How to Talk about Your Trauma
Go slow and give it time to land. Plus, the mental health of doctors.
Last week’s post struck a chord. I had three folks write me back, specifically asking about how to make intergenerational trauma not feel so heavy.
So this week, I’m answering a reader question on that topic. Then after that, I’m sharing some thoughts on the mental health of doctors (trigger warning: suicide).
Let’s start with the reader question, shared here with permission, and lightly edited to further conceal identifying details:
Hi Pooja,
The trauma I hold IS heavy and I would love for it to be lighter - and here I don't mean through therapy. The trauma I experienced is core to who I am and I want to be able to show up in the world and in my relationships with my whole, authentic self. I don't need or want the trauma to be the only thing people see or assign to me - but not owning it has felt like masking - and that's exhausting.
How can one share lightly the stuff that's hurt and caused harm?
****
Who I am and what I hold: I'm a first generation university graduate. My parents both grew up in low socio-economic households and one escaped a former dictatorship. On the ACES Index, I "score" seven out of 10 including sexual abuse perpetuated by my father; I have always suspected that my father was sexually abused as a child. I lost my youngest sister to suicide. Misogyny, patriarchary and capitalism are the systemic roots of my trauma.
- Authentically Broken + Almost Whole
Hi Authentically Broken + Almost Whole,
First, thank you for sending me this really thoughtful question. It hits on so many important aspects of living with trauma, and I’m excited to provide some thoughts. When I’m answering reader questions, I usually end up asking more questions in response because the reality is that trauma and life and psychology are all complicated, and there is never One Right Answer. There are usually Multiple Right Answers that will work for you, and those Multiple Right Answers depend on your unique responses to more questions.
So, my immediate questions for you are:
Lighter for whom?
What is your definition of “lighter”?
To me there are two issues at play here— the actual inner experience of living with and healing from substantial trauma, and then the representation/ public display of how you perform (my word) being a person who has experienced intergenerational trauma.
Those two processes are separate and interconnected, perhaps best thought of as in a dance with one another. I read your ask of “Don’t just tell me to go to therapy” as meaning that you have spent time and energy working on healing your internal wounds (an accomplishment in itself, but I think you know that).
I’m going to focus on the performance of being a person who has lived with intergenerational trauma, and how to show up in that role in public. I’m using the word performance to draw attention to the fact that it is a public and interpersonal role, not to imply superficiality. The way we represent our identities and roles can be just as important as how we embody those identities and roles internally.
So, after that long-winded context setting, let’s dive in.
Does your significant trauma history feel heavy because you are worried about how it makes others feel when they find out? I know you are worried about being pigeon-holed, and also simultaneously exhausted by masking. In psychodynamic therapy speak (that’s the Freud kind), we would say that you are conflicted in how you portray your trauma and in if your intergenerational trauma history needs to be portrayed in order for you to show up as authentically whole. Because you are conflicted internally, this issue feels unresolved or unsettled, which leads to the heaviness.
I suspect your heaviness has less to do with how others respond to you, and more to do with your messy feelings about how you present yourself.
That brings me to another important point. I think, if you are doing it right (with reflection, flexibility, and compassion for yourself), then you will portray yourself as someone with a varying trauma history depending on context. I don’t think this is disingenuous or inauthentic — I think this is meeting people where they are at and protecting yourself. Protecting yourself does not mean you are showing up inauthentically.
Let’s say you have a friend who is not particularly attentive or caring (but whom you like to spend time with for other reasons). Does this person need to know your whole story for you to be showing up authentically? I would say no. I do not think you need to feel bad or like you are not representing yourself authentically by holding back your trauma in some settings. But, the annoying thing about feelings is we can’t control what we feel.
The trauma you describe is what therapists colloquially refer to as Big T Trauma. Most people WILL put you in a box when you share Big T trauma. That’s just the truth. It’s especially true if you share it earlier on in the friendship/relationship because most people have not done the self-exploration that is needed to avoid projecting themselves into that situation. So, from most people, you will get some version of trauma porn sympathy and assumptions about who you are and what you went through. This is a reflection on them, not on you.