‘Creative writing lifted me out of my negative home life and into a college environment where I could begin to heal and thrive, to start over.’

René Bouchard, Huntington Station

“I struggle with developmental and relational trauma from childhood – pretty extreme neglect and abuse. I’ve been living with the effects of that my whole life.

“In college, I majored in creative writing, and I started focusing on songwriting and learning to play guitar. I’d always been a writer. I won some big writing awards in high school, which is why I was recruited to a really good creative writing college, even though I didn’t have the best grades. Creative writing lifted me out of my negative home life and into a college environment where I could begin to heal and thrive, to start over.

“My dad gave me his guitar years ago, and I took it with me to college. I’ve always loved music and singing, so I realized that if I could teach myself to play guitar, I wouldn’t have to depend on anybody.

“After graduating from college, I traveled a bit and I worked as a singer-songwriter all over the country. I also took other jobs, like being a bartender and a waitress, to make ends meet. I performed in little clubs, bars and restaurants in cities like Austin, Sedona, and New York City.

“I moved to New York City in the ’90s, and played at some indie venues. I was part of the anti-folk movement in the ’90s. I started working with a guitarist named David Romanelli. He’s a genius guitar player, and we independently produced some albums. “My husband, Cliff Ferdon, is also a musician. You know, I’m playing all these clubs, putting out albums with my guitar player, but I got tired of the grind. I wasn’t enjoying it anymore. I decided to pivot and went into nonprofit. Now I’m the director of development at the Cinema Arts Centre in Huntington.

“I really missed music, so I started doing it again for myself. Unfortunately, I started having recurring symptoms after a retraumatizing event, including flashbacks and self-harm impulses. It made life harder. I began doing research and read about complex post-traumatic stress disorder [C-PTSD]. It was the first time that I read about a psychological model that I felt described me. I saw myself in it. I wanted to understand C-PTSD and then learn how to deal with it.”

I thought I needed to fix myself, but now I know I need to just be myself.

“In 2022, I started therapy. I wanted guidance in my journey and to take my mental health seriously. I thought I needed to fix myself, but now I know I need to just be myself. I continued researching and learned about the model of structural dissociation. Dissociation is a coherent response to trauma that your brain does to protect you. I don’t want people to feel broken. It’s just how brains respond. Dissociation is a common and normal thing, but when someone has complex trauma, it can become more intense and lead to structural dissociation. A person with trauma may develop ‘parts,’– the ‘normal’ and ‘emotional’ parts, where they store the trauma. They may have multiple emotional parts, which act as trauma responses. I started to see my symptoms in a different way. If I had a flashback, instead of trying to push it away, I understood that the flashback might be the expression of one of these parts. They were trying to tell me something. They wanted me to acknowledge what I went through. As I began to recognize this, I gave that part my compassion rather than dismissal and judgment. It’s now been over a year since I’ve had a flashback.

“I’m a visual artist as well as a musician, so I wanted to engage my parts in a multimedia event which I premiered at the Cinema Arts Centre in Huntington. I’ve worked at that cinema since 2009. The space just means so much to me, so I wanted to have my premiere there. I want to create community connections. Huntington is such a vibrant arts community, and I feel so lucky to be part of it and add to it. I repeated the show at Industry in Huntington.

“One song turned out to be angry. It came from my fight part. I went back and forth with my normal part and emotional parts and ended up with nine songs. It’s a nine-song dialogue between the parts; each one is so different. I created collages for each of the parts with song lyrics, which became the program for my shows. I started writing these songs in the summer of 2023 and finished in December.

“Afterwards, I sought funding through a grant. I reunited with my guitar player, David. I’m really excited he was able to join and elevate the songs. We’re going to keep playing shows together.”

My goal is to develop inner compassion and less conflict between all of my parts.

“After I started therapy, I began playing guitar every day again. In the past two years, I’ve probably written 50 songs. I like the open nature of songs. The openness allows the meaning to change over time for both the writer and the listener. It allows people to assign their own meanings to the songs.

“I’ve changed since doing this project, and the songs are able to change with me. Songwriting is a wonderful medium. It’s a human right to make art. Anyone can be an artist. There’s no reason you can’t make art. You don’t have to have any special talent or skill. You’re allowed to just make things and be creative; it’s part of the human experience.

“Whenever I write a song, I always record it and try to write it down or put it up on YouTube so it’s not forgotten. David and I are working on making an album of some of these songs, and we want to record the dialogue songs from the show and release it with the art print book.

“I didn’t share a lot of details about my trauma in the shows because I didn’t want others to compare their own traumas. You’re allowed to have grief and heal and feel like your trauma had an impact. You don’t have to feel like it was too small or doesn’t count in comparison to anyone else’s. Your experience is valid.

“I don’t recognize myself sometimes. I have a lot of dysmorphia about what I look like, and it can be really triggering. I challenged myself with these shows. Rather than go into a shame cycle like I used to, I’m more able to treat myself with compassion. Shame is the biggest obstacle to healing. Sometimes it’s easier to look at other people and think they don’t have any of these issues, but a lot of people do. I’m not the only person who’s had trauma. I’m not the only person who has body issues. I want to reduce the stigma and encourage people to have more compassion with themselves. I want to model that by doing it for myself and showing growth. I’m finding a lot more moments where I realize that I can handle triggers. My goal is to develop inner compassion and less conflict between all my parts.

“My life looks a lot how I want my life to look. I just want to keep going.”

Interviewed by Melanie Gulbas