Finding Freedom: A Life Between Shadow And Light.

Growing up in Northern Ireland during the troubles meant navigating a world split in two. It was a childhood shaped by contradiction by laughter and fear, by family and conflict, by love and silence. My life was a delicate balance between truth and several, between the side of the street my father stood on and the side I occupied, passing him like a stranger the wind.

Omagh was filled with memories of joy, horse riding, neon clothing, New kids on the block, netball games, and tv shows that let us escape for a little while. There are moments of normalcy, of feeling like a child who belonged in a world untouched by war. But the reality of bomb threats, helicopters overhead, armed guards escorting us to school, and the constant sense of fear were never far away. It was a childhood where survival became second nature, where every loud noise sent a shock through my system, where trust felt like a luxury i couldn’t afford.

Newry was different. It held warmth the carefree days rolling down the fields, the smell of tattoo crisps, Woolworths pix a mix, grandma’s irish stew, and the seaside peace of Warrenpoint. Yet it was also where I learned to lie, to conceal the truth that my father was a soldier, to never reveal that my world straddled both sides of a war that i hadn’t chosen. My mothers brothers supported the IRA, and for them, my father was the enemy. I was caught between two loyalties, forced into silence, torn between love and safety.

There was a night when the IRA came searching for us. A warning from my uncle, a misdirection, a desperate escape. My mother and I fled, rushed back to Omagh, forced to abandon the world we had known. The ride back was suffocating, every noise felt like a threat, every pair of eyes on the bus felt like they were searching for me. The weight of fear settled deep into my bones, into my nervous system, into the way i moved through the world. I lived in constant state of flight or fight, sometimes freezing my core, anxiety gripping me even years after the danger had passed.

For a long time, those experiences shaped my life in ways I didn’t understand. The trauma didn’t just exist in my memories, it lived in my body, in the way I held tension, in the way I flinched at sudden sounds, in the way trust felt impossible. Counselling helped, but unless someone had been there, had grown up in the middle of it, they couldn’t fully grasp what it meant to live that way. I carried PTSD, nightmares, flashbacks, and a fear that lingered long after the war had ended.

But healing came. Slowly, piece by piece, I found ways to reclaim my story. Spirituality became a lifeline, a way to understand my journey as something bigger than pain, something rooted in growth and love. A holistic counsellor helped calm my nervous system, helped me find stillness in a world that once felt constant chaos. Journaling gave me a voice, a way to put the memories outside of my self, to see them with distant rather than drowning in them. Meditation brought peace to my body, easing the tight grip of fear that had lived in me for so long.

And now, I see it all differently. Everything I witnessed, every moment of terror, every once of joy, it was all part of the journey. It was my soul having a human experience, learning, growing, evolving. It wasn’t just war, just trauma, just fear, it was transformation. I moved from a place of lack, of pain, of distrust, towards a place of love.

Memories roll through my mind like a conveyor belt now. I choose which one I pick up, which ones I revisit, and the ones that do not serve me, I let them fall away, into nothingness. The past no longer holds me hostage. Instead, I hold the past in my hands, deciding how it shapes me.

For the first time I am free.