Trauma doesn’t end when the violence stops.
Sometimes that’s when the real damage begins.
I recently learned of someone’s death.
A woman I sort of knew.
And what I felt wasn’t grief.
It was relief.
That relief has made me pause. Sit. Reflect. Because for trauma survivors, relief after a death can come with shame. With self-questioning. With the fear that others won’t understand.
So I want to talk about why that relief exists.
After I was strangled, my life did not simply change because of the physical trauma to my neck and nervous system. It changed because the woman who harmed me continued to hurt me long after the assault.
She did it with lies.
She told people I made it up.
She said I attacked her.
She rewrote the story so thoroughly that suddenly I wasn’t the victim of violence. I was the problem.
And here’s the part that many people don’t understand unless they’ve lived it:
When someone lies after violence, they are not just protecting themselves.
They are recruiting others to participate in the harm.
Every lie told to a friend.
Every whisper passed through a family.
Every subtle suggestion that I was unstable, dramatic, or dishonest.
Those lies changed how people looked at me.
How they spoke to me.
How they treated my family.
Some people pulled away quietly.
Others stayed close but watched me differently.
As if I were something to be managed rather than supported.
I lost relationships not because of what happened, but because of what she said happened.
And that is its own form of trauma.
I remember being in physical therapy for my neck injuries. My body was still trying to relearn safety. I was exhausted. Raw. Doing the invisible work of surviving something that never should have happened.
That’s when I ran into the woman who later died.
She approached me warmly. Too warmly.
“Oh my god, how are you?”
“How’s the family?”
“How are you guys doing?”
I answered. Because trauma often strips you of boundaries before it gives them back. Because I was still in a state where being polite felt safer than being guarded.
What I didn’t know was that she would take that moment and use it.
She went on Facebook and posted on the page of the woman who strangled me. She wrote that she had just run into me. That I was at physical therapy. That she had talked to me. She left her number and told her to call.
She exposed my location.
She inserted herself into something that was not hers.
She became a messenger for someone who had already taken so much from me.
That moment crushed me.
Not because it was loud or aggressive.
But because it was a betrayal disguised as concern.
And that is something trauma survivors encounter far too often.
People who don’t scream.
People who don’t threaten.
People who smile while they do harm.
Over time, I came to understand how deeply indoctrinated some people were into the lies they had been told. When someone repeats a story long enough, confidently enough, others stop questioning it. They stop asking what’s true. They choose the version that makes their world feel less uncomfortable.
It was easier to believe I was exaggerating than to accept that someone they knew was capable of violence.
And so the harm continued.
Years later, I ran into this woman again. Same doctor’s office. Different version of me.
I was more healed. More grounded. More aware of what had actually happened, not just to my body, but to my life.
I made a conscious choice to sit next to her.
We small talked. She told me her father had recently died. She shared how much she was struggling with the grief.
And I listened.
Then I did something I had almost never done before.
I told the truth.
I calmly told her how unfairly I had been treated. By her. By her sister. By her father. I named the harm. Not emotionally. Not explosively. Just clearly.
She looked at me and said,
“But that’s in the past.”
And something in me shifted.
Because trauma survivors hear that phrase all the time.
As if time erases harm.
As if silence equals healing.
As if accountability expires.
Without planning it, without rehearsing it, I responded.
“Yes. Just like the death of your father.”
She got up and moved away.
I won’t pretend that moment was graceful.
But it was honest.
And for the first time, I did not abandon myself to make someone else comfortable.
When I later learned that she had died, what came over me was not sadness. It was a deep, quiet relief. Relief that I would never have to run into her again. Relief that I would never have to manage her gossip, her proximity, or her ability to reinsert herself into my life.
And I had to sit with the guilt of that relief.
Here is what I want other trauma survivors to hear:
You are not required to mourn people who contributed to your harm.
You are not obligated to feel sad when someone who hurt you is gone.
Relief does not make you cruel. It means your nervous system recognizes safety.
Trauma is complicated. But we often make it more complicated than it needs to be.
When you are in crisis, people are either helping you or hurting you.
There is no neutral.
Your body knows.
Comfort or discomfort.
Safe or unsafe.
If someone makes your chest tighten, your stomach drop, or your voice disappear, that information matters.
Draw the line.
Do not touch the spider web.
And never let anyone make you feel bad for choosing yourself.
I can hold compassion for a death without denying the truth of who someone was to me.
And I can honor my healing without pretending that harm didn’t happen.
If this resonates, if you’ve ever felt confused about your emotions after loss, know this:
Your truth is allowed.
Your boundaries are allowed.
Your relief is allowed.
She was awful towards me just like the woman who strangled me. Her sister was awful towards me. Her father was awful towards me. I think I am okay with her not being her anymore and I don’t feel bad saying it. That’s healing.
This family had zero business inserting themselves in my life. I guess what they say is true, what comes around goes around.
If you were a victim of violence I hope one day you step into your power and reclaim you right to feel okay with voicing how you feel because it feels really good.
Strangled In La Jolla 