Episode #17: Overcoming Trauma #17: Progress

Jan,23 2026

<-#16: Overcoming Trauma #16 Bedtime#18: Overcoming Trauma #18: Going Along ->

I woke up a little before my alarm and made it to the kitchen.

Normally, I stay in my pajamas until it's time to leave, an old remnant of being afraid of showing up in school with breakfast spills on my clothes.

I didn't have enough choices, and my mother didn't do laundry fast enough to allow me to change in the morning regularly.

This is why I can't be mad at Kyle for being clumsy with food; I was clumsy with food until I turned perhaps 12 or 13.

Perhaps it's a lack of maturity. I certainly blamed my mother for lacking in teaching me proper techniques, but I did try to show my son, and it doesn't work.

Could we have a sort of learning disorder? For me, it got resolved; let's wait before stamping Kyle with something that will follow him all of his life.

Eating breakfast nude alone felt weird until I remembered that this was now technically my choice.

I know why I did it. It doesn't mean I fully accept it, but I know.

When I am helping to save a patient, sometimes we realize that a compromise needs to be made. Perhaps we can save the patient, but not one of their legs.

What is the best? Give them a 1% chance of surviving whole or a 98% chance of surviving with an amputation?

Well, this is where I felt yesterday.

My daughter was firmly on the path to naturism. She was always shy, always too introverted and deliberate for her own good. Always afraid to open up to a new friend in case she made a mistake.

I thought Cassie was the first true friend she made and was feeling despair for her lifestyle. Seeing my daughter with the other naturist kids, however, revealed something else.

Could it be that I subconsciously transferred my own traumas to her? I never liked the clothes my mother bought me when I was growing up. Cool clothes were for bad kids in her mind.

So perhaps, when shopping with her, I expressed some worry about her fitting in, and it rubbed off on her?

How would I even begin to unbreak this if it were even true? It's not like an 11-year-old with transferred trauma from when she was 7 or 8 would know what is happening.

And then, there is my husband and my son. And my solidifying friendship with Nadia and my husband's friendship with Patrick.

Yet, none of that was a reason to be a naturist. This was all just social pressure, so why did I do it?

I justified myself by trying to claim agency. By trying to reclaim a level of power.

But eating breakfast in the nude, I wonder, am I refusing to accept that perhaps, maybe, I liked those 24 hours?

A full revolution of our planet without me wondering if I was dressed properly, if my skirt isn't too low or too high. Or if I am sweating and my bra is now peeking through my blouse.

And that's just personal, just me. Perhaps I liked how everyone was casual with everyone else.

I grew up around protocol, around calling my mother "ma'am" and my father "sir" and now, Dr. Phillips, the hotshot cardiologist, was "Greg" to me.

Even Martina, who is "just a cleaner". My mother wouldn't approve of socializing with a person of a lower class, but to Martina, we are just equals, and I like that.

Does that take being nude? Of course not, but in which sub-society are people so social with one another without another layer like the AA or trauma victim groups?

I went to those, and I stopped going. Quite a lot of these people, like me, go to get help, but many go to revel in their trauma. To use them to justify their own inertia. Not a lot, but when I tried to get close to them, they would pull me down with them.

I didn't feel like that at any point of the weekend, and yet, I felt free. I felt rushed, pushed, but free.

Of course I know that it's paradoxical, but we are complex people.

I put my plate in the sink, trying not to wake everyone, and got dressed.

It's weird, as these clothes I picked yesterday will now only serve for my commute.

Normally, I would wear them all evening, but I will undress as I get home. Should I wear the same set all week and save on clothes washing?

No, I wouldn't do that. Instead, I will make a special section in my closet and only wash those clothes every few weeks.

It won't save much. My husband is dressed at work and my kids are at school. The only reason I can even consider reusing clothes is that I change into scrubs as soon as I get in.

I get into my car without anyone waking up, like always.

I am surprised, however, that after parking in the employee parking lot, I spot Martina with a reusable insulated coffee cup, sipping as she slowly makes it to the hospital.

"Martina?", I say, getting closer.

Her whole face lights up. "Elena! Happy to see you"

"You start early"

"5:58 sharp, but I try to be in early and get the pulse of what's happening from the night crew"

"Very commendable. I start at 5:47"

She laughs. "That tracks. What's up with these schedules?"

I lift my shoulders as we get into the hospital building.

It's only 5:32, so I have plenty of time to change and discover that again, I am in the trauma room.

However, I don't start at 5:47, since when I make it, there is already a pair of car crash victims that the night shift team is struggling with, so I lend a hand even if I am not getting paid for those first few minutes.

I don't like people being hurt, but after this emotional weekend, it's precisely what I needed!

We saved both of them without any permanent handicap. Perhaps a lot of physical therapy and certainly plenty of painkillers with a risk of addiction, but no amputations or bone fusing.

That's a win.

And a ton of blood on the floor, which Martina is cleaning up, smiling.

It's almost weird seeing her in scrubs and not nude, but it's easier for me to make that transition in my mind than the other way around.

Dr. Phillips does his first consultation for a heart attack at 8:42. The patient came by ambulance, so he made it before the patient did, allowing him to direct us, using my actual name instead of a nickname. No one batted an eye; we were all focused on saving the grandfather's life.

We did, but sadly, not without side effects. His partial paralysis was set in stone while the ambulance was on the way to pick him up, and his issues were bound to require a pacemaker.

Dr. Phillips cursed when his wife had to leave for the restroom after her husband was stabilized but before he woke up.

"This is bullshit. This guy clearly had early signs, and they waited until the last minute. If you have a grandfather, make sure they consult"

The wife came back soon after, but her husband had been transferred to the ER now that he was stabilized. She was disoriented, but I guided her to her husband.

I know he woke up, but I didn't get to see him, as new cases came into the trauma room.

A few car accidents, which are typical for rush hour, a few heart attacks with Dr. Philips helping us, and one shooting.

We almost got a domestic abuse case, a feminicide. The killer was pronounced dead on the scene: suicide. By the time the victim came in, there was nothing we could do but call it.

It's sad, because we didn't even get to do anything.

When I stopped for lunch, Martina joined me. There is no stigma about whom we eat with for lunch breaks, which are technically staggered and, in reality, random, as you don't break for lunch mid-patient.

"This morning was a doozy", she says.

"Yeah. It's refreshing"

"Refreshing?"

"We've saved a few patients against all odds. It makes us feel useful"

She smiles. "I like that"

"Hey, you did an impressive job too."

"I try"

I nod. She has a lunch, while I ate from the cafeteria choices. And I'll be honest, it looks a lot more appealing.

"I should pack a lunch", I say.

She did have a few churros for dessert and gave me one.

"If you'd like, this week, you can come to my apartment, and I'll show you how to make them."

It's the second time she's offered it.

"I might like that." I say. Which makes her smile.

We trade phone numbers. Is this her way to make friends? Are we becoming friends?

If her love language is teaching how to cook and offering food, we'll get along, she and I. Mine is pretty much helping people feel better.

The afternoon went well, and soon enough, I found myself in my home, alone.

I hesitated before undressing but remembered that this was my decision. Which I made from despair but was starting to see as a necessity.

Not because naturism was inherently our destination. But I was starting to see why it might matter to each of us.

The ability to socialize without judgment, which is precious to an 11-year-old; the ability to overcome trauma over a specific skinny-dipping event that paralyzed my husband in a state of fear; or the capacity to look at my own traumas in the face and tell them, "Go on, what hold do you still have on me now?"

The only one of us I was unsure of was Kyle, but he was still young. I wouldn't say he didn't have a personality yet; he certainly did, but it's the next few years that will fix who the adult Kyle will be.

And if anything, the naturist Kyle is infinitely more patient and calm than textile Kyle. Or maybe Kyle is calmer around nudity. Perhaps because the adults are calmer. I think that whether he is wearing clothes or not matters less to him than to any of us. It's what others are wearing that seems to affect him.

Or I have it all wrong, and it's the calm that we have from our nudity that affects him.

If I have any reservations about this new lifestyle, it is about how it would affect him. Yet the reality is that he was following his sister, whom he adores a lot more than he would follow me.

My kids weren't surprised to find me nude in the house, but for perhaps the first time in years, Sarah actually hugged me before going to undress. Kyle, who takes his compass on how to grow up from her, also gave me a hug.

If I had known that to get hugged by my children when they get home from school was to become a naturist, all of my doubts over the weekend would have vanished.

I am also shocked by how fast Kyle joins his sister for homework in the kitchen, but his rest period was shrinking, even before Cassie came into the picture.

"Can Cassie come over after supper?" asked Sarah.

"Sure"

But then, she hesitated.

"Could I sleep over at Candace's sometimes?"

"With Cassie?" I ask.

"Well, no"

"Ah. Trouble with Cassie?"

"No, it's just... They are different friends"

I smile. "I get that"

Kyle speaks up. "If she sleeps over at Candace's, can I do too? I am friends with Jimmy, and he won't come to our house"

"What do you say, Sarah"

She could want some space from her brother.

"It's ok. They each have their own room. We slept in the living room because there were too many of us, but next time, it will be in their beds"

"Sure", I say. I certainly won't put myself in the way of their friendships. But perhaps we can rent a cabin, John and I, so we are close when that happens?

"Kelly is super nice. Really funny", says Sarah, later.

"Whom?"

"Candace's mom"

So that's her name. "And her father's name is?"

Sarah didn't know, but Kyle did. "Victor", he says.

So that's their names. I sigh. Of course my kids knew; they slept over there!

But the kids were soon done with homework, and I began working on the supper. I almost put on an apron, but I didn't really need one.

It's like my own skin was enough to cook.

When I finished golf, it had been 24 hours since I had undressed, but now, it's been 24 hours since I decided we would become naturists.

And now, the pot simmered. The house was quiet. As I am waiting for my husband to come home, somehow, I feel fine.

<-#16: Overcoming Trauma #16 Bedtime#18: Overcoming Trauma #18: Going Along ->