Just in the past few days I’ve heard several people reflect over the impact of traumatic events in their lives, but with a difference. These events took place at a time when they neither had the awareness of the harm that was occurring nor the tools (naturally) to deal with that harm.
Then I reflected on one of the seasons of my life where I experienced trauma with neither the awareness of the harm that was occurring nor the tools to deal with that harm.
As an apprentice my first three years (1984 – 1986) involved verbal and some physical abuse—considered normal more or less for that time and context. Yet it was still harmful. When I wrote about these experiences (trigger warning) here and here, some of my family were mortified, and my mother expressed sorrow for not even knowing about it. Of course, she couldn’t have known about it. It wasn’t discussed because I didn’t realise that it was abuse, even though these harsh experiences eventually inspired me to pursue a career in occupational health and safety. For something that occurred in the 1980s, none of us really had a bearing for it until recent times.
We’re more trauma-conscious these days than we’ve ever been—and that’s a good though also a hard thing.
It’s good because it’s the truth, and it’s only when we face our truth that we’re truly free. But it’s hard to face our truth because it’s always a journey, a process, a travelling toward the ideal of healing—one that cavorts with pain. And it brings us to the point of conflict because the emergent truth is often a revelation to others we care about too.
We will be healed if we enter that journey with diligence, yet to embark on such a commitment is always a step of faith because there are no guarantees.
Those traumas that occurred to us that we really didn’t recognise or acknowledge when they occurred can be a shock. We can feel like WE are somehow to blame, but how can we be blamed when we were both clueless AND the victim.
It’s understandable if the revelation of what we suffered rocks us. It’s also reasonable for us to experience all sorts of emotions. And at times we’re just relieved that we didn’t know at the time. But a lot of the time, facing such truths is itself a trauma—the sheer shock that we were vulnerable and harmed when we had no idea.
When it sends us into a spin and we don’t know how to deal with what arises, it’s an opportunity to seek help. Prayers remain that it’s help we get, and not victim-blaming. To do this is brave on three fronts: to experience the waves of shock and sobering reality, to trust courage to the point of reaching out for help, and then (if we get that support) to trust the support that needs to be relied upon (which is a HUGE thing when we’re so vulnerable).
One opportunity we can miss in resenting the presence of a trauma we now must recover from is growth from the challenge. In terms of resilience, if only we can hold the tension of two opposed things, we not only heal but we grow too.
The truth is, to wrestle with this is to heal AND grow,
but it may well feel like an impossibility.
Coming face to face with every truth that ever happened to us—a bit at a time so we can manage it—is the opportunity to truly heal. Coming face to face with every truth—one truth at a time—is ultimately the opportunity to forgive people and situations that harmed us so healing can occur.
See how we enter a crossroad at the sign of pain?
We can either experience disgust that it even happened and lose a significant portion of our lives enraged about it, or we can submit ourselves to the work ahead which we’ll grow from. We’re certainly understood and forgiven for feeling angry and bitter about it, no question. But it only takes us so far.
When we experience wonder for what can be achieved, we enter the task of healing from it.
Looking forward to what can be done is a productive way of dealing with looking behind which is just full of pain. But through the process we need a ton of support.
Trauma is common within the human condition in a harsh world.
Sadly, if we don’t endeavour to heal it,
we’re destined to be affected by it.
When we’re honest about trauma’s effects on us,
those effects don’t harm us or others as much,
and those effects are even able to be redeemed.
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