Braving The Wilderness // Healing Through Collective Pain
On a sunny afternoon in the summer of 2015, my life changed drastically.
As I was preparing my usual sandwich for lunch, someone knocked at the door of my coworking space (that day, only my friend Amelie and myself were there). As I opened the door, I didn’t have the time to say hello before I got punched right in the face. I fell to the floor and tried to protect myself as I was then hit on the elbow with a baseball bat. The next second, five guys rushed into our space and stole everything that was Apple-branded, leaving us completely horrified and helpless. As I tried to scream for help, I got punched again with a bat and they threatened to kill me if I screamed again. They then vanished as fast as they had arrived, leaving both of us in a state of shock. End result: my left elbow was broken and I was to have surgery.
I know this is shocking. Even writing these lines a few years later feels weird to me. The reason I’m telling you this story is because it didn’t end there. Truth is, I wasn’t traumatized as much as I could have been, and many people asked me what my secret was for recovering so fast. The answer is community. I didn’t feel alone during that whole mess. We were flooded with phone calls, text messages and emails of love and support. Family and friends visited us. And to finish, our direct community of friends helped us financially to buy replacements for the stolen equipment (a Macbook pro and a big Mac screen). No need for insurance, human solidarity was the cure. Also thankfully, my illustration business wasn’t too impacted and the surgery and physio on my arm went fine. Today, this all feels like a distant memory.
I think I would have been much more traumatized if I hadn’t felt as supported as I was. Friends shed tears so I didn’t have to suffer alone. Some were angry and therefore I felt heard. People collectively shared our pain and mobilized themselves in very concrete ways to help us morally, physically and financially. This changed everything, and it surely helped me recover faster than expected. As Brené Brown would say: “ We don’t always have to walk alone.”
