I must confess I was reluctant to undertake English 100 when I saw it on my program as a required course. I have managed to learn English as a second language as a survival strategy for my professional and academic pursuits. My mother tongue is Spanish and I have learned English as a second language just as a means to get to other ends. Being 48 years old, having pursued a BA and a master’s at the University of Chicago, it seemed to me that I must have managed English well enough to perform. So, I was not able to get away from the red tape at CapU, and surprisingly I was not capable of showing something on my academic journey that could extent me to take this course. So here I am, grateful for having taken this course with such a wonderful teacher. I must admit the readings and all materials presented touched my soul, the topics, and the contents mattered to me, make me sense and the by-product of all of it was that I was able to improve my writing skills. I have found very valuable the materials provided for this semester, especially the concept of
intergenerational trauma as Chelsea Wowel refers to as the “cumulative emotional and
psychological wounding across generations.”
Having personally suffered from anxiety and depression at several stages of my life and coming from a family with anxiety and depression disorders it was very revealing this new scope to explain myself, my ancestors, and my descendants.
On my father´s side, we are immigrants from Ireland to the United States and then to Mexico. My grandmother emigrated alone on a train during the civil war from Chicago to Mexico City to marry my grandfather. She traveled alone and got married alone, raised a family alone in Mexico, and suffered from depression and anxiety for more than 40 years, this is all her adult life. I have always thought that her depression was caused only by physiological and inherited factors. After learning these materials, the whole picture gets clearer as to why she suffered from depression so deeply. I can imagine now how being here alone, away from her land, her language her people, alienated by a totally different culture she was being dispossessed. I can see that she inherited from my father, who has treated his depression as Hari would say, with only one option on the “menu”
(3) namely with antidepressants and Cognitive Behavioral Therapy. Then my Dad inherited to me, and I have tried to “expand the menu”(3) by including other perspectives and aspects of my life to understand myself and now also to understand my daughter Jacinta who is actually at this very moment at her 14 years dealing with anxiety, taking antidepressants and undertaking CBT. I can now not consider her context, as we have just moved away from Mexico and the things, she cares about the most as a possible cause for her current condition. “Is there a language of depression? I’m not sure. As Hori mentions, Depression often seems to me like the exact opposite of language. It takes your tongue, your thoughts, your self-worth, and leaves an empty vessel. Not that different from colonialism, really”.
So this course also inspired me to share my own journey in dealing with anxiety and finding my own path through yoga as a source of wellness. That is why I chose this topic as my Care Package subject. I am thankful for having the opportunity to share with others and to realize at the same time and most importantly my own journey. I hope that my package is appealing enough for other beings to identify and be willing to reconnect with themselves.
Hari, Johann. “Is Everything You Think You Know About Depression Wrong?” The Guardian, 7
Jan. 2018, pp. 1-6