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Just Breathe Confessionals
Just Breathe Confessionals is a raw, reflective podcast where personal stories meet emotional growth, healing, and truth-telling. Each episode invites listeners into moments of becoming—through heartbreak, self-discovery, and the quiet power of breath.
Just Breathe Confessionals
Fragments of Childhood
Memory plays tricks on us all, but for those who've experienced trauma, it can feel like flipping through a photo album with half the pictures torn out. That's how I'd describe my childhood memories of Santa Rosa, California – fragmented snapshots rather than a coherent narrative.
When I first tried recording this episode, I described places: houses, parks, streets. But as my boyfriend pointed out, I wasn't actually explaining my childhood – just its geography. This simple observation cracked something open for me. The truth is, I don't remember much about growing up, and it took trauma therapy to help me understand why. My brain protected me by tucking away experiences deemed too difficult, leaving me with random fragments: making orange juice popsicles with my best friend, the ticking sound of the Perfection game, flying down the street on my bike with wind in my hair.
For years, I felt frustrated by these gaps. How could I tell my story without all the chapters? But I've come to realize these fragments aren't deficiencies – they're evidence of my brain doing exactly what it needed to do to get me through. Despite the missing pieces, certain memories of Santa Rosa bring unexpected warmth: playing soccer in the park, Friday nights at Bradley Video Store, skating at the Snoopy ice rink. These aren't just places but moments where I felt truly alive.
If your childhood memories feel scattered and incomplete like mine, you're not broken. Your brain was doing its job. You're allowed to hold onto the safe moments and let the rest stay tucked away until you're ready – or maybe forever. We don't need complete memories to honor our past or understand our present. Sometimes, the fragments are enough. Listen now, and remember to just breathe.
Welcome back to Just Breathe Confessionals. I'm Daria and today's episode was a really difficult one for me, and it really shouldn't be, but it is. I actually recorded this once already and thought, yeah, that'll work. But then I had my boyfriend listen to it because I wanted his honest opinion and he gave it to me. He said you're not really explaining your childhood, you're just explaining places in your childhood. At first I was upset.
Speaker 1:I've rewritten this episode so many times, thinking I could get it just right. But the truth is I don't really remember a lot of my childhood and the moments of happiness I do remember are few and far between. That's something I've actually gone to trauma therapy for. I can give you some parts of the puzzle, but not the whole thing. The first version he heard was me talking about the houses. I grew up in the parks. I played at how I'd spend hours with my best friend playing Jumanji, convinced we'd get sucked into it. I'd spend hours with my best friend playing Jumanji, convinced we'd get sucked into it, or making orange juice popsicles from frozen concentrate cans. But none of that really describes my childhood, does it? I thought it did. I really did. I thought I'd make this great episode all about my hometown, santa Rosa, california, and its cool facts, but sometimes it takes a third-party perspective to show you the truth. And honestly, truth hurts. And here's the thing I'm not holding back on you, I'm not hiding some big dramatic reveal for later in this episode. Dramatic reveal for later in this episode I honestly just don't remember my childhood is like a handful of Polaroids with half the picture missing.
Speaker 1:I've got flashes, a smell, a sound, a moment frozen in time and then nothing, just blank space. I used to think everyone's memory worked like that, like maybe it was normal to not have big chunks of your life in your head. But it wasn't until trauma therapy that I realized your brain can do that on purpose. It protects you by putting things in a box you can't open, and sometimes that box is so deep you forget it even exists. So when my boyfriend said you're just describing places, not your childhood, it kind of cracked something open for me, because he was right. All I have are places. I can tell you what the front porch looked like, but I can't tell you how I felt standing there. I can tell you what street my school was on, but I can't tell you what the first day of second grade was like, and that's hard, because when people talk about childhood they usually have stories, whole movies, in their mind. I have snapshots and I'm learning to be okay with that, even if it means my version of childhood is a little incomplete.
Speaker 1:I think of it like flipping through an old photo album where half the pictures have been ripped out. What's left is random. There's no order, no clear storyline, just fragments. One of those fragments is me sitting on the gravel in my best friend's backyard right next to his metal playset the kind that would get way too hot in the summer. We'd sit there for hours playing the perfection game, that little yellow board game where the pieces would shoot up in the air if you didn't fit them in before the timer went off. I can still hear the ticking. I can still hear us laughing when the pieces exploded everywhere, but I couldn't tell you what we talked about or what happened after Just that moment.
Speaker 1:Another one standing in his kitchen, both of us carefully pouring orange juice from the frozen concentrate can into little popsicle molds, sticking popsicle sticks in and cramming them into the freezer, like we were making the world's greatest invention. We check every ten minutes, convinced we could make them freeze faster by just looking at them. And then there's the snapshot of me on my bike, standing on the pedals, flying down the street, my hair sticking to my face because I'm laughing so hard. I don't remember who I was with, I don't remember where we were going, just the feeling of moving fast and maybe feeling free. But the thing about snapshots is you don't get the before and after. I don't know what led up to those moments. I don't know what happened after. They just exist and maybe that's all they're meant to do.
Speaker 1:I used to get frustrated about that, like why can't I just remember the rest? Why can't I fill in the missing pages? But the more I've learned about how memory and trauma work, the more I've realized maybe my brain was just doing the best it could with what it had. Maybe those fragments are the safest pieces to keep. And you know, even though my memories are scattered and incomplete, there's one thing I feel really clear about how much I love Santa Rosa. Just thinking about it now brings this unexpected warmth, like a quiet comfort that settles in my chest.
Speaker 1:I instantly think about the afternoon spent playing soccer at the park. The grass still feels almost alive under my feet when I remember it. And then there were Friday nights going to the video store, you know those little stores where you could actually rent movies, picking out the newest releases, with a mix of excitement and indecision, the smell of popcorn, the quiet buzz of fluorescent lights. That was a ritual, a simple joy that grounded me. And how could I forget the Snoopy ice skating rink? There's something magical about gliding across the ice, the cold air brushing my cheeks, surrounded by Snoopy and the Peanuts gang smiling down from the walls. It's a memory that feels like a warm hug, even if the details are fuzzy. These moments, they're part of my story, even if I don't remember every single detail. They're pieces of childhood I'll always cherish. And maybe that's enough, because Santa Rosa isn't just a place on a map. It's a feeling, a collection of moments, a part of who. I am Talking about it now. It brings a smile to my face, quiet, steady joy that reminds me.
Speaker 1:Even if some memories are lost, the ones that remain have shaped me in ways I'm still discovering, I think for a long time I believed there was something wrong with me because I couldn't remember it all, like how can you tell your story if you don't have all the chapters, but I've realized you still.
Speaker 1:Can you just tell it with the pieces you do have, and sometimes that's enough. If you're listening to this and your childhood feels like mine scattered, feels like mine, scattered, incomplete, maybe a little blurry, I want you to know you're not broken. Your brain was doing its job. You're allowed to hold on to the moments that feel safe and let the rest stay in the box until you're ready, or maybe forever. That's okay too. Forever, that's okay too. And maybe one day you'll be walking down a street in your hometown or hear a certain song or smell something cooking and a memory will come back. Or maybe it won't, but either way, you still get to decide how your story is told. So this is my version the pieces I have, the ones that stuck, and maybe that's all they were ever meant to be. Until next time, just breathe.