“Why Can’t you Just…” Because Trauma

Trauma is a big scary word for people. Many people associate that word with some huge dramatic life changing event. However, that is not necessarily the case. When we are young children, we have core needs from our family members. When we do not have those needs met, and we do not understand why our family cannot meet our needs, that is traumatic.

I have been following Dr. Nicole Lepera for a few years now. I am so grateful I have stumbled upon her on Instagram, @the.holistic.psychologist . She has helped me understand myself, my emotions, where I come from, and how I can move on. I have also learned that part of what makes a situation traumatic or not is the processing of our feelings after the event. If something invokes big feelings into a child and they are invalidated, or steered away from those feelings, it will make the situation even scarier in the child’s mind.

These can be little comments that seem like nothing, but over time add up to a child who cannot process their feelings in a healthy manner. Example a child is sad because their friend decided they did not want to play with them that day. The child goes to their parent and says, “I am mad! My friend left me for someone else, and it isn’t fair! I did not get to do anything I wanted today!” That child is having some pretty big feelings. In my experience as a child, and now as I watch parents interact with their children, I often felt and see children’s big feelings get invalidated. With statements like, “Oh come on, it is not that bad! It could be worse! You take things too personally, it is fine. Why do you have to be so sensitive all the time?” Those statements seem like nothing, and to people who can process their emotions in a healthy way they are not that big of a deal. However, if a child (or an adult with C-PTSD) hasn’t learned how to work through those feelings, it can be damaging. If their parent said, “Oh no, I could see how hurt you are by your friend. I know it must not feel very good to be left out of the game. Sometimes people need a little space. Maybe you both can try again tomorrow and see if you have the same ideas for play time. I know you are fun, and others see it too.” They would be able to process the feelings of rejection, abandonment, sadness, and then see the good in them that their parents shared. Once children learn to acknowledge their feelings, they can express them in a more healthy way as they learn and grow.

I have slowly, I mean super slowly, dug into my soul and memory bank to figure out the core of my triggers. I have come to learn that for most of my life every choice I made is because I do not feel safe. That is a big umbrella term for how I feel, but it covers all the feelings for sure.

Fear is a factor of not feeling safe. Due to a lifetime of consistent fear, I have been in a near constant state of fight or flight response. What am I so afraid of?? Fear of abandonment and fear of shame are my biggest triggers.

In the first 2 years of my life many things happened that are big life events. My very young parents moved across the country. I had the tip of my finger chopped off, and then reattached. My mother and father divorced. My mother moved out of the state where my father and I resided. I believe shortly after I was 2 years old; my father and I moved across the country again to a new location.

That is a lot for a tiny human to experience. When those big life events happen, it can start the repeating pattern of trauma. When your family members are not aware of your emotional needs it is hard for them to meet them. When you are a child, you do not understand your emotional needs, so how can you ask for them? Often parents will tell children to find the positives, while suggesting to ignore the negatives. This makes children feel that they must hide their hurt feelings, as they are too much for their parents to handle.

In addition to not processing my beginning life events, according to Dr. Nicole some of the trauma wounding I have is from not feeling like I belong, not getting the soothing attention I sought, not feeling understood, and not having emotional regulation modeled for me.

The feeling of not belonging and not feeling understood has been on repeat in my mind for years. It really started to hit me about 6 years ago when my husband and I moved back to our home state after 7 years of living in different places around the country. To be honest, many family members made me feel as if I am no longer family to them. This made me feel my reoccurring feeling of being abandoned, and validated my feelings of not being liked or understood.

It wasn’t until just recently that I was able to pinpoint why I felt so isolated. But I finally have the clarity I have been unconsciously seeking for my whole life. I now understand why I do not feel safe. I know can accept what has happened to me, learn and grow from it, and create boundaries to not put myself or my child in these types of situations again.

Part of the realization I had was understanding how misunderstood I am. I have learned that many of my family members have a preconceived notion of who they believe I am and who they think I need to be to be acceptable to them. I have learned their ideals of me are not aligned with who I am authentically. I also, for the first time in my life, actually love who I am and what I am doing with my time on earth.

I will go more into repeating patterns down that line, but here is a quick screen shot of what this pattern is perceived like from me:

A family member or old friend will not like something I say or do. Nothing is inherently wrong with what I said or did, but it triggers something inside them that they feel the need to point out.
Everyone always has “good intentions” when pointing out what they perceive as my flaw that irritates them, however often it comes out as shame.
Example it could be something like “people don’t like to talk to you because you think you know everything.”
My first reaction historically is to be defensive, because I know in my heart that I in fact DO NOT KNOW EVERYTHING and I feel that I have never claimed to do so. I would react to their blanketed judgement. Trying to get them to understand who I am, and why I am hurt that they see me otherwise. AKA I was defensive. Without having emotional regulation my defensive would be big and angry. Once again defending who I am to those who do not understand me.
The next step is whatever I say and how ever I say it is not taken well. If I am direct, I am told I talk down to people. If I am not passive to move on from uncomfortable situations, I am told I am patronizing.
Now the people who hurt my feelings are mad at me because I am hurt by what they said while asking them to understand how they hurt me. Generally, they get defensive and add more to the plate of reasons why people do not like to be around me.
Historically this is when I would have to shut down my feelings, apologize for how or what I said in my reaction to their hurtful action.
In this scenario, every time in my childhood until my 30s it ends with me sad, them mad, they get an apology from me for how I chose to use my words to express my hurt in the situation, and they never take accountability for the hurt that started the conversation.

That cycle is TOXIC, and it slowly killed my soul from childhood until 17/18. Finally, after years of judgment for being who I am, and feeling that I could never do anything right, I said fuck it. If you think I am such an awful person who will never please you, I will prove you right. And that is when I started my party toxic bitch era.

More about my toxic bitch era at anther time. The past 4-5 years I have stopped the conversation with people who expect me to bow down to their shame throwing. I have learned I do not need to sit and listen to anyone tell me why they deem me a bad person in their eyes. This is through expressing my boundaries and holding on to them. The conversations now typically go like this:

A family member or old friend will not like something I say or do. Nothing is inherently wrong with what I said or did, but it triggers something inside them that they feel the need to point out.
Everyone always has “good intentions” when pointing out what they perceive as my flaw that irritates them, however often it comes out as shame.
Example it could be something like “people don’t like to talk to you because you think you know everything.”
I now try to validate what they are saying, share my perspective of who I am and why I am the way I am, and say how I will work to be mindful of how they perceive me.
Example – I can see how from your perspective you thought I was being a know-it-all while talking to them, and that must be uncomfortable. I don’t think I have shared before what I am working on and the passion, I have for it right now. So and so also discovered that passion and was curious about my thoughts. We have discussed this at other times. I didn’t mean to come across someone who thinks they are smarter than everyone, sometimes my passions really work up an excitement in me. I will be more mindful of how my big energy can be off putting to some people.
This is easier typing one sided than done of course. Often, I am interrupted when family members are placing their shame on me. I am often told that they know me better than I know myself. If they choose to listen to me and try to understand me better, we can move on from the situation.
If that person does not accept who I am and my perspective of the situation, that’s when boundaries are a must. An agree to disagree type situation. I acknowledge that they feel a certain way, but I also must maintain my dignity and respect by not allowing another adult to continue to shame me.
If that person continues to come to me trying to change who I am as a person to fit their ideal of what they believe I should be, that’s when I must have space. I no longer will have adults invalidating my feelings, placing judgements on me, or speaking falsely of my character.

I have learned from my experiences that many people do not like change. I have changed. I have changed 180 degrees from who I was before my TBI. It makes people feel uncomfortable, as they have held on to who I was when I was 18-22 years old. Also, many people do not like boundaries at first, and that can rile people up. I have learned not allowing disrespect to come to my world is not pleasing to old friends and family members. That’s when they help fulfill my fear and dread, as they usually abandon me.

However, I now can process the grief that comes with abandonment. I am working on being able to feel more feelings than two primaries of fear and joy. So, if they may leave me, I will be okay. I will process the pain, find gratitude for the good, and learn from the bad. I also forgive everyone who has left me, but that doesn’t mean I will drop my boundaries to bring them back.

Childhood trauma leads to Complex Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (C-PTSD). This often is misdiagnosed as ADHD and Bipolar. It has been suggested I have both ADHD and Bipolar. I have come to learn that I am not either of those diagnosis. Because I am high energy people automatically conflate that with having ADHD, when I know it is because I do not feel safe. I will dive into that in another post. Because I only felt seen or heard when I had strong feelings, and I was not taught how to express my feelings in a healthy way, I used to come across angry or manic. I absolutely understand why old friends and family members might feel I am bipolar. However, I am teaching myself how to regulate my emotions. I am now seeing that anger is an umbrella for so many more feelings of hurt. I am also aware of how my high energy can freak people out, so when I am excited, I try to calm myself to express my joy in a way that doesn’t overwhelm those in my presence. It is not easy. It is a daily battle. I will get into more detail about all of this in future posts.

To answer the question, “Why can’t you just *insert shame for not being ‘normal’*?” I CANNOT JUST DO WHATEVER IT IS YOU WANT BECAUSE IT IS NOT POSSIBLE FOR ME AT THIS TIME! However, I will take your shame into consideration. I will process how I am being perceived and understand what is about myself and actions that have brought on those judgments. I will continue to be self-aware of how my personality and presence can affect other people. In the meantime, if I could have some grace for not being able to just move one or just get over it (or any of the other why can’t you justs), I would appreciate it.

With Love,

Heather

Check out the link for more information about childhood trauma from Dr. Nicole here.