Sounds like a funny thing to say right? I mean, you would know if you experienced trauma. Right??
Not necessarily so.
So let’s start at the beginning. When I use the word “trauma” lots of things probably come to mind: war, rape, a tornado, a car accidents. Am I hitting some of them?
And you are right! Those things are often traumatic for folks that experience them.
We in the psych world call those events “Big T trauma”. It’s a terrible name, but all that it means is that these are things that happened ONCE. Except war. War is obviously not a single incident trauma, but the powers that be threw it in there. Don’t ask. But regardless, anything that happens one time is single incident trauma and therefore Big T. And some of the folks that I work with come in for these sorts of reasons.
But FAR more of the folks that I work with have a different kind of trauma history. They often have something called “little t trauma”. Again, terrible name, because while the name implies it, one is not better or worse, easier or harder. But little t trauma is basically bad stuff that happened a lot. For instance, a childhood filled with abuse and/or neglect. Witnessing or being a victim of domestic violence. Being diagnosed with a major medical illness or disability. All of these things can also be traumatic. But you probably could’ve guessed that too.
Here’s the part that might surprise you. There’s a subset of little t trauma called “relational trauma”. This is where people hurt other people…but not necessarily with their fists or bodies. A relational trauma survivor might be someone who…
-
Endured a contentious divorce
-
Has a history of physical/sexual abuse and/or neglect
-
Had a parent/caregiver/family member who struggled with a medical illness
-
Had a parent/caregiver/family member who struggled with a mental illness or personality disorder
-
Had a parent/caregiver/family member who struggled with a substance abuse/addiction
-
The death of a loved one
-
Experiencing sexism, racism, homophobia, etc
-
Difficulties with regulating your mood:
-
Feeling mild to severe sadness more often than not
-
Explosive or inhibited anger
-
Chronic anxiety and/or panic attacks
-
Unstable sense of who you are
-
Sense of helplessness and/or powerlessness
-
Frequent feelings of shame, guilt and self-blame
-
Sense of being totally different from others
-
Feeling numb or empty
-
Relationship difficulties
-
Feeling the need to isolate and withdraw
-
Disruption in intimate relationships
-
Difficulties with trust
-
Ending up in the same relationship patterns that you know aren’t good for you, but you can’t figure out how to get out of them
-
Memory/Consciousness difficulties
-
Cannot remember major parts of childhood, including but not limited to, traumatic experiences
-
Can remember in vivid detail your traumatic history and it comes into your mind when you least want/expect it to
-
A sense of not being fully present in your life
**If after reading this, you want to talk to someone about potentially getting into therapy, feel free to visit me at my website to schedule a complimentary phone consultation or schedule an appointment.
