Every Trauma Is Real: Why Suffering Is Valid, Even If Someone Else Has It Worse
We don’t get to choose what traumatizes our brain and what doesn’t. Something I hear often from trauma survivors is “What happened wasn’t that bad,” and “I should have been able to handle it.” That’s not how it works. If you fall off a stool, there is no time to deliberate over your choices. Your body will immediately try to protect your head and core by putting your arms and legs out, but you may still stumble away with a sprained ankle. In the same way, your brain tries to protect you from dangerous or abusive situations by reacting quickly (flight, fight, freeze, fawn) but it does not have the power to prevent all injury, especially if the problem is ongoing. Just because you think it should not have traumatized you does not mean that it didn’t. Just because “others have it worse” after falling off a roof instead of a stool does not mean that you walked away without injury.
You have to deal with YOUR injury no matter the severity. Invalidating your experience and ignoring the injury is like running on a swollen, sprained ankle or pretending your bone isn’t sticking out of your arm. It’s going to get worse.
Healing is painful. The pain we experience when doctors examine and treat our injuries is part of the healing process - the same is true for psychological injury. Pain is uncomfortable but it gives us important information and motivation to deal with the problem.
Healing requires support. A valid reason to hold off on trauma-focused treatment is not having adequate support. If you don’t feel safe enough in your own home and have people in your life who will listen and respond to your needs, then you need to start there. Working with a trauma-specialist to develop a safe therapeutic relationship can be helpful in starting this process.
You can learn how to fall. Coaches, whether in sports, dance, horse-back riding, etc., teach their players how to fall safely to help prevent injury. Of course, players still get injured but less often and less severely. Part of healing is learning how to feel safe again. It can feel scary and vulnerable to take the risk and climb back up. The possibility of being hurt again is difficult to swallow. Fortunately, the more you deal with your own trauma injuries, work on your skills, boundaries, support system, and ability to embrace emotional pain, the more resilient you become. Your mind will have more protection. If you are re-injured, you will be able to bounce back a little faster.
“What is trauma? As I use the word, "trauma" is an inner injury, a lasting rupture or split within the self due to difficult or hurtful events. By this definition, trauma is primarily what happens within someone as a result of the difficult or hurtful events that befall them; it is not the events themselves. "Trauma is not what happens to you but what happens inside you' is how I formulate it.” Gabor Maté, The Myth of Normal: Trauma, Illness, and Healing in a Toxic Culture