Trauma

I often find myself trying to quantify trauma. I think, Well, as a child I survived my dad attempting suicide. And, more than once! So, what’s the big deal if I’m feeling a tiny bit sad or hurt or angry? I’ll survive this, too. And, I always do, of course.

But, when I recently told my therapist about that, she suggested that trauma is trauma, plain and simple. A person doesn’t have a quantifiable amount of traumas in a lifetime, you can keep having them, big and small, and they all count. Equally.

I listen to a few podcasts that discuss trauma, and they all eventually talk about “big-T” and “little-T” traumas; that is to say, Trauma and trauma. We all have some Traumas in our lives; for me, most of those happened in my distant past. I am, of course, grateful for the distance of time between me and those Traumas. But, I am human, and so I still experience the littler traumas. Our world, country, communities… they still experience Traumas and traumas that are impactful.

I’m working to sit with all the traumas and Traumas, past and present, and not try to push aside those things that feel “less than” because they’re not earth-shattering, life-altering moments. Day 21.