ON THE 25TH ANNIVERSARY OF SEPTEMBER 11 – WE REMEMBER

Eva Usadi

September 11, 2026

This anniversary has been a very difficult one for me personally.

My son asked me the other day to tell him some things about that day and the days and weeks and months that followed that others don’t know. He wanted to know my story—a story I have rarely shared with anyone.

So as we talked, the memories flooded back: the days I spent at the Armory on 26th Street; the months at Ground Zero in the big white tent, affectionately called the “Taj Mahal” by firefighters, law enforcement, secret service, FBI and construction workers; the hours I spent in my local firehouse, which had lost 12 members.

9/11 changed more than the trajectory of my career. It changed the way I understood service, sacrifice, and what it means to bear witness to the experiences of others.

And while that is true—and has been of benefit to those I work with in my private practice and through TRR—it does not tell the whole story.  

What I have rarely talked about is how profoundly 9/11 changed me.

I went to the Armory, to Ground Zero, and to my local firehouse because I wanted to help and knew I had the skills to do so. I could not have known then that those experiences would become a defining part of my life and would shape the work I would do for the next 25 years. 

I witnessed extraordinary courage, unimaginable loss, and the complicated aftermath that so many people carried long after the headlines faded, and that some still carry. I came to a deeper understanding of the way that trauma does not end when the immediate danger ends. For many, that is when a different kind of struggle begins. Especially for first responders who are so good at putting their heads down and staying operational–the emotional residue can be profound. 

Those experiences became part of the foundation of my work with trauma, and led me to deepening my work with civilians, and ultimately to the combat veterans I serve through TRR. They have shaped not only what I do, but how I understand the people I have the privilege of working with.

Twenty-five years later, I think less about 9/11 as a singular event and more about everything that came after it—the lives changed, the reward and the cost of service, the losses that could never be unlost, and the ways people found meaning and purpose in moving forward.

That, ultimately, is what I hope TRR can honor. Not only the sacrifice of those who valiantly serve, but their capacity for transformation.

And, it is especially poignant that most of the veterans we have worked with through the years joined the Armed Forces because of 9/11.

We cannot change what happened to people. We cannot erase loss. But we can help create the conditions in which people can heal, reconnect, and discover that there can be a life beyond what happened to them. The transformation belongs to the survivors and those who serve, not to tragedy.

That is the work I am grateful to be part of.

I want to remember.

I want to remember the people who were lost, the people who survived, and the countless people who showed up in the aftermath and carried what they witnessed home with them.

And I want my son—and those who come after us—to know that these were not simply events in history.

They were people.

They were lives.

They were families.

And for those of us who were there, in whatever capacity, they remain part of us.

May their memory be a blessing. 

On this 25th anniversary, I remember those we lost, I honor those who served—and I remain deeply committed to those who are still finding their way home.