Imagine a world game of telephone, with a message in Morse code- that's how we got our current definition of trauma.
It's why we all struggle to answer the "what is trauma" question, especially without all the strong emotions, tragic events, and fancy medical lingo...
Really. It's a problem.
Most of our current trauma definitions aren’t meant for our interpretation.
They're meant to guide professionals in triaging treatment to the best sources of help- emotions aside.
As professionals are going through this process (primary purpose= action), it provides us with positive side-effects of emotional validation and normalization (secondary gain= being seen and heard).
AND IT CAN FEEL AMAZING!
Many people who feel this way after identifying with a definition of trauma that fit their experience will also come to feel very passionate about it. So they share, educate, and advocate- which is all great and helps many other people out there who are also struggling, to get treatment!
But with so many interpretations, things get lost in translation and over time, we're all
Playing an international game of telephone, spreading subjugated messages about trauma…
that may be practical, outdated, or irrelevant, and most definitely- limiting to only those whom have experienced.....
The positive side effects (validation & normalization) that subconsciously became the purpose of the trauma definitions we spread.
Yeah. Welcome to the gray area.
We need multiple, more inclusive trauma definitions,
each with a specifically designed purpose, for a specific party involved in it's identification, validation, normalization, and treatment.
Here's one example:
A trauma definition for those seeking validation, normalization, and/or a better understanding of response patterns to any of life's challenging themes:
Trauma: an issue when one or multiple of these...
encountering new life events/ taking in their new, yet familiar-feeling sensory details,
thinking about uncomfortable past scenarios/ periods of life,
attempting to cope with habits, feelings, and/or body sensations, related to or informed by past ones,
or even just imagining handling future life circumstances with any of the above, similarly or better than those in the past...
ends up triggering an impractical reactivation of memory details (ie. sensations, behavioral patterns, relationship preferences, outlooks on life, preventative means, NOT JUST flashbacks or traumatic reactions you very consciously know are related to past circumstances), along memory networks, containing similar themes of information you've collected and interpreted throughout life - helpful, traumatizing, unsettling, or otherwise.
A). Trauma is timelessly pervasive. It can be 'triggered' in innumerable ways, when actively focusing on the past, present, or future. It also may or may not be associated with a consciously identifiable event or period in life, making terms like 'acute,' 'chronic,' and 'complex' trauma labels without practical healing/ treatment value.
B). Trauma responses vary immensely. They aren't just in the form of flashbacks, hyper sensitive emotions, or somatic fight-or-flight response. They can also take the form of undesirable patterns of thinking or behaving, specific habits or unhealthy coping mechanisms, relationship styles, and even overall lifestyle preferences and occupational choices.
C). Trauma is held in memory networks, which encompasses a lifetime of mind, body, & soul memory. Not just one or the other, but all.
D). Trauma healing is ongoing because our experiences in life are. Memory Networks are forever shaped by our old and incoming new experiences. Some new ones will strengthen the helpful learning pathways forged by the old, while others might challenge them in new ways.
If we approach healing with treatment planning frameworks that are more inclusive and easily adaptable for any person's situation,
Finding relief [from trauma] can be a dream that's realistically attainable for anyone and everyone.
We just need more education (aka multiple definitions I mentioned earlier), accessibility to treatments, and to partially unlearn trauma's current definition from the late 80's, so that…
healthcare professionals can update/ change their definitions of what to look out for and treat [as trauma], while we seek more validation from the right sources, with our right purposes in mind.
Your takeaway from this long winded, educationally-based, passion project/ diary entry of sorts:
We’re blindly leading our society into a pandemic of traumatic invalidation…
If we don’t do something to validate the traumatic learning and experiencing of MORE PEOPLE.
How do we do this?
We need to share more!!
And I don’t mean share more traumatic details, experiences, or even memories, but more so just patterns of responses, that can lead to feeling distress on any level from irritating, to disastrously vivid.
What caused/ perpetuates and how to categorize our response patterns for best treatment, is and should continue to be for our healthcare professional to determine.
You, me, and everyone else just needs to share the content for them to help us out in decoding them.
Stop traumasplaining traumatic experiences and one's that aren't traumatic enough to be consider trauma.
Unlearn what you think trauma is and just share things and experiences that are bothering you without benefit PERIOD.
For example, consciously or less consciously ruminating (more internally focused anxiety) over past events, self-perceptions, mindsets, relationship patterns, habits you hate, or even "I should have's" that are rooted in the past, aren't benefiting you today, while worrying (more externally focused anxiety) about encountering new circumstances, their outcomes, and your involvement has a higher chance of being more adaptive and potentially beneficial.
Regardless, trauma is simply learning that got stored ineffectively, incompletely, or inaccurately for the purpose of future self/ experience improvement... but missed the mark.
Xoxo,
Carolyn,
an EMDR Certified Therapist, with many more visual perspectives and trauma healing solutions to share and provide.
Ps. Make sure to keep checking in on my new freebies! There should be one coming up further explaining what I mean be 'traumatic details' or 'traumatic learning,' AS OPPOSED TO full blown trauma or traumatic events/ experiences.
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