Trauma travels through generations until someone is strong enough to stand through all that pain and heal it.

We carry our mothers and their pains on our backs, just as they carried their mothers and their unhealed pain, just like our daughters, if we don’t stop doing our job, they carry us on our backs and our pains.

The pain and trauma pass on like a transgenerational leap: a wounded and suffering mother, traumatized, unconnected and unable to connect to the child. A child without a mother present, connected, will be a child who absorbs all the pain and carries it on.

A lot of us are “strong” women. A strong woman had to become like this because she went through a lot of pain. Often, strong means full of defensive mechanisms, which are the ones that disconnect us from ourselves and those around us.

Cassandra Jones:

“Trans-generational Trauma: A Self Portrait With My Mama

This project has been on my heart and mind for a very long time.

I chose to do this particular image as a self with my mother because she is the strongest person I know. She has rebuilt her life more times than I can measure. She has endured more than any one human should have to endure. I chose to take this portrait with her because I am aware that I carry her experience with me.

I am aware that I carry the experiences of my ancestors in my DNA. I can feel it on a cellular level. I can feel it in my soul. But, I am equally aware that I derive a great deal of my strength, empathy, and resilience from her and the women who have come before me as well.

This is not just my story, but the story of many. It is a story I feel people can probably relate to in so many different facets of life, the world over. A story that transcends geographical location, ethnicity, age, space, and time.

Everyone I have spoken to about this image has interpreted it differently. I cannot help but wonder what you see when you look at it”.

Article and Credit -Sacred Dreams-Colli Christante is with Jane James