The opposite of falling asleep = falling awake.  

At 36 years old, I slowly started to "wake up" to my life, (I am now approaching my 49th year). Up until that point I had built a world based on decisions that directly resulted in affirming others, not self.  Unhealed trauma takes on many iterations, and this pleasing nature I acquired in order to function "normally"  is the one that felt the safest...until it wasn't.

I found myself questioning which of my thoughts were mine and which thoughts were infiltrated by the expectations of  being a "good southern" woman, mom, daughter, wife, sister + friend. How much of what I believed was really my beliefs, and  how much of it was a conditioning of my environment; society.

 And then wrestling with the fallout of  making those decisions that I felt were really me.

The following conversations with women and men tell all of my story. The photographs depict the dormancy leaving my body, and I remembered how to PLAY again. There are emails, letters, voice recordings, photos, and drawings of my ascent into falling awake, and the people who were honest enough to help me dissect that learning without the added pressure of pleasing them in any way. Honest, non-judgmental fragmented conversations. Unfiltered.