Fictionalizing Trauma

Start from a place of curiosity

Writing fiction to heal is just another version of our reality, except you write the rules. Literally. And what you decide to put in your reality is a choice you have to make. Sometimes we make the hardest choice of all — to be brave and courageous and dig into something painful we’ve been through. But it doesn’t have to look like reliving trauma or writing your story as it actually happened. In my method — I use gentle prompts and questioning that ask the writer to look at certain aspects of an experience or event, not the entire thing, and never all at once. Carefully and strategically, I help writers dig out the kindling from their life to light their fictional stories.

It’s entirely possible to experience healing parts of your trauma without ever going into what actually happened in your past. What’s important for you and your story is to focus on how that event shaped you and molded you into the person you are now — light and shadow sides. And one way of seeing that in play is through the characters and stories we choose to tell (both to ourselves and others).

Here is something I tell my students and clients:

“Writing can be whatever you want it to be. It’s impervious to the decision. If you want to write happy, it will give you that comfort. If you want to write mad, it will hold your anger. If you want to write sad, it will literally dry your tears (and probably smear things). Your writing, in whatever form it looks like, is what works for you.”

So let’s put it into practice. Here’s a quick example of how easy it can be to take one teeny, tiny element of a painful reality and turn it into a fictional scene to explore more.

• Losing someone you love in a tragic accident

Becka stared up at the fat raindrops landing like kisses on her face. She giggled as it rained faster and then she found that place inside of her that had been holding onto all his memories, and just let them out. She choked and laughed. Laughed and splashed in the puddle. She wasn’t sure he was listening. He was gone and she’d never get the chance to wipe the grease from his forehead or roll his socks up in tidy little pairs in the drawer. If she’d known that he would be taken from her so suddenly, she would have begged whatever god or deity that existed if she could go as a sacrifice. But no one had heard her then. And she’d been sure no one would hear her now. But goddammit! He heard me. And he gave me exactly what I asked for. A sign that he was there.

I don’t know who Becka is or who she lost or why — but I do know that moment when you feel like the person you’ve lost will never be there again. That empty pit-of-your-stomach sensation that feels a lot like grief, but rubs you even rawer. I know those feelings, so I just put them into Becka as I wrote. I wrote as if I had just asked my own loved one to send me a rainstorm as an answer. I even felt lighter after writing that paragraph because I allowed myself to dwell in the possibility that my loved one could send me a rainstorm as proof of their existence. And I didn’t even have to touch on the tragedy of their death to do it.

See how reality and fiction blend themselves together? It works on every level. Good, bad, indifferent, confusing, complexing.

Writing as rebellion

The act of writing about your trauma — whether it’s in your journal, in a memoir, or in fiction — is an act of rebellion. When you “own” the stories of your life, you get to take the power back to that narrative. You don’t get to be silenced. You don’t have to adhere to someone else’s “rules.” This kind of empowerment is liberating.

An example of how to take one piece of traumatic history and turn it into a rebellious piece.

• In a court hearing with an abuser

I walk up to the podium and every part of me that can sweat is drenched. I’ve waited for this moment since I learned that asshole was back at it again. Ruining lives with his inability to keep his hand off little girls and their most precious parts. As I lay my piece of damp paper on the podium, I look up at the faces in the crowd. Mom first, her eyes red, tears streaming down her face. Then Dad, his lips quivering, trying so hard not to show emotion. Then my sister, who has her hand covering her mouth, waiting for me to begin. And my husband who looks away. I scan the other faces on his side, the people I once called family, but are now just people who share the same DNA as me. Lastly, I look at him. He glances at me, but he’s a coward and won’t look me in the eye. That’s all the motivation I need to say what’s been caught in my throat for years.

“Hello, everyone. I’m here today to read the victim impact statement I was denied years ago. I’ve spent a lot of time and a lot of paper working through what I wanted to say today. There were angry drafts. Sad drafts. Forgiveness drafts. Drafts that broke my heart. Drafts that stitched me back together. But here’s what I’ve learned. The victim impact statement isn’t for you. It’s for me. And what I’ve been afforded in waiting this long is time and experience. And a lot of writing between. I wrote a million drafts of this letter but I also learned what it is I truly wanted to tell you if I got the chance. And it’s this:

A medium I sat with channeled grandpa once. When I asked him what grandpa thought you deserved, he said, “I hope he comes back in another life as a cockroach or a mealworm. The lowest of the food chain. Living a life in fear of aways being stepped on, or poisoned or killed.”

I sat with that image for a long time and decided it was the truth. Death is not the worst thing that can happen to you. Because the absolute worst thing I can imagine for you is that your next life is one of fear and pain. That you will feel what’s like to be fearful of your own existence. Because that is what you did to me. To all of your victims. You made us afraid to live fully. Beneath every decision and action, there is a movie reel playing in our heads of all the ways in which we’re terrified by life, and that was compounded by you.

So today, if these are the last words you hear me say, then I don’t want to fill it with surface-level bullshit that you can justify in that sick head of yours. I want you to be thinking and replaying for the rest of your life these questions I am about to ask you:

“How do you live with the knowledge of the pain you’ve caused so many people? I’m genuinely curious what you do to keep from killing yourself on those dark nights of the soul? Do you justify your actions? Do you feel rage because you were caught? Do you feel like you live a lie every single morning when you wake up because of the things you’ve done and pushed deep down inside of you? Are you going to pray when it’s time to die? Are you going to ask for forgiveness from whatever God you believe in? Will you think of me, in those moments before you give your last breath and realize the depth of pain you’ve caused?”

Here’s something else I believe to be true. I think at the end of the day, you’re terrified of me. Of all us who have come forward, but especially me. I broke the cycle. I owned my story so that others could do it, too. And you better fucking believe I started a revolution in this family dynamic. And revolutionaries — strong and brave women who stand up against injustice — we’re always feared. And the fact that I can come through what I’ve come through and help others find their way, becomes a strength in numbers. And if you’re not scared of me... you should be. Because my greatest weapon in the world is not hurting or killing you or wishing revenge. No, my superpower is not forgetting the truth. My superpower is talking as much and as loud and as long as I want about the person you are. Because then, the legacy of pain you’ve brought upon us will stay alive. And that’s infinitely worse than being dead.

Isn’t it great how all the little girls you touched end up growing to be your worst mistake and most feared opponents? It’s because we’re stronger than you ever gave us credit for.

Thank you for listening.”

None of this happened. I didn’t get to read my statement. I didn’t get to say those words. I didn’t even get to look him in the eyes.

Yet all of this is true at its core. All of this is me wrapped up in a character who gets to have the ending she wanted. And by putting it down into the world, I get a little piece of the ending, too. More than the closure is the sense of empowerment it gave me to write those words as if we were right there in the courtroom in real life. I may never get to say anything to him but I know my words will remain. How’s that for rebellious?

The Walk Away Rule

Writing is so powerful that sometimes it can take us into unexpected and uncomfortable places. Sometimes, it stirs up unwanted emotions, flashbacks, or triggers. When that happens, my favorite suggestion is to walk away from that session. Regulate, relax, refresh — whatever form of self-love you do, now is a perfect time. Then I want you to go back to a blank page and journal.

• Rate how you felt at the time of walking away (on a scale from 1 (slightly upset) to 5 (triggered, activated, extremely upset)

• Write about what emotions came up that made you walk away

• Did you identify a trigger (ie, writing about the experience or event directly, a sensory detail, a memory, etc.)

• What do you want to do next armed with this knowledge

• Rate how you’re feeling now that you’ve reflected on what made you walk away

Example:

Writing Session Rating at time of walking away: 3.5

Today I started on a piece around my promiscuity as a young woman and I suddenly felt so much shame around it that I couldn’t bear to think about it so I walked away. I completely forgot the “point” I was trying to make by writing about the piece and just ended up thinking about the mistakes I made during that time period in my life, the pain I endured, the loneliness. I’m not sure if I can write about it directly or if I need to approach it with fiction. I would say that I’m feeling around a 1 on the scale now that I realized what that rise of panic was for. I touched a nerve that I haven’t worked through yet. Now that I know that, I may wait to tackle this one when I’m better equipped to.

Writing about our writing is helpful and clarifies an understanding of ourselves and our approach to writing better. Because I took the time to “debrief” after walking away, I also learned (and felt better) knowing this was a topic that I’m not ready to dive into yet. I don’t feel bad about it at all — the opposite actually — I feel empowered to start something new at my next writing session.

Conclusion:

Writing fiction (like many other forms of writing) is powerful. But it has the same amount of power to heal us as it does to hurt us. When we understand ourselves and our stories better, we learn how to harness the power of the page to write for inner change and growth. If you’ve ever wanted to discover who you really are, writing will do it. But it requires you to be brave and vulnerable and honest. It will always meet you where you’re at because that is its job. You merely have to tell it where you’re at and how you’d like to begin.

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If you enjoyed this piece of experiential teaching with examples, you might enjoy my upcoming workshop, Writing Fiction to Heal. The course is full of lessons just like this one, with case studies, examples, and more. I also do deep-dives into topics like this in my Write Minded Community. Join us for a free month!

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Note: I owe the development of this piece to my wonderful friend and creator, Deanna. I was inspired to write this piece after she gave me a list of questions she had about the writing fiction to heal method. This was an attempt to answer some of those questions (I hope this helps, Deanna!)