when your writing becomes not about you but about addressing the gaze that others you. there is a loss there. but there is an immediacy to it – you feel compelled. no, you are compelled. it is demanded of you. i wouldn’t call it a phase (it will always be there). perhaps a passage. a necessary trap. it needs to be done, so that perhaps your writing can move on, and you can represent yourself without looking at yourself from the outside in, without always being angry and traumatized. and finally, find true liberation in your work. when i no longer always need to write about trauma, and can write about fuzzy caterpillars and dust bunnies and why i like my egg yolks runny.