How I Escaped Iran & Wrote My Way to Freedom | My Name Means Fire Author Atash Yaghmaian

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What if the condition that made your life unmanageable was also the source of your greatest gifts? In this episode, I sit down with Atash Yaghmaian, a therapist, activist, and author of My Name Means Fire, to explore how writing became the bridge between her many parts, her trauma, and ultimately her freedom. Atash lives with dissociative identity disorder (DID), and shares what that means: not as something to be feared, but as a brilliant survival mechanism that carried her through war, revolution, and abuse in her native Iran. We explore the power of writing from your parts, how reading can be an act of solidarity, and why inner harmony makes you a better human, writer, and friend to the world.

Episode Chapters

• 03:02 Coming Out With Dissociative Identity Disorder
• 11:10 Writing a Memoir With Multiple Voices
• 21:25 From the Iranian Revolution to Finding Freedom
• 37:09 Healing the Inner Child Through Writing
• 42:14 DID as Protection, Healing, and Activism

Resources for this Episode: 

• Books to Read on Iran
• A Different Side of the Self: On Finding Freedom By Telling My Story in English by Atash Yaghmaian
• Find and Refine Your Memoir’s Narrative Arc
• Ditch Your Inner Critic Now 

Atash’s Bio:  Atash Yaghmaian is the author of “My Name Means Fire.” She is a writer and a psychotherapist whose stories and articles about mental health and Iran have appeared in LitHub, Ms. Magazine, The New York Daily News, The Mighty, and Thrive Global, among others. Born in Tehran, Atash migrated to the United States alone at the age of 19, fleeing war, trauma, and abuse. She blogs at atashyaghmaian.com.

Connect with Atash: 

• Website: www.atashyaghmaian.com
• Instagram: @ayhealing
• YouTube: @AtashYaghmaian

Sign up for Find and Refine Your Memoir’s Narrative Arc: https://bit.ly/4aK5wQI

Connect with your host, Lisa:
Get Your Free Copy of Ditch Your Inner Critic: https://lisacooperellison.com/subscribe/
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Produced by Espresso Podcast Production