On Friday, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez appeared on Maria Hinojosa’s podcast Latino USA, on which she spoke about her experience after the Jan. 6 Capitol riots and how she has taken care of herself since then. She said it was her good friend and fellow “squad” member Rep. Ayana Pressley (D-MA), who got her to focus on self care following the event.
“After the 6th, I took some time and it was really [Rep.] Ayanna Pressley when I explained to her what happened to me, like the day of, because I ran to her office,” AOC said. “And she was like, ‘You need to recognize trauma. And this is something that you went through, but we’re all going through. And it’s really important to pause after that, because that’s how you process it.’”
She added that the Jan. 6 insurrection brought up similar feelings she had after her father died when she was in college at Boston University.
“That happened at a young age, and I locked it away,” she said. “I had to live with that for years, and so, I learned my lesson then. And now, I feel like I’ve had to take a beat.” She added that she’s been in therapy but also said she has made it a priority to slow down in her life.
“I think the Trump administration had a lot of us, especially Latino communities, in a very reactive mode,” she said.
Ocasio-Cortez has previously spoken about how she was affected by the events of the insurrection, a day where she has said she feared for her life. During her Instagram Live in early February, she revealed that she is a sexual assault survivor and explained how trauma “compounds,” no matter its size.
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