Toward a Trauma-Informed Writing Process (opinion)

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“Your writing isn’t academic enough.”

A single sentence from a faculty mentor cut deeper than I expected—because it wasn’t the first time my voice had been questioned. I spent decades believing I was not good enough to become a writer. Not because I lacked skill or insight, but because I was writing through a deep wound I didn’t yet understand.

That statement was a flashpoint, but the wound began long before:

When I, as a shy Guatemalan immigrant child, felt I was lacking academically and learned to shrink my voice.

When I was told that my ways of knowing—grounded in culture, emotion, embodiment—didn’t belong in academic writing.

When I absorbed the perfectionism and shame that academia breeds.

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