Breaking the Cycle: Recognizing Trauma and Rewriting Generational Patterns

Trauma.
A word that is becoming more prevalent, yet still scares people away.
A word that applies to all of humanity, yet so many are reluctant to accept what it truly means.
A word that can completely change the trajectory of your life — depending on how you respond to it.

Growing up, I never knew what trauma was, nor how to truly understand my emotions. I lived in a household where feelings weren’t discussed. I don’t blame my parents for this; they were doing the best they could with what they had been taught. But the truth is — they weren’t given the skills either. Nor were their parents.

And so, like in countless families across generations, the cycle repeated. Silence around emotions. Patterns of survival. Coping strategies passed down without anyone naming them for what they were.

Recognition Is the First Step

I don’t share this to excuse behavior — mine or anyone else’s. Instead, I share it to shed light on how generational patterns continue when there’s no recognition, no accountability, and no ability to step back and see life clearly.

The moment you recognize what’s happening — when you can say, “This is not mine to carry forward”— you open the door to rewriting the story.

So I challenge you:
What happened in your childhood that you are committed to not letting bleed into the next generation?

Because you do have the opportunity to change your family for the better.

The Hardest Question: How Do I Stop the Pattern?

It’s one thing to know what you don’t want to repeat. It’s another thing entirely to know how to keep from repeating it.

Maybe there’s substance abuse in your family history. Maybe verbal abuse was normalized as a way of communicating. Maybe silence around emotions was the air you breathed growing up.

These patterns don’t just disappear because we want them to. And here’s the truth many people never say out loud: most of us were never taught the skills to actually stop them.

Why Support Matters

This is where support becomes crucial. Trauma lives in the body as much as it does in the mind. Our nervous system learns patterns of survival — fight, flight, freeze, fawn — and without support, it tends to repeat what it knows.

The work of healing, then, isn’t just about “thinking differently.” It’s about helping your nervous system regulate, so that in the very moments where you’d normally fall back into old patterns, you have the capacity to pause, breathe, and choose a new response.

With consistent support — whether through therapy, nervous system regulation tools, mindfulness practices, or community — you begin to rewire the automatic responses. You start writing a different story, not only for yourself, but for your children, and their children.

Rewriting the Story

Let me reassure you: you don’t have to have all the skills today. The most important piece is recognition. From there, healing is a practice — a series of intentional actions, moments of pause, and new skills built over time.

Every step you take away from repeating the old story is a step toward building a future where your children, and their children, inherit something new: the ability to feel, to regulate, and to meet life’s challenges without being trapped in cycles of pain.

You hold the pen now. What story will you write for the generations to come?

We Need More

As a society, we need more help. Mental health disorders are becoming increasingly prevalent, and rather than teaching people how to understand and work with their emotions, we often medicate or label individuals.

More support needs to be offered to help people recognize the signs of distress, overwhelm, and shutdown. When adults receive this support, they can break cycles and pass on healthier skills to the next generation. Without it, the cycles will continue to repeat.

No matter how much schools and therapists try to support children, children ultimately return home to adults who may never have been taught how to manage their own emotions — adults who may have become reliant on medication rather than skills. As a result, they don’t know how to support their children when those same emotions rise up in them.

What Comes Next

This is why support is not just important — it is essential. We are at the beginning of a cultural shift where new tools, resources, and practices are emerging to help adults and families regulate, heal, and grow together.

The future is about rewriting the story not just for ourselves, but for the generations who will come after us. And more support is coming.