didn’t last long in that job because my mind and my body were in a fight-and-flight response the whole time I was working there. Being a mother and having to take care of a child and a home, as well as being a dutiful daughter-in-law, is an Indian woman identity that enters the forefront of situations again and again.

The more I delve into how identity is defined by how we look, our skin color, our speech, and our culture, the more I am fascinated by the world we live in. Treating trauma cannot be possible unless we look into an individual’s intersectionality. Though the trauma experiences of an individual are unique, the factors regarding why that trauma has manifested can be part of a collective consciousness. 

Guest Post Disclaimer: Any and all information shared in this guest blog post is intended for educational and informational purposes only. Nothing in this blog post, nor any content on CPTSDfoundation.org, is a supplement for or supersedes the relationship and direction of your medical or mental health providers. Thoughts, ideas, or opinions expressed by the writer of this guest blog post do not necessarily reflect those of CPTSD Foundation. For more information, see our Privacy Policy and Full Disclaimer.

Shravani Bojja

Shravani is a complex trauma survivor and is a Certified Trauma Recovery Coach. She is a Daily Support Call Leader for CPTSD Foundation. She is a group facilitator for PostPartum Support International and Parent Helping Parents. She is a mom of two teenage boys and loves gardening, reading and nature photography.

The word Intersectionality and the concept of it is extremely new to me. When I learnt the definition of it, I was wondering if it is actually a new concept or if the world just realized that we have been all playing these roles for the longest time. After a little bit of pondering I started to chart a map for myself. I locate myself as a South Asian, Indian American, a multilingual 42-year-old brown-skinned Hindu woman from a patriarchal culture married to an equally brown Indian man, both of us immigrants, born in a middle-class blue-collared family, a mother, a sister, a daughter in law, and a complex trauma survivor. In addition to this, I also locate myself privileged. I am well educated and married to a man who is loving, supportive, and earns enough that I don’t have to work; furthermore, I locate myself as a homemaker, lawyer, trauma educator, peer supporter, and trauma recovery coach.

Picture credit iwda.org.au

After acknowledging how I locate myself, the next question I asked myself is how this has manifested in my life. If I had been living in India, would I be asking this question, or am I asking this question to myself because I reside in the US? To the latter question, I would answer yes. In a world where a lot of us are judged on how we look, it is very important to me that I start to feel comfortable in my own skin. 

Growing up in a society that values male children more than female children, I was taught very early on in my childhood that I was privileged, and that my father didn’t distinguish between a male and a female.  I believe this is why I had a fawning response growing up. My father put constant pressure on me to always be the best; however, it was his own need to prove that his daughters are the best. He strived to prove that although he didn’t have sons, he had raised excellent offspring who were brilliant in every which way. Being born in a patriarchal society, a majority of Indian women have always been foreshadowed by the men in their life, and I was no exception. As a child growing up in a violent household where the man was dominant, my responses were mostly flight or freeze. As a teenager subjected to objectification and who was always taught that men need only one thing from a woman, I was always on guard but assault happened anyway. My gender is my dominant dimension which has changed how I operated back in India. The gender dimension factor of intersectionality manifested quite early on in my life due to the fact that I was a female child. In a culture where women are taught to be submissive no matter their education, I have always been stuck in the fight-or-flight responses throughout my life. Had I not been a woman, I would still have to be responsible for the family but the expectations would be a little less. There would have been pressure to study as a boy but I would have not been exposed to the patriarchal society’s injustices. But that’s another story and since I cannot see the world in that dimension I cannot address the unknown or the what if’s.

Picture credit www.cultureamp.com

As a brown-skinned Indian immigrant in the United States, I am privileged. I realize that I am in a very comfortable position because of the income our household makes. However, in recent times, I have been judged for my accent and now I realize that I might have been hired in my first job due to the fact that I was a brown-skinned Indian. The stereotype thinking that Indians care only about money and will work crazy hours no matter what job probably is the root cause for this. A brown skin woman sitting at the front desk in an immigration firm says it all. No matter what qualifications I had, it didn’t matter for this job. I was paid a low salary but since it was my first job, I took it up anyway. I didn’t last long in that job because my mind and my body were in the fight and flight response the whole time I was working there. Being a mother and having to take care of a child and a home, as well as being a dutiful daughter-in-law, that Indian woman identity comes into the forefront again and again.

The more I delve into how our identity is defined by how we look, our skin color, our speech, and our culture, the more I am fascinated by the world we live in. Treating trauma cannot be possible unless we look into an individual’s intersectionality. Though the trauma experiences of an individual are unique, the factors of why that trauma has manifested are collective. 

Guest Post Disclaimer: Any and all information shared in this guest blog post is intended for educational and informational purposes only. Nothing in this blog post, nor any content on CPTSDfoundation.org, is a supplement for or supersedes the relationship and direction of your medical or mental health providers. Thoughts, ideas, or opinions expressed by the writer of this guest blog do not necessarily reflect those of CPTSD Foundation. For more information, see our Privacy Policy and Full Disclaimer.

Shravani Bojja

Shravani is a complex trauma survivor and is a Certified Trauma Recovery Coach. She is a Daily Support Call Leader for CPTSD Foundation. She is a group facilitator for PostPartum Support International and Parent Helping Parents. She is a mom of two teenage boys and loves gardening, reading and nature photography.

My life’s journey has been bumpy since the start. There’s one incident that my mother shared with her friend once, that now while writing this gives me a different perspective of my life. She shared that in her first trimester, she could have had a miscarriage because the fetus (me) slipped during a dance. A midwife helped set the fetus again into position. Was this my first trauma? Maybe. Memories are very tricky. They pop up when you least expect them. You are having a very casual conversation with someone and bam they appear in front of your eyes. I grew up in a house where any situation could turn volatile at any moment. A simple thing as less salt in a dish on a bad day could escalate into a verbal or physical altercation. I remember my earliest memory of this since I was maybe 4 years old. My memories are vivid rather than repressed. Every detail is very easy for me to describe. The pain that these memories bring me is very hard to process even now as an adult.

Repressed Memories:

A memory of a mother walking out of the house as a result of a fight and then me, as a child of 4 years old, searching for her with my father is my earliest memory of the violence in my house. The ensuing years till I was 8 years were probably the happiest of my childhood. But now that I go back, I honestly do not remember much of this period. Only small glimpses of that period pop here and there. I am not sure if I repressed them because the bad parts of my life overshadowed the good parts.

Trust Issues:

The period from my fourth grade (8 years) to pretty much till I was 20 is the most painful period for me even as an adult. Living with a parent, who I now know has CPTSD (undiagnosed) was hell. I was an introvert but perceived as an arrogant child by friends. Trusting never came easy to me. Sometimes it is still hard for me to trust people and take any advice at face value without expecting some ulterior motive. I hate chaos and can never function in it due to the chaotic childhood I have had. Lying came very easy to me. Now, I hate lying or liars. Lying was a means of self-preservation in those days. But after lying, came the guilt and shame. The violence that ensued brought more guilt and shame especially if someone else in the house like my sister or my mother got hurt. Our pet dogs were treated better than my mother, me, and my sister in our house. The guilt of not protecting my sister from witnessing the worst form of violence still haunts me.

Body image:

I have never felt beautiful. Especially as a child and as a teenager, I never had a choice of choosing what I wore or where I went. It was practically dictated to all of us in our house. Looking back, I manifested all my frustrations and anger in any relations I had. Forming friendships was hard for me. My relationship with my sister slowly developed into a friendship during this period through the competitiveness that my father brought into this relationship still hurts me to this day. The undercurrent that this rivalry my father introduced between us is a disturbing relationship that pains both of us equally. Distrust, the frustrations due to the expectations of my father, anger, guilt, and shame were the emotions that practically were my foundations. Being blamed for my dad’s fatal accident which brought him close to death’s door took me on a downward spiral which now I realize was a path of self-destruction. Unfortunately, this spiral affected my career and was an additional layer of guilt and shame. I was disappointed in myself.

Being Vulnerable:

I still don’t feel comfortable in my own skin. Living in a society where women were groped in public transport, leered, jeered, and whistled at, was horrible and traumatizing. Taught at an early age that men always want only one thing from a woman has made me look through my shoulder all the time. This probably makes me very uncomfortable with my sexual life even now. The playful gestures that my husband sometimes does are crude to me and put me off. I call him upon those gestures which are just casual to him. I still am conscious of my body all the time. I am a petite woman and any weight I put on is a matter of contention with my parents. Growing up, I have seen my dad criticizing and ridiculing my mom for her weight gain and this calling out inherently comes in the category of self-judging.

Self-Harm:

Meeting my partner was a good thing for me but the turbulence that it brought into my already chaotic life was a spiral that didn’t leave me a lot of room to even breathe. The distrust that my father had for our relationship despite him choosing my partner was hurtful and shameful. My future husband was a loving person but the downward spiral I was in made me angry, distrustful, and lash out at him quite often. I remember defending my father quite often when my partner called out my dad for his actions. I was never diagnosed during this period but going back, I think I was in depression during this period. Anxiety, panic, stress, and this cloud of sadness were my constant companions. I tried to harm myself in one such period. My sister was the one who saved me and I still feel guilty and ashamed that I put one more layer of trauma in her arsenal.

Anxiety/Panic/Depression:

In the ensuing years, unintentionally I did dissociate from these memories and lived in a fog-like state. I got married, completed my law school, had kids, and moved to the US from India. From the outside, everything was perfect. But the inherent sadness and anxiety remained with me throughout. Some of the things in my family spiraled out of control and I was trying to fix them. Panic and stress were my constant companions. My first stress attack came out of nowhere in 2013. After this attack, I became more conscious of pushing back on things I was uncomfortable with. But with this, came sadness, guilt, and insomnia. I didn’t sleep for more than 3 hours for almost a year. My physician recognized this as a cause of depression and helped me with some over-the-counter medication. I never spoke to him about my abusive history because I still associated it as normal to my culture. I knew it was wrong but honestly didn’t think too much about it. After this period, I went into a very fog-like state. I existed only in a shell that performed to the occasion.

The fog-like state was a blessing in disguise for some time honestly. Nothing hurt me anymore, I stopped crying, I stopped getting angry or frustrated and it was easy to be me without feeling any emotions. My old self with depressed feelings would pop up at times but a small shopping spree would tamp me down. A small altercation with my father over the phone was the root cause of my second major panic attack and my diagnosis followed. Had my husband not disclosed that there was a childhood abuse in my history to the neurologist, I would still be undiagnosed. I was hesitant to even then to disclose it. I was still that child defending her father. That’s all I knew then and was imitating that behavior even as an adult. Since then my layers of trauma are slowly peeling off and the process of healing has begun.

Summary:

Even before I started the process of learning about trauma, I thought I was like a volcano where I had this fire and pressure in my core that was building up, and one day I would explode. I think the panic and stress attacks are those explosions. The secrets that I had to hide for my self-preservation by lying, not functioning in chaos, the anxiety, and panic in an unknown situation, the distrust in people, guilt, shame, and this idea of perfection that I still sometimes carry with me are all the results of the abuse I went through for a lot of years. I am healing steadily but slowly. I still get hurt and sometimes take two steps back before taking that one step ahead. It’s hard but not impossible.

Guest Post Disclaimer: Any and all information shared in this guest blog post is intended for educational and informational purposes only. Nothing in this blog post, nor any content on CPTSDfoundation.org, is a supplement for or supersedes the relationship and direction of your medical or mental health providers. Thoughts, ideas, or opinions expressed by the writer of this guest blog do not necessarily reflect those of CPTSD Foundation. For more information, see our Privacy Policy and Full Disclaimer.

Shravani Bojja

Shravani is a complex trauma survivor and is a Certified Trauma Recovery Coach. She is a Daily Support Call Leader for CPTSD Foundation. She is a group facilitator for PostPartum Support International and Parent Helping Parents. She is a mom of two teenage boys and loves gardening, reading and nature photography.

All throughout my life till the time I was diagnosed with PTSD, I never realized that the emotions and feelings I associated myself with had a name. Looking and sifting through them as an adult with a magnifying glass and as a survivor gives me a broader view of these attachments, relations, or lack of relationships thereof.

I would associate myself with the following attachment styles:

• Anxious/Ambivalent
• Avoidant Fearful till the time I was diagnosed
• Avoidance Dismissal (In some instances)

Since then I have been working hard to heal myself and slowly transitioning into Secure attachment.

As a Child:

I grew up with a physically violent father and an enabler mother in an environment where I did not see any close relationships which would mimic secure attachment. I was a very anxious and frightened child who was forced to perform and overachieve at school. All my achievements created this persona of an extremely arrogant and proud girl but a good student. The only thing that I honestly cared about was pleasing my father and not being beaten by him. I came across as a girl who just cared about her grades and accolades. Friendships were hard to maintain when you could not discuss what was happening in your home, especially when going to school with bruises was a very common occurrence. I was capable enough to make a few friends but sustaining them took a lot of work due to the constant fear of rejection. I was angry all the time and every little thing that was said in jest was personal. Anger, outbursts, guilt, shame, blame, and doing things like lying to get praise and validation from my father was a constant throughout my childhood.

I never had a big group of friends and was only capable of maintaining one friend at a time. It was easier that way but when I look back now those friends came from very secure backgrounds and probably knew that I needed them to keep me grounded and it was their very innate sense of positivity that sustained the friendship.

As a Teenager:

As a teenager, I was the worst form of myself. I was anxious, critical, distrustful, emotionally unavailable, angry but at the same time in constant need of validation, somewhat manipulative, clingy and wanted to be noticed by people. I hated myself and wanted to disappear because I was tired of making and sustaining relationships. I couldn’t care less about making friends from when I was 11 years old to 16 years old. I spoke to a lot of people but honestly didn’t care to build any of those relationships. I distrusted a lot, spoke to people who made me happy at that point or flitted like a butterfly to different sets of groups if I didn’t like one set of friends. It was a norm for me. I could not take any rejection. I was angry and outbursts, especially when my father was not around were common.

The change of place during my transition to an adult definitely helped me a bit to form some good friendships and sustain them. But the distrust, the need for validation that I was good enough to be loved, the constant need to move among friends remained. I just could not stay among one group of friends. I was emotionally distant from them but thought that I was the one being wronged. I was probably projecting the push and pull emotion on all my friendships that I had seen my father doing with me all along. I felt betrayed and shamed by them since in my mind they were in the wrong. I completely stopped speaking to some of my friends after an altercation after an outburst from my side which could have been solved amicably. I could not take the blame of any type. I started hating myself at this point and was being very self-critical which probably manifested itself in every aspect of my relationship.

As an Adult:

During the above period, I met my future husband and I had to project myself as this very confident person which was not me. Sustaining my friendships as well as the budding relationship with my husband was an overload on my system and I had constant bursts of anger, guilt over it later and I have constantly tried to apologize due to that outburst. I didn’t have any self-worth at this point and the only shining point was my husband. I needed that validation from him and for that, I would do anything. I felt loved but the push and pull reaction between my father and my husband put me in a constant state of anxiety which again put me in a spot where I started questioning the need for any relationship in my life. The only person I was emotionally available to at this point was my husband. The slightest rebuff from him would end up in fights or I would shut down completely.

From my mid 20’s till the time I got my diagnosis I would say that I have shown a mixture of all three avoidant attachment styles – Anxious, Fearful, and Dismissive at the same time. I had a need to prove myself. I turned into the caretaker of my family trying to resolve everyone’s problems even though everyone involved was an adult. I just needed that validation of being the right one, a good person, and loveworthy. I took on the burden and the mantle of my family without being asked. I craved praise, wanted sympathy, and desired acceptance from people in my life. The fear of being rejected and abandoned was a strong sentiment that drove me. As a mom, I have a beautiful relationship with my boys without any expectations. I have neither felt rejected nor looked for validation as a good person when I am with them.

Summary:

To sum it up, I would say that I have always been capable of making friends and relationships because I have a knack for talking and making people comfortable. Sustaining them for a very long time had always been a problem. The fear of rejection, abandonment, and the worry that I have done something wrong in a relationship always hovers in my mind. I go into a relationship without boundaries and the slightest rebuff sets me back from feeling rejected. The constant thinking and overanalyzing of perceived slights in a relationship was draining me out and was very unhealthy.

I am happy to say that since the time of my diagnosis in 2019, I have been healing and working through a lot of issues. I have been able to form a secure attachment with many people in my life and sustaining those relationships is not as draining as it used to be.

Guest Post Disclaimer: Any and all information shared in this guest blog post is intended for educational and informational purposes only. Nothing in this blog post, nor any content on CPTSDfoundation.org, is a supplement for or supersedes the relationship and direction of your medical or mental health providers. Thoughts, ideas, or opinions expressed by the writer of this guest blog do not necessarily reflect those of CPTSD Foundation. For more information, see our Privacy Policy and Full Disclaimer.

Shravani Bojja

Shravani is a complex trauma survivor and is a Certified Trauma Recovery Coach. She is a Daily Support Call Leader for CPTSD Foundation. She is a group facilitator for PostPartum Support International and Parent Helping Parents. She is a mom of two teenage boys and loves gardening, reading and nature photography.