From American Detox: The Myth of Wellness and How We Can Truly Heal by Kerri Kelly

Nine days after 9/11 we piled into my living room—family, friends, neighbors— and leaned into the TV as President Bush addressed the nation. Our house had become mission control since the attacks—overcrowded with people, activated by the search, and stuffy with uncertainty and grief. We were yearning for answers: How did this happen? What will make it right? But when the president boldly declared retaliation—when he said “this will be a war like no other”—I flinched. At the time, over 10,000 were still unaccounted for (including my stepdad). Hadn’t we lost enough? Why would we put ourselves in a position of losing more? Of risking more lives? Of destroying more families? And in that moment, I had a punch to the gut—a knowing so deep it was undeniable—that meeting violence with more violence was not the answer. As I sat there feeling the sting of his words, the dread of what was to come, I knew that my life as I had known it was forever changed. ... Everything I had come to know about what it meant to be well came crashing down with those towers. My perfectly curated “before” life was shattered, and the illusion that I was somehow insulated and sheltered from the rest of the world was destroyed. And despite society’s attempts to deny us the truth, to numb our pain, to distract us, and to keep us separate and desperate, I was forever altered.