DNA

Exploring Collective Trauma in our Family Trees

February 3, 2021 by Jennifer Holik Leave a Comment

In my new course, Trauma in the Family Tree, we will explore four core themes, one of which is collective trauma. What is it? How do we identify it for our ancestors’ lives? How did they cope with it or did they not process it? How much of the collective trauma our ancestors endured was passed through our DNA to us?

In broad strokes we will explore and identify several areas of collective historical trauma for students to work with in their own family histories. Learn more in my video and be sure to subscribe to my mailing list using this link. Subscribers will be the first to hear about registration and receive a discount for the course.

Trauma in the Family Tree Course Details

January 30, 2021 by Jennifer Holik Leave a Comment

I’m excited to announce some details about a new course I’m releasing, Trauma in the Family Tree. In this 3 hour course/retreat, I will cover four primary topics in broad strokes.

Trauma as a biographical event.
Collective Trauma and how it impacts us today.
Personal Trauma and exploring how to identify what is ours and what is our ancestors.
Energy healing tools. Many of these will be explored throughout the course to help you tap into the past and heal the present, but additional resources will be provided before we close.

Replays will be available for all sections of the course along with some guided meditations and energy tool videos and worksheets as required.

Registration opens soon for this exciting new course. To learn more and be the first to receive registration details, be sure to subscribe to my mailing list today. Subscribers will receive a discount to this new course. Learn more in my video below!

Your Family’s War Journey Master Class

January 17, 2021 by Jennifer Holik Leave a Comment

Start your journey to the past and transform your life…

Journey with Jennifer as your travel guide, through your family’s history, their military stories, and your own story. On this journey you will read a life-changing book.

Together with a core group of people, we will discuss issues and emotions around the themes of war, religion, women’s themes, spirituality, family, stories, patterns, trauma, inherited trauma, racism, LGBTQ, caregiver issues, secrets, shame, guilt, PTSD, and many other topics that come from the book, my questions, and your experiences.

We will discuss various ways to heal the issues that arise through this deep research and writing we do and with what emerges in our personal lives.

You will explore your family’s history and dive into who you are with this knowledge. You will even begin to write your own stories.

We will use the book “Reconciliation with War” by Janelle Kaye and Charles Willshire as a foundation to transformation. You are required to purchase the book. Details are in the confirmation email you receive upon registration.

While this book focuses on the WWII experience, the themes and exercises discussed apply to any war, any ancestral pattern or trauma, and every family. You will be able to take this knowledge and apply to many aspects of your personal life and ancestral lineage healing practice.

Learn more extensive details and watch another video about course themes on the registration page.

Does Historical Context Matter Anymore?

November 10, 2020 by Jennifer Holik 1 Comment

This year has been a roller coaster of emotions and events. With a lot of incorrect information pushed to the masses to keep them asleep, in fear, and not questioning. In some ways, the world has reverted back to the atmosphere of WWII where they ratted on their neighbors and lived in fear because the propaganda at the time was pushed on them to have one point of view. If that point of view was questioned, then the consequences could have been deadly.

On the flip side of this coin we are also seeing a lot of hidden information about people, the past, and events, come to light. As this happens, we are each being called to process it, witness what took place, acknowledge the unintegrated trauma that is contained in our bodies and energy systems, and heal. I have been doing a lot of this since March and honestly, it has changed some of my feelings about the World Wars, the sacrifices made, especially by my those who were killed who have called out to me, and this work I do. It has taken months to integrate some of what I’ve learned and come to a place of personal peace. I thought I understood the historical context of it all, but I discovered there was more to the story that had been kept from the world.

Historical Context & Trauma

As I dive deeper into healing work and trauma work with my military research clients and writing groups, I am aware of the unintegrated trauma that lives within each of them. I also see how they are willing to explore the historical context of the past. In fact, this month I spent the Office Hours for my writing groups doing facilitation on energy and trauma healing. Individually, and as a group, they had reached a point in research and writing that was pushing them beyond the boundaries of where they had been and were being pushed to go deeper. To allow the emotions to surface. To start questioning even more than they had prior. To do the deeper healing work.

I have also observed how many 20-somethings and kids still in school are viewing the world and history. In speaking with one of my kids and observing posts by younger people on social media – it is clear that the concept of historical context has not been taught in school. If it has, then it was a 5 minute discussion. The majority of young people today are offended by anything that doesn’t fit within the narrow view of life they’ve been programmed to believe is real. They believe books and movies and music should be banned because it’s deemed racist – even if it was written decades ago. And they view history through their eyes today – if an event or concept doesn’t fit into what they’ve been programmed and manipulated into believing then it must be a lie or couldn’t have happened or shouldn’t exist. I have to ask, Does Historical Context Matter Anymore?

Ignoring the context of the past does not help heal the past or heal each of us individually. It only prolongs the suffering and pain and slows the change that could take place on the planet and in our lives.

Do We Need Historical Context?

I feel strongly we need to be teaching historical context to every person on the planet. We need to understand why it is important to witness the past through the eyes, rules, laws, culture, society, religion, and education of those times. The world functioned differently then. Values were different. Events took place that had dramatic impact on creating mass trauma for the collective, especially through the two World Wars. And after the war, people were encouraged to forget, shove it away, don’t talk about it. Definitely do not question anything that took place.

We need to be able to drop in and observe what took place in the past without attaching to it. Sometimes that is easier said than done. I spent many years crying, moving through deep emotions and personal trauma that surfaced from my life and from my ancestral lineage, and healing what was there. It was not an easy or fast process and as healing is a spiral, we are never done.

Trauma and healing are also an embodied process, meaning we need to be in our bodies and paying attention to what is happening inside. Through witnessing and observing where in our bodies we feel the pain or numbness or hyperarousal, we can begin to work with it and heal the trauma that resides within. Are we responding or reacting to what is happening outside us in the world or this new information we receive? The answer to that question shows us where we are functioning from in that moment – pain or healing.

We also need to teach historical context in the present and encourage people to look at what truly IS in this moment. Ask….

Why do we have this pain or suffering or trauma being created right now?
How have I as an individual contributed to the creation of this trauma?
How can I as an individual help heal this trauma?

Healing with Historical Context

It has been a blessing for me the last several years, to be of service to clients who requested trauma and grief healing through the military research projects we have done together. One of the biggest factors to start the healing process or identify why a client was feeling a certain way, was to first look at the historical context of what took place that is creating the reaction in the client.

As an example, I had a client who became angry and upset when he read the research report and files because his father was given rights to his oldest brother’s remains and personal effects during World War II.

My first step was to explain the historical context. As the father/male head of the family, he had legal right as next of kin to make those decisions and receive the effects. This explanation opened space for the client to better understand why this took place.

My next step was to learn more about the client’s family and early life during and after the war to identify any other issues that may have created such a strong reaction. I learned quite a lot that gave me context.

Then we were able to do some facilitation and began to clear away old beliefs and feelings that were keeping the client stuck in a pattern of anger over the past. One of the gifts I have is to help clear out old energetic patterns and trauma, to help people heal. One step at a time. However, it began with historical context.

So what do you think? Do we need historical context any more? Should we be teaching this in schools? Should parents step up and take a more active role in planting seeds with their kids about context?

If you would like to work with me to explore and heal your family’s ancestral trauma, grief, and loss, please check out my facilitation packages and details. You can also email me to ask questions.

How Has Military Research & Writing Saved Your Life?

October 29, 2020 by Jennifer Holik Leave a Comment

First, let’s put it out there that when I ask the question, How has military research and writing saved your life, I’m not necessarily asking if, or implying, you have been or are suicidal. Though some people may have had thoughts. Something or someone stepping in to save our lives doesn’t always mean it is life or death on a physical level. It can be emotional, mental, or spiritual.

I can say without a doubt, military research and writing has saved my life and healed deep parts of me on multiple occasions. It all began in a small way in 1996 when I started researching my family history and heard snippets of stories about my WWI and WWII relatives who served and most of whom died. Yet it wasn’t until 2010 when I started writing my bucket list book To Soar with the Tigers about my Flying Tiger cousin Robert Brouk, that the ancestors and research and writing, stepped in to help me heal. To stay sane. To be of greater service to the world.

Robert’s story opened me up to writing and publishing and soon after, speaking publicly on military research and writing. As soon as I published his book, my relatives who died in service showed up to say, ‘Now write about us and figure out how to do it!’ So I took the plunge and dedicated thousands of hours to learning how to research all branches. Read so many files and death files I’m surprised I didn’t become incredibly depressed and anxious – though on some level I was and didn’t realize it until years later.

Next, Michael, Frankie, and James showed up. Michael and James had the biggest impact on saving me from 2012 – 2014. When Michael showed up, so did his brother Joseph (my great grandpa). Joseph showed up when I moved out and began guiding me, loving me unconditionally, giving it to me straight, and being there so I wasn’t alone. Michael’s was the next story I wrote, which tore me to pieces. I cried so much as I channeled parts of that story, including the ending about Michael’s return and burial. You can watch that story at the end of my RootsTech 2018 talk (about minute 34).

I was holding in and shoving down so many emotions about my entire life, my divorce, starting a new life with my boys, that Joseph said basically, ‘You can write it out, cry it out, serve others, or become a suicidal serial killer. What do you choose?’ I chose to write and serve. Doing that opened up my heart, released a lot of old baggage, fears, emotions, patterns, and allowed me to step into a new version of myself.

James showed up not long after Michael but I took his story more slowly. James guided me, my career, helped people show up, loved me, and encouraged me the final time I was offered my first trip to Europe to TAKE IT! He was with me that entire trip. You can see him in the orb above my head here in France.

James rearranged our trip after the first week so we could visit places he fought before he died. He made sure I met people I knew in past lives, one he fought with in WWII who lives now in Europe. He made it rain the day we visited his grave for the first time and flew his burial flag over the Luxembourg Cemetery. (On my next visit a few months later he let the sun shine as I entered the grave space and let me know it was all ok.)

He stood with me the following day near Bras, Belgium where he was killed in what is now a replanted forest near a large open field. The others there whispered to me to keep going, keep writing, keep telling THEIR stories so they wouldn’t be forgotten, even when it was hard and wanted to kill me. Keep going.

That first trip completely changed my life and life course and future relationships.

Fast forward to today, 29 October 2020, as the world stirs the bubbling cauldron of chaos, hate, anger, strife, violence, censorship, suppression, division……..where some of us are standing in light and love. Where some of us see the truths unfolding.

The military work I’ve done the last 10 years has shifted dramatically this year as I stood more in the power of who I am today. It also helped me heal something very deep that I was really scared to look at for more than 20 years. The story of my paternal grandparents, Joe and Libbie. However, in going deep into their lives and stories around the war and what came after, this year has allowed me to heal myself in deep ways and them and all those attached to us.

The last couple of months I’ve done a lot of writing about Joe and Libbie and myself and my husband. No one has seen this and most of it will never be shared. Working with energy healing and other healing modalities, I was able to forgive, heal, release, shift the patterns and energy and intense emotions out. I have a better understanding of why it was the way it was. Why it has been a certain way most of my life. Why my current relationship is, on one level, what it is and is not. And what my grandma wanted for me all these years. To be loved and happy.

There are still some layers of that story yet to be revealed, but I took the big scary step of really looking at their story and my life with honesty and openness. I mark it as one of the biggest ways I’ve healed and changed in 2020. So while lockdown and being separated from my husband for what will probably be at least a full year by the time Europe settles down, it has served a purpose. The military research and writing has served a purpose. There are many other stories I could share and you will see some of them on this website, but for today…..this is enough.

On 6 January 2021, I will be giving a talk with the Virginia War Memorial Foundation on Military Research and Storytelling as Healing. Details will be posted soon on this new chapter I’m creating in my business. It is time we start to heal, especially after all that comes to light in 2020 and early 2021.

How has your research and writing saved you? In what ways? How are you now being of service to others by sharing your stories?

If you are interested in working with me to write your stories, need help with energy healing to process what you learn, check out my facilitation services and contact me today to ask questions about how I can best help you.

Genograms as a Family & Military History Tool

May 28, 2020 by Jennifer Holik Leave a Comment

There are so many ways to look at our genealogy and military family history in deeper ways than just compiling a family tree. The Genogram, a diagram outlining the history of the behavior patterns (as of divorce, abortion, or suicide) of a family over several generations, is one tool that can be useful to dive deeper into your past and also heal your present.

What Does a Genogram Look Like?

The best way to show you what a genogram looks like is to give you something interactive. View a short Genogram video depicting the Skywalker family from Star Wars.

How are Genograms Helpful?

Genograms can show us through various symbols showing relationships, births, marriages, deaths, patterns, and some biographical data, what is happening in a family at a point in time. Therapists use genograms to explore what a new client is dealing with at the time they start therapy. One nice thing about a genogram is it can be continually expanded as new information comes in or the therapy sessions continue.

So if this is a tool for therapists, why should family or military historians or those seeking to do self-healing use it? I use it because it shows the family patterns and issues we may not otherwise see. Sometimes a visual example is better than a story. Additionally, being able to see the military connections and patterns that surfaced after World War II were surprising. Visual representation of the effects of war were more powerful than family stories.

When I completed my genogram in December 2019, while reading the book Family Secrets by John Bradshaw, I was astounded and shocked that I was living pieces of my paternal grandparent’s lives. Not the blessing part of their lives but the burdens. Expanding this again in May 2020 I learned even more patterns I was carrying forward in my life and relationships, not only on the paternal side relating to my WWII Navy grandpa, but also the maternal side. John’s book helped me explore many aspects of my family history and he gives many examples of how family historians can use genograms in a simple way. Now I am able to look more deeply at my grandpa’s story and do some inner healing so I stop living parts of his life. This brings enormous peace.

This knowledge created a turning point for me in which I had to choose to continue these patterns or allow them to surface and look at the dark side of my family and personal history. Look at the choices I’ve made unconsciously, that now I can bring to the conscious level and explore. What is working? What is not? What can I let go of or change? Do I still have to repeat negative or destructive patterns? It is all a choice.

Other Uses of a Genogram for Self & Family Healing

Interestingly, this diagram can be used for so much more than behavioral patterns. We can map out the beliefs and patterns for an individual and family relating to the following topics. This information can help us explore our personal patterns and negative traits in relationship to different areas of our life. Looking at these areas can allow old patterns and inherited ancestral burdens to come out of the dark into the light to look at. Once we are able to look at these things, we can heal and release them so they not longer affect us or our ancestors or descendants.

Health history
Culture
Religion or Spirituality
Occupation
Ethnicity, Immigration, Migration
Business, Government, or other Institutional relationships
Play
Family Constellations

Would you like to explore this more?

Join my mailing list to be the first to hear about my new Ancestral Souls Healing Circle Membership, launching in June 2020. In this healing circle we will have monthly Zoom meetings to explore topics like this and other deeper genealogy and family pattern topics. When you join the mailing list you also get access to the free member’s area of Finding the Answers Journey, which is my course and webinar website.

Do you have questions or would you like to work with me? Email me at info@wwiirwc.com to discuss.

Disclosure – the book link is an affiliate link. I make a tiny percentage off the sale. This does not affect the price you pay.

Book Review – Ethical Dilemmas in Genealogy

February 12, 2020 by Jennifer Holik Leave a Comment

Penny Walters has written an amazing book every genealogy and military research should read. It’s called Ethical Dilemmas in Genealogy by Penny Walters.

Why is this book important?

Penny outlines many potential ethical dilemmas faced by genealogy and military researchers. A few include: How do we handle things like secrets uncovered? Knowledge of a DNA match to someone the family didn’t know existed? How does a professional provide potentially emotionally damaging information to a client – or do they? Do you celebrate when you find a criminal in your family? These are only the tip of the iceberg.

How do we handle these things? Penny’s book shows us how through numerous examples and case studies. Her book covers:

What are ethical dilemmas?
Ethical dilemmas in genealogy.
DNA Testing
Adoption
Ethnicity and Identity
Potted History & Potential Future of Genealogy

Why did I want to read this book?

As a 20+ year genealogist and 10+ year military research professional, I purchased Penny’s book to explore the deeper layers of this work I do, that most of us do, that people are not as willing to discuss. As I move more into energy healing, ancestral lineage healing and helping families explore family patterns and go deeper than names, dates, places, battles, etc., Penny’s book shed light on areas in which I have not worked or needed to consider, like Adoption.

Now working with adoptees through private facilitation sessions, I have more tools in my toolbox to help them navigate their journey. I have more questions to ask as they write their stories and explore their personal truths. The remainder of Penny’s book also provides a lot of questions we can ask ourselves or our clients. Broader questions I think that should be discussed in the larger genealogy community also – something many are afraid to do because of taboo subjects and worries about offending someone. I think if we set those things aside and open up to these important questions, we can change and heal so much in our families and histories and the world.

Penny’s book is one I will be recommending to my clients and using further in my many projects, classes, webinars, and research work.

Disclosure: The book link is an affiliate link. It does not affect the price you pay.

Facilitation Sessions Now Available

January 13, 2020 by Jennifer Holik Leave a Comment

Facilitation sessions can serve a lot of different purposes. You can read more about them on our services page and watch the video to learn the new ways I’m offering facilitation sessions. If you would like to book a session, please visit Finding the Answers Journey to select your package.

Book Review: Aftershock. The Human Toll of War

November 25, 2019 by Jennifer Holik Leave a Comment

I had experienced many grim signs in combat. I took more pictures than I can remember. But the best picture was the one I didn’t take. I was about to photograph a group of inmates who obviously didn’t have more than thirty minutes to live. I just couldn’t bear to see the look in their eyes. So, I lowered my camera and simply walked away.
Robert stubenrauch 163rd signal photographic company on dachau

Recently the National Archives livestreamed a program about a new photo book based on the end of WWII. The book is Aftershock The Human Toll of War. The livestream is worth watching because I learned a lot of new details about combat, research, the number of photos at the archives, and more about the service members themselves.

This book is not your usual World War II photo book. It contains layers of questions we should be asking ourselves about our veterans. It contains research possibilities you may not have considered. It contains powerful quotes like the one at the top of this article that make us stop and think about our family member’s experiences. Some people will see it for the images alone. Others will see the depth it contains.

Even victory was traumatic……Upon the release of a POW camp when the POWs rushed the tanks, kissed the tankers, and showed so much joy, Rosenblum wrote “You see men killed before your very eyes. You see the hate in the face of the Nazi soldier even while our medics are giving him first aid. And then the French and their stories of Nazi oppression. The brain isn’t large enough to encompass all the suffering and hardships the Nazis have caused.”
Walter rosenblum

The book is focused on the year 1945 with its images. Each image has been digitally enhanced and context has been provided. Photographers are given credit for their photos, which was not normally done during the war. The photos would be printed in the newspapers with Army Signal Corps as the creator.

The book does contain very graphic photographs. If gore or viewing photos of concentration camp victims or war dead is not for you then you might skip this book. If you can stomach what you see, it might just change your perspective on the war, any war, and the way our veterans were. It might also generate a conversation about why we continue to fight wars today when they continue to do more destruction than good.

The book did give me some leads on research possibilities. A couple photos specifically say a photographer took photos of members of the 69th Infantry Division. If you are researching that Division, you know there will be some images – maybe not of your soldier, but worth checking.

I have visited the Dragons Teeth on the West Wall – commonly referred to as the Siegfried Line, but this book contains a photo from 1945 that gives me a much better image of what it looked like then and just how massive it was.

The book also provides many glimpses into the combat experience of these war photographers. How often we think only the man with a gun would have PTSD or have suffered from his experience. We forget that everyone who was in the war suffered in some way. The photographers maybe more than others because they were up front and personal with their subjects, which often contained death and destruction. One photographer is quoted, “Sumners wrote about finding a family of four lying together in the crater made by the explosion of a mortar shell. I did not take a picture of this he wrote, but I still remember the whole family huddled there and covered with snow – a father trying to shield his family from the enemy.”

I highly recommend this book and encourage you to look deeper than the images themselves. It may create a whole new perspective for your military research, family stories, and healing.

Learn how I can help you

Are you ready to learn the bigger picture of your family member’s military service? There are many ways we can help you with research – we offer full service history research, we can help with evaluating what you have to prepare a research plan for you to do some of it yourself, we can help you write the stories. Just email us at the address below to schedule a free phone consult to discuss options.

Want to travel in your service member’s footsteps? We are a firm with not only hands-on document experience but also travel experience and can connect you with a guide or suggest places to stay and visit. We are taking new clients and can help you find the answers and tell a deeper story about your family member. Email us at info@wwiirwc.com to set up your free phone consultation today to discuss project options, fees, and time.

Disclaimer: The book links are affiliate links to Amazon. This does not affect the price you pay. When you purchase using my link I make a small percentage of the sale.

Veterans, PTSD, and Grief Study

November 14, 2019 by Jennifer Holik Leave a Comment

“While there has been abundant research quantifying war’s psychological impact, much of it has focused on PTSD, depression, and substance or alcohol abuse associated with combat exposure, there has been limited focus on grief among veterans.”
Pauline Lubens

UCI Studies Grief in Veterans

In World War I we heard the term SHELL SHOCK. In World War II we heard COMBAT FATIGUE. After Vietnam we didn’t hear much new unless it was in regard to how many Americans viewed returning veterans in a negative light. Then by the 1980s we had PTSD to label veterans suffering from a variety of illnesses that were previously undiagnosed or ignored.

PTSD trickles down through our DNA into future generations. Growing up in a household where PTSD exists can create this in children and other family members. Any traumatic situation we find ourselves in can create PTSD symptoms.

With all the studies on PTSD and veterans, one primary component, especially when we look at veteran suicide is GRIEF. Yet, grief has not been studied until recently. Grief also creates issues for not only the veteran but the family and friends close to the veteran.

Unresolved, unacknowledged grief over what someone did in combat, or did not do, who they lost, survivor’s guilt and sadness of being the only one left, and many other ways veterans hold grief all contribute to their state of mind, the life they live, the joy (or lack of )they feel. This unresolved grief also affects those closest to them.

Finally, the University of California Irvine conducted a study on grief in veterans. You can read about it here. It is interesting what they discovered and how it deeply affects veterans, even separately from any PTSD they may have or had, and how it affects families.

A radio interview was done with the Ph.D. student who conducted the study and several listeners called in to contribute to the conversation, including a female Graves Registration Service soldier. The interview is powerful and full of many themes I feel we should all be exploring with our own families – even if we have to go back to our WWII or Korean War veterans to ask questions and look for family patterns. Grief is something passed down also.

Exploring Grief in Your Family History

In our society we are taught/trained/told to buck up, shove things inside, deal with it and move on, or solve a problem, when we talk about grief. We are given 2-3 days of leave from our jobs if someone in the family dies. Apparently all we need is 2-3 days to deal with arrangements, grieve, forget and move on. Our western society has not done a good job helping people to learn how to grieve, or explain why it is important to do so.

I invite you to explore the times and places in your life and family history where there was an opportunity to grieve and instead you pushed it away or did not fully deal with it. Consider the cost of that to yourself, your health, your family life, your history. How did your family veterans handle grief? How did their spouses and children? How do you? How can you begin to change this?

Grief Resources

Do you need a resource to help you? I am taking a couple of courses with Shauna Janz through Sacred Grief. I am finding these grieving courses extremely helpful. I encourage you to check them out. I wrote an article about her Healing Conversations class here.

The website What’s Your Grief is also full of resources and articles. Have you explored this site?

Can I help you with your research?

Are you ready to learn the bigger picture of your family member’s military service? Email us at info@wwiirwc.com to set up your free phone consultation today to discuss project options, fees, and time. You can also sign-up for our free newsletter and receive the Start Writing Your Military Story Today free!

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