As my bio states, find every way you bloomed through adversity. Find your true self.

Who you were before the traumas. Before the pain.

How your heart always existed. How you've always been. The traits you always embodied even while traumatized. What you naturally always gravitated towards.

Because as you do this, you shed away the lies that trauma and people put onto you. You find who you truly are. When you know yourself this deeply, no one can put false perceptions and lies onto your reality. The only one that can change you, is you; and it becomes easier to find yourself if you ever get lost.

I personally found out that I was always selfless. A protector of those in trouble. A carer for the sick and injured. A creative who scribbled onto the sides of his schoolwork because I had no art supplies at home. A soft heart for animals in need. A soul that valued honesty and integrity. A strong loving heart and soul that only went cold because of repeated trauma events. And still throughout it all, those little truths seeped out over the years.

A heart's truth will always shine brighter than any darkness veiled over it. Because you aren't your own lies, other people's expectations, or your trauma responses.

Everything shaped you into lovely blooming ways but you have to do the work to find those truths. Find out who you are when no one else is looking. When no one else is telling you what they want you to be. Use your dark times as fuel to further shape who you wish to become.