Sharing – Mental health: ‘Shame is carried by people as a result of trauma. That sense of shame might be buried quite deep’
I said this about the pandemic. I would argue we’ve had repeated trauma after trauma for the last five years, and it’s impacting people.
High prevalence of trauma exists in people seeking help with depression, anxiety or personality disorders, yet trauma itself isn’t always the focus, says clinical psychologist.
If you read the article linked above, and you should, I want you to remember that not addressing what is happening in the world and people’s lives is not treating them. The shame and trauma that people feel because of the various ways their world is burning around them won’t go away because they learned some self-care tips to help with their mental health or even with therapy designed to treat anxiety and depression.
As an abuse survivor, I’ve learned over the years that I SHOULD feel anxiety because of what happened to me. My brain needs to watch out for actions and situations that led to me being abused so that I can act to keep myself safe. That’s not a treatable condition; it’s what my mind needs to do.
That high-level anxiety is not going to go away until some of that trauma is healed. So long as my entire being remains traumatized by child abuse, I will struggle with mental health. Those mental health issues were a result of the trauma of my childhood. Treating me for depression without talking about my trauma would have been like treating a bleeding wound by wiping the blood from the floor. It’s a symptom, not the cause.
On the other hand, I don’t entirely blame the mental health practitioners. How many abuse and trauma survivors have come to them complaining of anxiety, insomnia, depression, etc., without mentioning their trauma? We know child abuse survivors often get well into their adult years before telling anyone about their abuse. I would not be surprised if many people coming into a therapeutic situation do not talk about their abuse.
If no one knows about our trauma, we can’t complain too much that they aren’t helping heal it.
We have done a good job of removing the stigma of getting help for things like anxiety, depression, ADHD, and multiple other symptoms of mental health issues. We haven’t done enough to make it acceptable for people to talk about the trauma they’ve suffered. Until we do that, and until we recognize that we all have experienced various levels of trauma, we’re going to continue to have a growing mental health crisis on our hands.
