Can You Move Past Severe Trauma and Begin to Heal?

the feelings that I didn’t wish that anyone else could feel. So when I was in pain, I wanted it to only be me. I didn’t wish that anyone else on the planet would feel such pain. So now in university, I’m outside of the house, and here I am thinking, the world owes me something. And yeah, so then again, another series of extraordinary events, rape, sexual assault, started to come like in a pattern and how people were looking at me and responding to me at university was their faces were scrunched up, or they were mad at me for things, and I could see the scowls on their faces. And I just thought, you know what this is, just, if I’m going through life this way, it’s really no different than my childhood. I’m really perpetuating the same things. And I heard, you know, I saw…how did I know they were extraordinary experiences as a child is I saw Oprah Winfrey was on TV, and she would always have a guest on, and maybe they were raped or sexually assaulted or beaten in their home. It was always one thing. But then here I am at 17 and then 22 again, going, Wait a minute, I’ve had all of these. Wait, I’ve had extra. Why am I getting extra? Why are they so extra extraordinary? And then at the same time, I have this gift of channeling this divine wisdom, which is getting me through life. It was really quite amazing. All to come to say, I started to recognize patterns, and I wanted to change it. I did not want to cause anybody else suffering, and that’s where I’m at today. It’s still the same as that decision I made in my 20s. Every vibration and every word that I say, I want to resonate in people in a way that touches their love and their light and their peaceful self, which I believe is our nature, and I don’t want to perpetuate those kind of negative things, and also I learned to heal from those things, and that I can heal, and that might be a different topic. But.

 

Manon Bolliger  07:34

No, no I think we should talk about that part, but, but But staying in the same state, and even though it was not so or it was acceptable to stay in victimhood in the 70s, it just continued to create the same scene, right? It’s like the energy was there, and that’s what attracted itself to you.

 

Andrea L. Wehlann  08:04

And the culture was supporting it. So I would read, you know, the there was a Bernardo case that was very popular in our area, in the Niagara region in Ontario back then. And, you know, the girls ended up murdered. They were taken and they were murdered and and so on the news and in society, it was kind of perpetuated that if you were a victim, that’s pretty much, that’s what you were in life, and then that’s kind of the end of the story. So I wanted to supersede that and just get to the end. And so I tried to kill myself eventually, probably once or twice, just wanted to die to end the pain, basically. And there’s a beautiful insight in that as well, that in that moment is when I could see that there was an up. I haven’t looked back since. But.

 

Manon Bolliger  08:57

Well, let’s do that now, if you’re okay with that.

 

Andrea L. Wehlann  09:00

Of course, yeah.

 

Manon Bolliger  09:05

No, so, what happened in that moment? Like, basically, where you’re at? Basically, yeah.

 

Andrea L. Wehlann  09:11

Yeah, I was sawing my sawing my wrist with a steak knife. And I can laugh about it now, but I can still feel the pain, just just as real as if it’s happening, and I could see that the striations, I think that’s the word correct me if I’m wrong. But in from the blade was peeling away my skin, and it had a look just like cheese as I was cutting through. And I’m having these realizations and just content to be the end of all of it. And as I was there, I just like halfway through, I just had an insight that it was up. It was almost like that Shania Twain song that came out, up, up, up, can only get up from here. And my voice is terrible, but the insight I followed, so I had that inside voice say that to me in that moment. But I also had that inside voice repeating the poetry, the words of this beautiful poetry, and the language that was so beyond me, and I followed that. I followed that over the culture, and the you’re just a victim, you’re meant for dead.

 

Manon Bolliger  10:14

Mm, wow. Okay, so let’s, let’s talk about that poetry.

 

Andrea L. Wehlann  10:21

Wow. Poetry is really something. I honestly believe that you can transform your life if you’re writing journaling, even if it’s not poetry. But there, it’s quite amazing.

 

Manon Bolliger  10:39

Do you mind sharing a poem that I mean, they’re all impactful, obviously, but

 

Andrea L. Wehlann  10:47

I’ll share them, yeah. So I wrote so in what was the lockdown year? I think 2021, was the year we were locked down, right? And so I had heard that the domestic violence phone calls went up 60% like six zero. And so here I am at home. I had lost my job and had to be home with my kids, so, and my yoga studio was shut down, right because no one can come so. And then I heard that about domestic violence, and that just invoked that spirit in me that doesn’t want to see other people suffer. And I’m like, wait a minute. I have I went through all of these extraordinary experiences, and I wrote words for all these extraordinary experiences. And so I put the book together in 2021 and it’s called, No Matter How Dark the Stain, poems and inspiration for the woman in pain. And so sometimes, sometimes healing can just happen in an instant. I know this because I’ve studied a lot of you know, yoga, budism, Zen, NLP, meditation. I’ve really studied, really hard to have a foundation so that what I’ve built for myself doesn’t crack. And really, the healing can happen in an instant, but we need words for how to process these things. Sometimes things happen, but it’s words, and it’s through the language that we can we can heal, and we can start to transform things. So when my book was coming out, there’s a poem in here called Rohypnol, and there’s a poem in here called Rape. And a funny story is that my publisher was like, well, Andrea, I don’t think we should, you know, say rape, or, you know, like Rohypnol. We could call it like Sunset Beach, or like, you know, something. And I said, you know, I think that’s what we have been doing. I think we have been quiet about these things for a really, really long time. And I think there’s women that are sitting here in silence now. They’re sitting in covid in silence, and they can’t get out. Yeah, and let’s just call things what they are, because like this platform with you and having new conversations will make for a new future and a new world and I firmly believe that. There’s, there’s a little process that happens, and the Greeks had a name for it, called imitation, and it’s called minesis, and it’s the first page in No Matter How Dark the Stain. And it’s Plato’s theory, actually, that all forms of art, imitation and life are of reality. And that minesis allows us to explore the relationship with our inner selves, our emotions, beyond what’s possible in the real world, but in poetry, specifically the form of minesis, the words are written at one point in time, read at another point in time, and through this mind to mind and heart to heart experience, the reader finds that he or she is transformed. So like one girl at a book signing cave and her dad, I know her dad, and he bought her the book for the poem rohypnol, because he thought something happened to her, but he wasn’t quite sure. And when she stood at the bookstore and willing to have her copy signed by me, she said that she didn’t really know there were words for the experience that she went through. But it’s that minesis, it’s that my twin thing, and you wouldn’t know, you wouldn’t know the words unless, like I believe, I had a gift to be able to write through these things, because now other people can heal the trauma from reading what I wrote when I was going through it by writing it. Now that’s what happens. We we change each other, and, yeah, it’s transformative. Okay, let me find you the poem, a love poem or a serious poem. What do you think? What should we read?

 

Manon Bolliger  14:38

Why don’t we stick with, you know.

 

Andrea L. Wehlann  14:43

A healing one?

 

Manon Bolliger  14:45

Yeah, a healing but, you know, a serious one that. And then we can end with a loved one and, yeah.

 

Andrea L. Wehlann  14:53

How beautiful is that? Okay. So this one is called Rohypnol, okay? And for those that don’t know, Rohypnol is also known as the date rape drug, and there’s a lot of things these days, like nail polishes and little things you can buy so that you can know if your drink is tainted, if you go to the washroom or something at a bar. But this experience happened to me three times in my life where I was out and somebody put something in my drink, and the one time led to gang rape at frat house, frat house type thing. The memories go in and out, and I really believe I was left for dead in that moment. Another time was in a different country, so I might not be here had that, had I not figured that out, or had somebody come and grab me from the strangers. And another time I was with one of my best friends, Brad, and thank goodness, because that was really weird, too. So this is popular. This isn’t just something that happened to me. This happens all over the place, and I just found some words for it. And I hope you, I hope the poem resonates for whoever needs to hear it. So this is called Rohypnol from No Matter How Dark the Stain. Dressed up. Nice, big night, tonight, year one class reunion. Sorry. Year one class reunites to dance, stealing glances out the door, smiles wide. The world is yours, reading, writing, fulfilling dreams. Statue of strength will to succeed, heightened glory, light and love, friendship, dances, freeway, hugs, life before a drink or drug, smiles wide. The world is yours, reading, writing, fulfilling, dreams. Statue of strength will to succeed, slowly turn around, creepy predator, a stolen crown, false smiles, dirty streams, infected drink, muffles your screams, smiles, hide the world, outdoors, animals, attacking, the angels, dream, fallen statue. No glory to succeed. Free will of man leaves the angel to bleed.

 

Manon Bolliger  17:08

Mm, yeah.

 

Andrea L. Wehlann  17:14

So it kind of matches that,

 

Manon Bolliger  17:16

Yeah. Oh, yeah. And you know, a big part of healing is, is being heard or being understood, you know, and you know, offering the ability to, you know, through poetry or stories or whatever too. But I particularly like poetry myself, yeah, but because I think it can be succinct and short and I find that it’s easy to to conjure up a lot of like, images, you know? And I find it, yeah, I find it not too verbose, like, you know, when you when you’re writing, or even a short story or a novel, it’s too many details for me. I just want to get to the point. So, yeah, conjure up what it is, and then it’s like, yeah. And if you’re going through it, or having gone through it, yeah, you recognize it. It’s like, oh yeah, you know, you’re not alone, you know.

 

Andrea L. Wehlann  18:27

Yeah. And I think a lot of times we feel alone, or we don’t know what to say, or we’re in shock, you know, just kind of like, frozen, like, kind of what happened, yeah, yeah. And I think, I think it takes only one person to see you, one person to understand you. And I think that that can be so transformative, just one person, just one poem, one breath at a time, one heart at a time.

 

Manon Bolliger  18:56

Yeah, no, I agree. Great.

 

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Manon Bolliger  20:09

So let’s do a love one.

 

Andrea L. Wehlann  20:13

Okay, this one now you’re so short I’m nervous.

 

Manon Bolliger  20:18

No, no, no, that was short. What I mean, it’s the structure of a poem. Is you, you know you’re going to get to the end of it. It’s not, well, there are long poems. I shouldn’t say that.

 

Andrea L. Wehlann  20:33

I love that. You know all this about poetry that’s so fabulous, I feel like it’s lost, and I want to bring it back. And so one of my hashtags I like to use is #onepoemaday, because I believe that just reading one poem a day softens your heart. Mm, keeps you in touch with that, with the heart center, really. Mm, okay, I have one called Dream ready. Okay, so this is Dream from No Matter How Dark the Stain. In the hollow of the dream feel the relentless scream. Dying to the end you’ve already seen in thought, in prayer, the world has left you naked bear. In the hollow of the dream you wish and scream to an audience out of sight, someone appearing black as night. As you wish. You close, naked and bare, you dream the hollow dream, though no one’s there. Alone in the silent still of the fright, you repeat your episode Night after night. Wwith thought and prayer, since no one is there. In the hollow of the dream, you twist and scream unaware. Bear nothing, as it seems, you tear a wet stream. In the hollow of your dream you could not see you’re wrapped in warmth of piercing wings, naked and raw, you create this scream a world of blessing you have yet to dream.

 

Manon Bolliger  22:13

Nice.

 

Andrea L. Wehlann  22:16

Thank you for having me read those, thank you.

 

Manon Bolliger  22:21

So let’s ttie in the yoga and how you know, how you see that helping, the healing? And…

 

Andrea L. Wehlann  22:31

Oh, I found yoga. And, yeah, it’s like it was a healing path for me, the Four Noble Truths, like, life is suffering. There’s causes to the suffering. You can…there’s cessation of the suffering, right? There’s and the Eightfold Path, really, you know, right speech, right values, right mindfulness, all. There’s eight of those. And it really resonated with me reading the book from Titch Not Han, Being Peace, the Zen, the Zen way of life, and just I didn’t know that there was another path besides the one I was on. And so I really fell in love with learning, learning all kinds of healing modalities. I did meditation long before I ever went into a yoga class, five years of meditation, I joined the Canadian Theosophical Society. So just, just went learning. But with yoga, I found I could use it every day practice. It just really gave me a path of connecting to my heart center, and that’s the place I really wanted to be, that every action I took from my heart center, the look I saw on people’s faces was love of joy. The things in my house started to transform. They’re nice, they’re bright, they’re the colors I love, the foods that I eat reflect that. And so it’s really been this journey for me really just magical.

 

Manon Bolliger  24:05

And do you see, I mean, it’s kind of a crazy question, but I’ll go for it. Like, you know yoga is, it’s breath work in part, I mean, for half of yoga and it’s physical, right? But what does having your physical body connected to your heart do for the healing process in your in your experience?

 

Andrea L. Wehlann  24:40

Everything. I really believe that. So in meditation, what I learned was that the yoga poses, so people were meditating. The monks have been sitting in in the where do they sit now? Why is that word escaping me? Uh, the Buddhist temples, they’ve been sitting for for decades and centuries, and they sit cross legged, usually mindfulness meditation practice. Of course, there’s different kinds, but this is the one I’m referring to. And their hips would get tired. And the yoga asanas, the poses, actually came from them trying to stretch the hips after sitting for a long time, and then they could sit longer, which quiets the mind. I believe, and how I teach now my Ganga Moon yoga, my yoga studio, is that we practice Asana to quiet the mind. We move the body so that we can be still at the end of practice. Now, I think it all has to come down to just having the the mind that’s always monkey that’s always wandering, just having it quiet, just for a moment, because it’s in that moment of silence. It’s in that moment of connecting to your heart, art, poetry, whatever it is for whichever person. But we all have that nature that you can see that you are more than your thoughts, and you are so much more than you think you are. And when you have that experience, it’s you. You can’t it’s something that you can’t talk yourself out of it. Your mind is a liar and a trickster and but that is a feeling that’s inside, that’s inner peace. And I think that yoga, each time you experience that, it builds on that and expands. And I really believe that there is a kingdom of love, of peace, of light inside all of us right now, right now. Yes, yeah, it’s what I’ve come to know for sure. And you know, if I sign a book for people, that’s usually one thing that I’ll put there. I have deeper days. The book I wrote for inner calm amidst chaos. And I really sign that like there’s magic and wisdom in doing a daily practice, like just one thought a day can keep you calm and peaceful and add meaning to your day. But the real kingdom and and it’s, it’s a source that’s within all of us. It’s just that our western culture here doesn’t teach us that we have this power inside of us if you’re born, if you’re born in the eastern culture, and I just learned this in my 40s, because if you’re born in the east, you are raised to be that potential from day one. I mean, we all have that destiny inside of us, and I’m just like, hey, I’m going to share my story until everybody feels their destiny. Because when someone else, like, even you doing what you love is allowing me to do what I love. And so if somebody listening has like, a little pang of like, oh, maybe I should do this. Yes, you should do that, because we’re all going to feel it, and the whole world is going to be a better place,

 

Manon Bolliger  27:44

And we need that now more than ever. You know, as really needing to reclaim, you know, sovereignty. You know, in health, for sure, but in, in all aspects of our life, you know, even, like, I don’t know where you Where are you living in which place?

 

Andrea L. Wehlann  28:06

I’m right between Niagara Falls, Ontario and Toronto.

 

Manon Bolliger  28:10

Okay, yeah, there’s lots of things going on there.

 

Andrea L. Wehlann  28:14

Where are you?

 

Manon Bolliger  28:15

I’m in Bowen Island in British Columbia. Oh,

 

Andrea L. Wehlann  28:19

Oh beautiful. Okay, oh, that’s pretty. So you have nature, and I do not.

 

Manon Bolliger  28:31

I was thinking some but, but, and they’re taking away a lot of the farming land in Ontario. It’s unbelievable, but that’s where people need to really feel that, you know, we are whole, and we are more than you know what we’ve been told we are, you know, like this land is, is our land. You know, in in a true way, right? Like you know, you can’t just take away the food supply for some crazy thing, they’re going to create a phony lab food or, you know, like, what a chaos world, you know. And it’s time we all wake up to this reality, you know,

 

Andrea L. Wehlann  29:21

Amen, yeah, I agree 100% and the thing is that you can take it away all you want, but it’s still, it’s like, did you ever, like, see a bed of rocks and there’s like, one piece of green something grew in it? Like, we are seeds. You can, you can bury us all, like we can be buried as much as they want, but we are seeds, and we are born to grow and I really think the greatest illusion is separation. I don’t think there’s any difference between us and the soil. I mean, when my body dies, where am I going? Right back into the flower beds. You know, hopefully the ocean. But we, you know, we are specs of stardust. We are stars. We are destiny. And who are we not to shine, for sure, but I agree with your opinion on that 100%. We could go further down that route, but… I could go down that route.

 

Manon Bolliger  30:19

Well, actually, you know, that is one of the questions I ask, because it had huge impacts in Canada. And most people that I interview are from the States, and when I share what has happened in Canada, and the fact that you know, most of us who who made a different choice for their bodies or try to anyways, weren’t allowed to travel. You know.

 

Andrea L. Wehlann  30:48

We’re locked up in this school board locked up children in rooms. Yeah, called them isolation rooms. It’s a horrific crime against humanity. I’m not even going to sugarcoat that. Absolute crime against humanity, the things that happened to to us and to a lot of other people in the world, absolute crime. And what’s coming out now with yeah, the distancing being made up, the masks being made up is not being helpful. And the pharmaceutical companies, the amounts that they’re paying back, they lied.ca. Howbadismybatch.com? Like it is incredible, if you are willing to look at some things that will knock your socks off. And, yeah.

 

Manon Bolliger  31:37

Yeah, sorry. Go on.

 

Andrea L. Wehlann  31:40

And I just feel like we need to have a way to like as much of that is so scary. There is still that not to lose sight of, that the nature of our soul is kindness and love, even with the AI, the AI can come and do whatever it wants to do, but our love and our human heart is what it can’t capture, and it never will, unless we give it away. This is why I’m big into one poem a day and inner calm amidst chaos and in deeper days, just adding some meaning to your day. Every morning, when you make your coffee, you know I am love, I am abundance. We have to remind ourselves of these things, because what we’re seeing on the news and those revelations that are coming out are absolutely frightening,

 

Manon Bolliger  32:29

Yeah, and I think, you know, some people found out about this earlier, or were wise to it earlier, because it’s not the first attempt to, you know, to muck up with people, but this one, you know, was truly, you know, genocide, right? And I think when we see what comes out from the people that are behind this. Because, you know, the best source, I thought, for history, is Dr. David Martin. He’s a he’s a lawyer. Oh, my God, like, you know, he’ll have the history of the coronavirus, like, way back. It’s absolutely worth watching. His latest video. I just watched it, so it’s top of mind. But, you know, it was patented, the whole, you know, all the treason between also the countries and the plan to launch this, you know, it was, it’s all the air, right? It wasn’t like that. There was no confusion. This was, you know.

 

Andrea L. Wehlann  33:48

And it’s still there. And, and what’s shocking, what I heard this week was, you know, I’d heard about the plan to eradicate like the humans or the human race, but I heard the percentage this week. I don’t know if you’ve heard it, but it’s 90% of the human population is like, why that’s an awfully big number to be plotting, you know?

 

Manon Bolliger  34:07

Yeah, well, I mean, they failed at that, you know, so, and I don’t think they can get there now, you know, because I think there’s a lot of cleaning up that is happening. But if you think now all the stuff that has come out, you know, because of, because of this, and because people are waking up and now doing their own research rather than listening to, you know, whatever. What do we have here? I don’t have a television.

 

Andrea L. Wehlann  34:40

I got rid of mine as soon as that happened.

 

Manon Bolliger  34:44

It’s like whatever you know, not even gonna like. Why would I put myself in front of propaganda? You know? I’ll do my own research, you know. But, now that all the child trafficking, and I think that makes you know is worth bringing up during the talk with you, because I think that is one of the heaviest things that as as humanity that we’re going to have to come to terms with. Is that there’s been, like 8 million children missing, and they’re being tortured for organ harvesting and for Adrenochrome, and that, you know, and that our governments are complicit, you know. And, yeah, yeah, and big organizations that you would think, I don’t want to give names, because otherwise, you know how it works in this country, especially now.

 

Andrea L. Wehlann  35:43

Yup.

 

Manon Bolliger  35:44

You know, but have have like, you know, people should look at this and, you know, stop calling all this conspiracy. I think those who try to warn people need to be acknowledged for having tried to warn people, and now we just have to look at this and they’re going to need. This is where you know your poems, learning yoga. I mean, my God, it’s going to be so much to deal with.

 

Andrea L. Wehlann  36:18

Mm, hmm. Yeah, absolutely, yeah, this is, this is my passion. This is exactly why I put, No Matter How Dark the Stain out, I’m thinking, Okay, now 60% of women, the 60% of phone calls to the police, are domestic violence. You know how many women that is sitting scared in their homes right now, not doing what their destiny, not living compassionate, not writing books, not singing songs. No, no. We’re going to call things exactly what they are.

 

Manon Bolliger  36:47

Exactly.

 

Andrea L. Wehlann  36:48

It’s it’s rape, it’s torture, it’s domestic abuse. It’s like where the IP something where the partner kills their…intimate partner violence, is right now just around me is declared a state of emergency. No one would know that, because it’s not on the news. It’s not on the news. Because like to have it on the news, then you have to change the laws like it’s so far gone. It’s so far gone, but the heart is not and that’s my focus. But I will, I will die to speak my truth every day and to the women in these situations. And I also think that the story, and I’ve never said it on another show, because exactly why you said you’ll know when I say it, but I absolutely think the story around rape and victimhood should change too. You will be raped. You will be raped and you can handle it. Because what if all the women up to this day knew that? What would they be doing different? It’s not you’re raped and you sit in a corner. We’re not in those days anymore, like we’re not. Now, it’s still one in three women, yeah, one in three women, every three…no, every three seconds a woman will be raped. Yeah, I studied that in grade school. I studied that. It’s so it makes me so angry, like, how is this not changed? And now, now we’re talking about the millions of kids. This is, this is a rape culture. This is a rape culture. We’re all like sitting here pretending it’s not, let’s be real about things. Yes, the poem in my book is called rape because that’s what’s happening. We need to know how to heal it. We need to know that these things are going to happen and we can survive them. We have been surviving them for generations. And like, sorry, I wish it wasn’t. And if I had a magic wand, that’s the first thing I would stop absolutely the first thing. Don’t touch other people if it’s not welcome, period. But it’s not the case. So…

 

Manon Bolliger  38:53

Okay, well, I think we’re going to end with a positive thing. But no, that is positive, actually the truth calling things, but they are, talking about it. You know.

 

Andrea L. Wehlann  39:08

If we’re not having this conversation, if it’s not happening, then the world goes by the same way. We need to have new conversations for a new future, and that’s what’s happening. I don’t believe anything is good or bad. Rape is this or that. It’s nature. Everything is nature, and we’re part of it, and we are it, and period, it’s just the way it is. And so the poetry is my way of, you know, hopefully spreading a little bit of love or adding some light to help with the healing, just so that the that person who’s feeling dismayed, despair, anger, upset, can get a grip, can feel their feet again and maybe contribute to the world despite what happened. Because no matter how dark the stain, we’re still destiny. There’s Destiny inside all of us. We are all light. We are all love, and we need to be taught that. We need to be shown that and felt that

 

Manon Bolliger  40:06

Alright. Thank you Andrea for spending this time having a conversation.

 

Andrea L. Wehlann  40:11

Wow, yes, I agree with you. Thank you so much for having me.

 

Ending

Thank you for joining us at the Healers Cafe. If you haven’t already done so, please like, comment and subscribe with notifications on as I post a new podcast every Wednesday with tons of useful information and tips for natural healing that you won’t want to miss, go to DrManonBolliger.com/tips for more tips