Neglect

My name is Kylie Pollan, and I am a survivor of domestic violence that occurred in Ellis County, Texas. After the assault, I began experiencing severe pain, swelling, and discoloration in my right leg. I sought help repeatedly from doctors and hospitals, including Baylor Scott & White, but despite clear symptoms and imaging showing injury, my pain was often dismissed or minimized. Instead of being heard and believed, I was told that what I felt “wasn’t that bad,” or that it was something I was creating in my mind. That experience broke my trust in a system that is supposed to protect victims and help them heal.

Over time, my condition worsened, and I was later diagnosed with Complex Regional Pain Syndrome (CRPS) — a debilitating nerve disorder often triggered by trauma. This diagnosis confirmed what I had been saying for months: my pain was real. Unfortunately, by the time doctors took me seriously, the damage had already progressed, leaving me with chronic pain, mobility struggles, and emotional trauma from both the violence and the medical neglect. I’ve since relocated to Oklahoma for safety and ongoing treatment, but my heart remains with the people of Ellis County who may still be suffering in silence.

I am now working to raise awareness about how often women’s pain is dismissed, particularly among survivors of abuse. Many victims are told their pain is emotional or exaggerated, when in reality, they are living with life-changing injuries. I don’t want what happened to me to happen to anyone else. I believe that by speaking out — through advocacy programs, support centers, and public awareness — we can help improve how medical professionals and systems respond to survivors.

I am reaching out in the hope that my story can be used to help others — whether through education, awareness campaigns, or local advocacy efforts. If there are opportunities to share my experience, participate in community outreach, or contribute to training programs for victim support or healthcare sensitivity, I would be honored to help. My goal is simple: to make sure that when the next woman says she’s in pain, she’s believed, treated with compassion, and given the care she deserves.#domesticviolencesurvivor #BreakTheSilence #believewomen #godsplannotmine #faiththroughhealing

Deaf people are often told to feel grateful for crumbs of access while being blamed for the system’s failures. When your writing doesn’t fit the mold, when your words stumble under someone else’s grammar rules, remember this: you were never broken. You were miseducated.

Too many Deaf people carry shame that was never theirs to bear. They stare at blank pages, freeze mid-sentence, or apologize for “bad English,” as if their intelligence could be measured by syntax. Let’s be clear, this is not your fault. The system failed you, not the other way around.

Ten Reasons You’re Not to Blame (and why you’re better at language than they’ll ever understand):

1. Teachers’ Low Expectations: You were told “good enough” when they should have demanded excellence with you, not for you. They praised mediocrity instead of nurturing mastery, teaching you to settle instead of soar.

2. Limited Access to Language: Early years spent in sound-based classrooms with no fluent signing models, language deprivation in plain sight. You were expected to lipread meaning instead of seeing fluent ASL daily.

3. Interpreters Who Filtered Too Much: Full ideas got reduced to summaries. The richness of language was trimmed into bite-sized pieces. What was meant to empower ended up restricting.

4. ASL Classes That Taught English on the Hands: You were taught to translate word-for-word, not concept-for-concept. The “ASL” you learned was really an English remix, not a visual language.

5. Writing Rubrics That Punished Difference: Instead of teaching Deaf rhetoric, they graded you by hearing standards. They “red-penned” your voice out of your own story.

6. IEP Pressure to Use Signed English: They forced you to mimic English signs in the name of “inclusion,” stripping away ASL’s natural rhythm and structure.

7. Schools That Rewarded Speech Over Substance: Grades went to those who could speak, not those who could think. Sound mattered more than ideas.

8. College Advisors Who Said “Maybe Try Something Easier”: They mistook your access barriers for ability limits, confusing lack of opportunity with lack of potential.

9. Media That Called You “Inspiring” but Never “Intellectual”: They praised your survival while ignoring your brilliance as if the depth of visual thought could be measured by grammar tests.

10. A World That Equates English Fluency with Intelligence: They forgot that language is a bridge, not a scoreboard.

Every time you hesitate to write, remember what you’ve survived. You think in a visual language: rich, dimensional, alive. Translating that into text isn’t failure; it’s art in motion.

Every Deaf Person Carries Layers of Translation.

Every time you write, speak, or sign in mixed spaces, you perform mental gymnastics most people never attempt. Each sentence becomes a bridge between worlds that were never built for you, worlds that demand your access but rarely return it.

When you move between ASL and English, you’re not just switching languages. You’re shifting entire cultural systems: the rhythm of one, the structure of another, the emotional cadence of both. What hearing people see as “errors” are often echoes of your first language. It’s not wrong. It’s authenticity, the way your brain and culture move together.

You’ve been asked to translate not only your words but your existence. To adjust, explain, clarify, constantly. And still, you communicate. You teach. You make meaning in spaces that were never designed for you. That isn’t weakness. That’s art. That’s resistance in motion.

Don’t let anyone shame you for how you write, how you sign, or how you blend the two. Your language carries history, resilience, and truth. What they label “improper” is often your truest form of fluency, the sound of ASL living freely, even inside English.

My Reflection ~

I’ve seen this pattern in classrooms and conversations, and it hits a nerve every time. Deaf people are forced to perform literacy in a world that never offered full access to it, then they’re blamed for not fitting perfectly. The truth is, Deaf writing holds rhythm, imagery, and movement that hearing readers can’t replicate. It isn’t broken, it’s bilingual thought translated through survival.

I want my Deaf peers to know this clearly: you were handed fragments of language and told to build a mansion. You were expected to perform English without ever being given full access to it. When you struggled, they called it a weakness. That wasn’t truth. That was systemic neglect disguised as education.

When I write, my English isn’t a badge of superiority. It’s a craft I built through curiosity, frustration, and long nights reshaping sentences until they breathed. My love for language didn’t come from hearing privilege, it came from fighting for expression in a system that tried to limit me.

Sure, I use Grammarly to clean structure, but those are mechanics, not meaning. The rhythm, spark, and bite of my sentences come from Deaf experience. That’s not correction, it’s transformation.

Final Quotes ~

“You were never behind; you were just never given the full map.”

“Fluency doesn’t define brilliance. Expression does.”

“Stop apologizing for how you write. The system should apologize for how it taught.”

“The struggle wasn’t yours. It was the world’s failure to listen visually.”

Addiction is one of those words that carries a lot of weight. It’s often misunderstood, judged harshly, and simplified into labels like “weakness” or “bad choices.” But the truth is, addiction isn’t that simple. It’s not about someone being “too weak to stop.” It’s about a tangled web of biology, trauma, environment, and emotions that pull people into a cycle that feels impossible to escape.

At its core, addiction is the result of the brain’s reward system being hijacked. Substances like alcohol, opioids, or even nicotine flood the brain with dopamine, creating feelings of relief, pleasure, or escape. Over time, the brain learns to crave that rush, and everyday joys—like laughing with your kids, eating a good meal, or finishing a project—don’t feel the same anymore. It’s not that the person doesn’t care. It’s that their brain has been rewired (Nestler, 2005; Volkow & Li, 2005).

But biology is only part of the story. Trauma plays a massive role. Many people struggling with addiction carry heavy stories—childhood abuse, neglect, loss, or pain they never got the chance to heal from. The famous ACEs study (Felitti et al., 1998) showed that people with adverse childhood experiences are significantly more likely to develop addiction later in life. Substances often become a way to cope, to silence the memories or feelings that hurt too much (Sinha, 2008). For a moment, that drink or hit can feel like relief. But the relief never lasts.

Addiction is also shaped by the world around us. Growing up in a home where substances were present, being surrounded by friends who use, or living in an environment where stress and survival overshadow peace—these all make someone more vulnerable. And when you combine those factors with genetics—research shows 40–60% of the risk for addiction can be inherited (NIDA, 2018)—you get a perfect storm.

Mental health struggles are another piece of the puzzle. Anxiety, depression, borderline personality disorder, PTSD—these don’t just increase the risk of addiction; they often go hand-in-hand with it (Kessler et al., 1996). The pain of living with an untreated mental illness can make substances feel like medicine, even though they end up worsening the very symptoms someone is trying to escape.

The hardest truth is this: no one wakes up and says, “I want to be addicted.” Addiction isn’t a choice—it’s a disease. A disease that changes the brain, warps thinking, and feeds off pain. And yet, behind every person struggling is someone who still loves, still hopes, and still dreams of freedom.

Finding Hope and Support

While addiction has many causes, recovery is possible—and it starts with hope. Healing looks different for everyone, but no one has to walk that road alone. Here are some places where support can begin:

Therapy & Counseling: Working with a therapist, especially one trained in trauma and addiction, can help untangle the deeper causes and provide healthier coping skills.

Support Groups: Programs like Alcoholics Anonymous (AA), Narcotics Anonymous (NA), or SMART Recovery connect people to a community that understands (Kelly & Hoeppner, 2015).

Treatment Centers: Inpatient or outpatient programs provide structure, medical support, and therapy to start the recovery journey (Laudet & White, 2010).

Holistic Healing: Exercise, mindfulness, journaling, faith practices, and creative outlets (like writing or art) all help rebuild a sense of self.

Reaching Out: Sometimes the bravest step is simply telling a trusted friend or family member, “I need help.”

Addiction may take hold of a person’s life, but it does not erase their worth or their capacity to heal. Recovery is not about perfection—it’s about progress, about reclaiming moments of peace, and about rediscovering joy beyond the substance.

If you or someone you love is struggling, remember this: addiction is not the end of the story. With support, compassion, and persistence, a new chapter is always possible.

Crisis Hotlines & Resources

If you or someone you know is in crisis, please reach out to one of these resources:

Canada: Call or text 988 for the Suicide Crisis Helpline (24/7).

United States: Call or text 988 for the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline (24/7).

United Kingdom: Call 0800 1111 (Childline) or 0800 915 4644 (Addiction Helpline).

Australia: Call 13 11 14 (Lifeline).

International: Visit findahelpline.com to locate support lines in your country.

You are not alone. Reaching out for help is not weakness—it’s one of the bravest things you can do.

Bigmommaj

#mentalhelath #Awareness

Life has a way of moving in circles. No matter how far we think we’ve come, sometimes we find ourselves right back where we started — the same pain, the same mistakes, the same emptiness. It can feel exhausting, like we’re trapped in a cycle that will never end.

But often, what we’re really circling around is our inner child.

The inner child is that hidden part of us that remembers everything — the joy, the innocence, but also the wounds we never fully healed. It carries the weight of neglect, abandonment, rejection, or abuse. And until we turn inward and tend to that child, we find ourselves going in circles, repeating patterns without understanding why.

Maybe you’ve noticed it in relationships. You keep attracting the same kind of love, even if it hurts. Or maybe it shows up in addiction, where you go back to the same coping mechanism that promised escape but delivered only deeper pain. Sometimes, it’s in the way we treat ourselves — constantly criticizing, sabotaging, or hiding behind masks.

These circles are not random. They are calls for healing.

Our inner child keeps bringing us back to these familiar places, not to punish us, but to remind us of what still needs our attention. Each cycle is another chance to stop, to notice, and to finally break free. Healing doesn’t happen in a straight line; it spirals. Every time we come back to a painful pattern, we have the opportunity to face it with more wisdom, more awareness, and more compassion than before.

The truth is, we can’t shame our inner child into silence. We can’t numb it away forever. What it needs is what we needed back then — safety, love, patience, and someone to listen to us. And often, we are the ones who must finally become that safe person for ourselves.

So the next time you feel yourself stuck in a circle, ask:

What is my inner child trying to tell me?

What wound is asking to be healed?

How can I show up for myself differently this time?

Circles don’t always mean we’re failing. Sometimes they mean we’re still learning. And healing, even when it feels repetitive, is progress.

Step by step, round by round, we move closer to wholeness.

Because when we finally sit with that inner child, the circles that once trapped us can become circles of safety, circles of healing, circles of love.

Bigmommaj
#innerchild #MentalHealth