- Casandra Stouder
- Apr 14
- 3 min read
My name is Casandra Stouder. I am Diné and Seminole. And let me be real with you, I am a work in progress. I come to you not as a perfect healer, but as someone who has walked through fire and is still learning to respect the ashes.
My story starts with my sister, Cynthia. At eight months, a brain injury altered her voice, her sight, her movement. She lived in a powerful way, feeling the world through sensation. She went from eight months of what we perceive as normal to being diagnosed with cerebral palsy, blind, paralyzed, unable to speak and confined to a wheelchair for 36 years, her power, my life teacher. My grandma named her turtle in Creek/Seminole. My big sister taught me that strength isn't about what you can do, but about what you endure, and that true strength resides in stillness. She taught me about the raw, undeniable power of the human spirit to survive, even when the body fails.
My journey wasn't pretty. I grew up on the rez, my grandparents waking me before dawn, urging me to pray. My grandparents and community elders gave me many traditional roles from a very young age as though time was running out to learn the old ways. This urgency is something I understand as an adult. Most adults in my childhood battled alcoholism, their own pains, anger, a legacy of the trauma we carry as Indigenous people. Boarding schools, forced removals, the systematic destruction of our culture – it's not just history; it's in our hereditary code. It's complex.
Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) research shows how trauma rewires our brains, disrupts our hormones, and increases our risk for chronic disease. Epigenetics reveals how these experiences can even alter our gene expression, impacting generations to come. This isn't just about feeling bad; it's about the physical reality of what we carry.
I walked through my own underworld. From 4 to 33, I battled addiction, surviving abduction and brutality, incarceration, violence, self-harm. I know the taste of despair, the weight of shame. I know what it’s like to want to disappear. I’ve been there. I’ve survived near death experiences many times and I've done the things that I am not proud of.
And yet, despite it all, I’ve also lived as a leader, a child advocate, a women’s support, a recovery coach, a wellness and fitness master trainer, a social worker, a wilderness education leader, and so much more. I've held positions of strength and service, only to repeatedly fall back into the darkness, not yet ready to fully embrace my own healing. This is my truth. I resented each time I fell, each time the darkness pulled me under.
But I also know that we are not defined by our scars. We are defined by our willingness to heal, to rise, to reclaim our power. I learned that healing isn't about erasing the past, but about facing it even when we shake, it's about understanding it, integrating it, and choosing a different way. These last few years, I’ve finally grounded myself, dedicating myself to prayer, healing, and truth, the best way I can.
I’m here to share the tools I’ve found on this journey. Not the perfect answers, but the hard-won lessons, the undeniable power of ceremonies, and other science-backed practices that have helped me find my way. I'm here to offer a space where we can be real, where we can share our truths, where we can learn about solutions and heal together.
Our healing isn’t just for ourselves. It’s for our families, our communities, our future. We are the ones who break the cycles, who rewrite the stories, who build a better world.
We are not alone. We are connected all creation to the earth, to the stars, to each other. We carry within us the strength of those who survived, and we are building a path for those who will thrive.
Relatives!
Let’s be real, let’s be honest, let’s be brave. Explore our own offerings, and let’s walk this path together. Aho!
