Jo Kent Katz discusses ancestral trauma

Jo Kent Katz on the Continuing Impact of Ancestral Trauma

It takes a lot for me to trust that someone knows about, or cares about, the survival of my people. And I need to hear it, and I need to hear it several times, in order to quell the fear that I have inside of me that says that they don’t care, they don’t have our backs, and that we could all just be annihilated and that would be better according to whoever they are.

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Beshert | Was My Depression Meant To Be?

If you ask my therapist, she’ll say I’ve been struggling with hypomanic depression since my freshman year of college. But if you ask me, I think I’ve struggled with some form of mental illness since at least seventh grade. That’s when my bouts of melancholy, followed by periods of merriment began. Until college, the emotions were manageable, not raising alarms as anything more than typical teenage mood swings. But by the middle of my freshman year, the fluctuations were more palpable. During the days of depression, I’d skip class, watching endless hours of TV and eating whatever takeout was easiest to get my hands on. Happiness eluded me, seemingly unattainable. Coming out of those moods felt better, but was by no means healthy. I’d feel frenzied, talkative and overexcited. I would stay up till three and...

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