Carrie Saum - Storyteller

Awhile back, I started using the phrase “Act as if” to work through some challenges.

This isn’t about avoiding responsibility or accountability—there’s no magical thinking or shirking here. Quite the opposite, actually.

Internal reckoning is layered. The pain administered, the wounds received, both the inherited and chosen suffering—those aren’t the only layers.

There are lessons in sifting out the more subversive truths and transformations, even when Trauma Brain wants to convince us that all of it hurts and there is no redemption to be had.

It’s tempting to devalue, disparage, and allow shame to bloom within.

Reckoning *requires* gleaning the the good along with the bad. It requires taking responsibility and integrating those converging elements and transformations. It’s how we combat the shame.

This is your permission to reclaim the pieces of you that blossomed in the moments leading up to the pain. To reclaim those beautiful moments between the woundings, before the bitter endings. Those layers are still true, too.

Don’t let that pain rob you of the joy you experienced along the way.

🫶🏻C

I still hold my breath
Sometimes
Watching you breathe
My eyes well up on their own
Any time you ask for
Something new

I touch the spot on my
Abdomen where your
Tiny fist grew
Stretching the skin
A permanent reminder
Communion
A body broken

My boy
I would shatter into stardust just
To watch you grow
Breathe
Climb and
Eat

Maybe one day
I will forget to whisper my
Gratitude that
You stayed.

✨✨✨

Happy Birthday, Echo. Thank you for choosing me to be your mama. I choose you right back, every day.

During the last two years, I’ve made a certain kind of peace with my body.

It doesn’t look like the 16 year old cheerleader’s that was riddled with self-flagelating thoughts and disordered eating.

It no longer vaguely resembles the 20 something it once carried across multiple continents, swimming naked in the Mediterranean with a bunch of Aussie Olympians, or trekking up an active volcano in Guatemala.

No remnants remain of the 33 year old who punished it by depriving it of food under a false banner of health—balding scalp, wasting muscle, all so it could fit into a size 8 and social norms.

Now it bears the softness of early aging skin. Elasticity giving way to gravity. Fine lines deepening to irrefutable etchings, telling a thousand stories about the human it firmly holds.

Downy, shrunken breasts commemorate two well fed babies, a belly that stretched to hold them, and a permanently pocked chin that quivered every day from fear of losing them.

Stronger than it has ever been, it climbs and hikes and walks miles at a time and plays chase with those grownup babies in the yard. It swims in frigid pacific waters and cold current rivers. It’s arms smoothly sculpted and shoulders straight from deadlifting 75 pounds of 8 year old boy because it never knows exactly when gravity will win.

It’s pleasure is more intense and joy more pure—like sunbeams hidden and invisibly radiating beneath silky skin.

This aging body is a tribute to decades of experiences, triumphs, and barriers overcome. A constant reminder that even though it sometimes feels like it’s falling apart, it’s chest crushing underneath grief, it continues on. Loving deeply, standing firmly, persevering ecstatically, and moving on with gratitude when its heart knows it’s time to go.

Hard relate.

Tomorrow begins a new chapter.
✨
Earlier this spring, my children’s father and I chose to gently and respectfully end our 14 year marriage.
✨
The end of a hard-fought marriage is like the death of a comfortable, dependable companion.
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It is the unrequited finality of a dream never fully realized.
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It’s painful. Yes. For everyone. Nobody makes this choice lightly.
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And it has also been affirming and hopeful. We are discovering a new path forward.
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I also decided it was time to dig in deeper to my local network and business community.
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After a wild summer of adjusting, healing, helping, and dreaming, I accepted a job as a business navigator for one of Portland’s oldest neighborhoods.
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I’m thrilled to get back into the community, stretch my branding skills, acquire new tools, and most of all work to make things right for folx who have been pushed to the margins for centuries.
✨
If you are scared to leave the comfort of what you have because you cannot imagine a path forward, take heart.
✨
Sometimes you can’t see what’s next until you take the bravest blind step and walk through the door.
✨
So, here is your permission to lovingly and firmly disengage whatever you’ve tied yourself to out of fear of the unknown.
✨
To trust yourself to know what is best for you.
✨
It’s time to reimagine what’s possible.
✨
It’s time to dream a new dream, darling.

💜 Carrie

But it hurts so good?

May it be so. ✨🙏✨

Every year when this pops up, I feel all of these same feels.

But every year they become less potent, less sticky.

I heal a little more, even though the gravity of this time in my life never lifts.

I grow and get better but also, some experiences will stay with me forever. I broke my body to give my baby life, and I can’t erase the physical or psychological scars that come with it.

And that’s okay.

Those scars, both visible and invisible, are reminders that my baby lived.

That we survived.

You are capable of living, surviving, and healing, too.

💜

:: Content Notice - Infant Stroke, Breastfeeding Trauma ::

In case you haven't heard, this is World Breastfeeding Week.

Every year for the last three years, it's rolled around and I've had many, many feelings.

But mostly, I feel shame.

Before my son was born, I planned to breastfeed. I took all of the classes, bought all of the nursing bras and tanks and Bamboobies and ni**le creams. I even had phone numbers for two IBCLCs.

I was scared but determined.

I was ready.

My son was born at the crack of dawn and latched quickly. It hurt, but it was okay. He nursed all day and then into the night. Then he vomited profusely, covering my husband and me in colostrum and amniotic fluid. Then we all slept.

The next morning, he wouldn't nurse. He was tired. I was tired. Sitting upright to nurse was extraordinarily painful for me, and I felt every ounce of the 3 liter blood loss I suffered during his birth.

That second day, I pumped colostrum and my husband fed it to our baby with a dropper. He perked up, but not much. Soon after, my newborn baby stopped breathing while feeding at my breast.

He turned blue.

As a trained medic, I knew what to do. I breathed for him. We called 911. He began breathing again.

The ambulance came. He stopped breathing again and continued to stop breathing every 10 minutes for the next 16 hours.

Our tiny baby boy had suffered a stroke.

Over the course of the next week, we would learn that a clot traveled through his body to his brain and destroyed cells in two areas in his right hemisphere. I would sit painfully upright in a wooden chair next to my son's bed in a tiny NICU room where he teetered between heaven and earth.

And I pumped. Every three hours. I willed my body to make milk to feed him because when he decided to stay here with us, he would be hungry. That was a thing I could do. That was THE THING I could do.

The stroke left the left side of my baby's body weak and slow to react. We did all of the home therapies the hospital showed us. I tried to latch him to my breast but he was unable to form a seal with his mouth because of the muscle weakness.

I was relieved. Deeply, shamefully relived. Because every time I held him to my body, I felt the terror of his near-death shoot through my body like ice water. Holding him to my bare breast sent me into a silent, self-loathing panic and all I saw was his tiny body turning blue.

So, I pumped. Every three hours around the clock.

When he had recovered enough muscle tone to nurse, he looked at me with fear in his eyes and screamed. He was terrified, too.

I passed him to my husband and pumped.

I accepted this breastfeeding failure. And the inadequacy began chipping away at my soul.

A few months later when he was diagnosed with a rare food allergy syndrome and it became clear that he would need my milk for many more months, I cried. Huge, selfish, shameful tears rolled down my face and onto my chest. I could not fathom pumping for another week, much less an undetermined amount of time.

As summer came, so did chronic mastitis. My b***s were done. I did all the things I was supposed to do to prevent it, but after 13 months, living on a 12 food elimination diet to keep my son's profound food allergies in check and unrelenting stress, my body wanted to be done. But my baby wasn't. I was still his sole source of nutrition.

Even if I wanted to quit, I could not.

I put a sticky note on my breast pump. It said "One More Day".

That was my mantra in the morning during my first pumping session. It turned to "one more pumping session" and "5 more minutes of pumping" on hard days.

I watched my son grow as I sat on the couch and pumped. As my husband and friends fed my son the precious gold that came at a very dear cost to my mental, emotional, and physical well-being. I wanted this part to just be over.

And I felt the shame wash over me again.

My final pump session was not the wild, freeing, jubilant affair I believed it would be. After 21 months, I put that electric bastion of failure and disappointment in the closet and whispered "f**k you".

Then I whispered it again.

F**k. You.

To the pump.

To the closed closet door.

To my breasts.

To my kid.

To FPIES.

To the stroke.

To god.

And then I put it all away.

This week, I opened up that closet and took out my pump. I looked at it with indifference. It was a tool, it was not my captor.
Then the ghost of the shame I've been carrying around all these many months reminded me that our story isn't over yet. That there is redemption in this. My pump made it possible to take exquisite care of my baby. It gave me a reason to continue living.

It was a literal saving grace in the midst of the most traumatic time of my life.

The shame is transforming, and transitioning into pride. I did that. Every three hours. Every damn day. For 21 months.

The "f**k you" has turned to deep, unspeakable gratitude. Gratitude for these breasts, that pump, and my healing, thriving 3 year old. Gratitude that I get to be his mom.

To all of you mamas making great sacrifices for your babies, no matter what those sacrifices are, you are unbeatable warriors and tidal forces of love. The world and your sweet babies are lucky to have you.

You can do this.

One.

More.

Day.

Love,
Carrie

http://wp.me/p5nv6m-lB

As an empath with a genuine knack for being able to help calm chaos, this is perhaps the most necessary lesson for me to learn.

It’s hard to watch people I love give themselves over to the flames again and again. To burn down their lives, and every bridge that was ever built in love and good faith to bring them back to safety.

It took me too long to realize that codependency looks just like this.

So here is your permission to disconnect from the people you love who seek out destruction over healing. To not be their savior. To hold onto yourself and your energy in service of building your own life and finding those who want to rebuild, too.

Sometimes it’s better not to question the silence.

Darling friends, you are allowed to change.

I love these happy boosts. What’s your favorite way to feel a little better?

This is the last week of being 7. A year of completion marked by the monotony and uncertainty of pandemic life, whiplash changes, and joy deferred.

This year, you have grown in ways I could never have imagined—you are self-sufficient, patient and inclusive with all the younger kids in our pod who have adopted you as their big brother, and now delve into science and math with voracity.

You are dynamic and flexible in both body and spirit—strengths you’ve always possessed but now are unshakable characteristics.

You love Star Wars and Marvel movies, but still cuddle Havie while you watch Daniel Tiger and sing the songs to her. You adore each other and both of you are at a loss when separated for very long.

You sweetly tell me facts about animals and ecosystems, and get furious at me when I push you to do something before you’re ready. You love combing the beach for treasures, and we lose track of everything else when we are hunting for beach glass and sand dollars. It is our happiest place together.

Your teachers go out of their way to tell me how kind, funny, and calm you are. Mrs. Bienavidez even said you remind her how to be zen when chaos is unfolding in the classroom.

You are determined to be fully in this life with your entire being, and nothing stops you once you’ve committed to accomplish your goals. You know intuitively how to save the day, say the right thing, and make people feel special.

You show your dad and me glimpses of your mysterious brain and we are always stunned by those brief revelations. Your inner life is vast, my love. Much more than any of us can ever know.

The trauma of the first half of your life now fascinates you. You ask me about the stroke and FPIES, talking about it as though it happened to an old man instead of tiny you.

You are so certain of yourself, love and accept others just as they are, and are learning to hold the tension of feeling all the empathy without losing yourself.

You are remarkable in every way, and I can’t wait to see what year 8 holds.

I love you forever, Echo Justice.

May you always be exactly who you are.

I’m not even offended by this. 😏

As a 42 yo mama, HECK YES. Time to dismantle the patriarchy. ✨

This is such a tricky day. I’m holding space for all the folks who need it today. ♥️

The nurse who gave me my first dose three weeks ago gave me my second dose today.

I walked up to the counter and she looked up and immediately said “You’re back! I’m so glad I came in today. I need some positivity.”

Three weeks ago, this health hero was running far behind schedule. Other folks were impatiently waiting, making their frustration clear.

The nurse asked me to wait, apologizing for the delay.

I looked her in the eyes and said “I’ve been waiting a year for this moment. A few extra minutes is no big deal. I’m in no rush.”

She looked at me and said “Thank you so much. That’s a great perspective.”

As I followed her back behind the privacy screen a little while later, she told me again with a shaking voice how much she appreciated my kindness, and it brought some much needed positivity to her stressful day.

I listened to her, and acknowledged how hard the last year has been for all of our health workers. I thanked her for showing up, for doing this important work at this time.

She administered the shot so expertly that I didn’t even feel the needle break the skin. I stood up and thanked her, and tried to hold back tears of relief and gratitude.

Then I stepped out from behind the privacy screen and announced to the other folks waiting that this nurse did a phenomenal job, it didn’t hurt a bit, and we are so fortunate to be just a little bit closer to returning to real life.

I got in my car and cried like a baby—the trauma of the last year, the relief of getting this vaccine, the pure hope for what’s to come, and the gratitude for our healthcare heros—it washed over me in choking sobs and crocodile tears and wide, cracking smiles.

So, today when I went back for my second dose and she remembered me, I was stoked. I wanted to see this through with her.

We walked behind the privacy screen, talking like old friends, buzzing with excitement.

We sat down and she said, “Here we go. One step closer to normal. It feels good, doesn’t it?”

“It feels like life,” I responded.

Then she gave me another painless shot, and I walked out of the pharmacy feeling elated, proud, and deeply grateful.

Thank the people who are doing this massive, important, life-saving work.

Be patient when things don’t go according to plan.

Be gracious with those who are actively making it possible for us to resume real life.

And take heart—we are finding our way out of this moment one vaccine at a time.

Hello Darkness, my old friend.

Hush Puppies are just savory donuts.

Change my mind.

It’s been weeks and Will is still missing.

Our Black community is hurting deeply in ways the whyte community cannot even begin to grasp. Duante Wright was a young father and beloved son and friend. He was unjustly murdered by a police officer this week, and the grief is palpable.

But I have good news—we can take effective action.

Now is the time for whyte folks to speak up because being a Person of Color should never ever be a death sentence.

As whyte ppl, it is imperative that we take responsibility for the ways we have been complicit in violence against non-white communities. For the ways we have defended people in positions of power, and allowed them to escape natural consequences for their life-altering and life-ending actions.

For the ways we have let ourselves off the hook without doing the work to become Anti-Racist.

If you don’t know Doyin Richards please go follow him now. If you haven’t signed up for his Anti-Racist Fight Club, sign up now.

Take action first by holding yourself accountable for the sneaky ways white supremacy has infiltrated your own life. Then get ready to become bold and educated advocates for our neighbors who need it the most.

Being Black in America should never ever be a death sentence.

✊🏾

Good luck getting this image out of your heads. YOU’RE WELCOME.

✨14✨

If you had told these passionate kids 14 years ago what marriage would actually entail, we probably would have given each other a way-too-graphic-for-public kiss and parted ways.

I’m glad we were too naive to know any better.

I’m glad we were too stupid to care.

We are older now. A little bit wiser. Wary of the world but more certain of each other.

Our love has lived it’s own full life—continuing to grow and change, sinking its roots deeper and providing refuge under its canopy.

This year has been unimaginably difficult, but we have found each other all over again. May we continue to find each other over and over in this life and ever after.

I love you, Best.

LOLSOB

TFW you use anti-wrinkle serum and night moisturizer for ‘mature’ skin and also need pimple stickers. Wearing a mask is totally worth the maskne. 💕

Parenting during a pandemic is not regular parenting. Be gentle with yourselves, your little (and big!) humans. Kids are resilient, and they will show us how to bounce back when life returns to some sort of normal. ♥️

Spinach facts