WRITINGS
Resources, Stories & Poetry
Explore a wealth of articles on relational trauma, systemic burnout, and decolonizing well-being. Whether you're seeking practical guidance or transformative perspectives, you'll find resources to help you nurture connection, resilience, and collective healing.
AI-Ethical ‘Stance’ Statement
As a scholar and researcher, I am committed to ethics and transparency in my work. All academic-related writings are rigorously cited and will not appear on this site, while fully original pieces are shared on my Substack. On this blog, I use AI tools to support clarity, structure, and flow, helping translate my detailed, dense writing style into accessible posts for wider audiences. All ideas originate from my own research and writing, with AI serving as a supportive tool. As an Autistic researcher, this helps me to make complex topics more engaging. I also use midjourney to produce artwork for the site, along with use of open-source images.
I explore AI, post-humanism, and cyborg futures in my academic work, reflecting critically on its potential and ethical implications. This is my ‘stance’ today, the ground on which my feet are held. This could change tomorrow. Life is dynamic, and so is technological ‘innovation.’ If you wish, you are welcome to write me to share perspectives, or to ask for references and guidance.
An Ode to the AidMama(toto): How a Photo Became a Song, a Song a Ceremony, A Ceremony a Movement
This post began with a photo—an act of raw vulnerability, a moment of transformation. What followed was a ripple of connection: a poem became a song, a song became a ceremony, and now, that ceremony is becoming a movement—a collective reckoning with burnout, grief, resilience, and the unseen labour of those who mother, in every sense of the word.
The Great Trauma Myth: Were We Ever Whole to Begin With?
Trauma studies has convinced us that healing means returning to a ‘whole’ self—the self that existed before trauma. But what if that self never existed? What if the very idea of wholeness is a colonial, capitalist, and psychological construct designed to manage, contain, and govern us? What if trauma isn’t a break, but a force—a rupture that reveals the limits of the world we thought we knew?
AidMama(toto): A Love Poem
This is a poem for the AidMama(toto)—the ones who balance caregiving and service, who hold their children while holding the world together. It is for those raising communities while navigating impossible choices, displacement, surveillance, and exhaustion.
It honors those whose burdens become resilience, whose unseen labor sustains futures, and whose love has no bounds.
Whether you are an AidMama in name or in spirit—this is for you.
You are seen. You are heard. You are not alone.
Why You Can’t “Just Be Present”: Trauma, Nervous System Responses, and the Healing Power of Connection
When we are activated, we are not present. The rupture of dysregulation pulls us out of the moment, shifting us into protection rather than connection. Healing from trauma is not just about individual regulation—it is about restoring the relationships, environments, and connections that shape our nervous system’s sense of safety.
The End of the World (As We Know It): On Trauma, Collapse, and the Possibility of Otherwise
What if healing wasn’t about resilience or repair, but about releasing the world as we know it and imagining something beyond its limits? Denise Ferreira da Silva challenges us to see the end—not as catastrophe, but as an invitation to unmake and remake the very structures that have sustained violence.
Why Is Trauma Such an Overused Word These Days?
The overuse of the word trauma risks diluting its meaning, but reclaiming a relational understanding can help us address its systemic and collective dimensions.
Special Series (Part 3) - The Room We’re In: Unpacking the Systems That Shape Us
Breaking the cycle of harm begins with rethinking the self, embracing relationality, and imagining a world beyond the systems that keep us disconnected.
Special Series (Part 2) - The Room We’re In: Unpacking the Systems That Shape Us
Burnout and disconnection aren’t personal failings—they’re symptoms of a system that thrives on cycles of extraction and harm.
Special Series (Part 1) - The Room We’re In: Unpacking the Systems That Shape Us
The dominant system shapes our thoughts and lives, convincing us that burnout and disconnection are personal failures rather than symptoms of a broken system.
The Hidden History of Trauma: How Our Understanding Was Shaped by Systems of Power
From railway spine to PTSD, the biomedical model of trauma reflects a history of prioritizing individual pathology over relational and systemic realities.
What Is the Biomedical Model of Trauma?
The biomedical model of trauma frames it as an individual pathology, but relational approaches reveal its systemic roots and call for collective healing.
The Future of Healing: Building a Pluriversal Approach to Trauma
A pluriversal approach to trauma honors the diversity of healing paths, embracing relationality, cultural wisdom, and systemic transformation.
From Dualism to Relationality: Redefining the Self in Healing Work
Relationality invites us to move beyond dualism, redefining the self as part of a vast web of relationships where healing is a collective and systemic process.
Woundscapes: Mapping Trauma as a Geography of Pain and Possibility
Woundscapes frame trauma as a geography of relational ruptures and openings, revealing pathways for collective healing and transformation.
Trauma and the Land: Why Healing Must Include the Earth
Healing from trauma requires reconnecting with the land, recognizing that our well-being is inseparable from the health of the Earth.
The Violence of Perfection: How Colonial Ontologies Shape “Normal”
The pursuit of perfection, rooted in colonial ontologies, disconnects us from relationality, but embracing imperfection can open the door to collective healing and connection.
Beyond the Individual: Why Trauma Is a Collective and Systemic Issue
Trauma isn’t just an individual experience; it’s a rupture in relationality, calling for collective healing and systemic change.
The Dominant Ontology of Trauma: Why It Keeps Us Stuck
The dominant ontology of trauma isolates individuals, but relational approaches invite us to restore connections and address the systems that perpetuate harm.
Báyò Akómoláfé: A Brilliant Bard Breaking Boundaries and Bouncing off Backslashes
Bayo Akomolafe invites us to step away from doors that confine us within the known and into the cracks, where new realities and transformative possibilities emerge.
What is moral distress?
Moral distress arises when systemic barriers conflict with ethical values, reflecting a need for relational care and collective action to transform systems of harm.