The Traumatic's Response To Newfound Safety

2024 Author: Harry Day | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 15:43

Robin Skinner writes: A small child who has lost a mother is outraged and protesting. Once again, being safe, he once again demonstrates to those around him his fear, indignation and protest: I was abandoned! And I felt bad, bad! And it calms down only after a while

Key phrase - when the child is safe. That is, among loving and supportive people. Among those who will not offend, but, on the contrary, will save. And they, close and loving, receive from the baby for what fear he has endured. (for more details see the quote below)

This explains a lot in trauma therapy.

It is not without reason that traumatics have a reputation for being terrible, disgusting, obnoxious people. "Biting the hand of the giver", ungrateful, spiteful and aggressive.

For example, in a therapy group, participants will take pity on an unfortunate (really unhappy) traumatic person who bitterly mourned his fate, and he in response snaps angrily and says nasty things.

How can you endure such disgusting behavior? And the traumatic immediately shoots from the outraged groupmates, and rightly so. And crawls into his corner even more offended and unhappy.

In fact, the traumatic demonstrates to those who pity and support him, this very infant protest. And only patience and support can calm his cry. This is not out of anger, this is a cry for help: Mom, look how bad I felt without you.

That is why goodwill (without the willingness to endure and contain an exorbitant amount of aggression from a traumatic person) usually does not help: how much can an ordinary average person withstand?

Well, one, well, two. A traumatic person who has reached psychotherapy has already been deprived for decades. He has accumulated a lot of indignation and grief. He has a sea of poured feelings of loneliness and misunderstanding.

It is better to pour out the pain from psychological trauma on a specially trained psychologist. It's his job to endure and cope.

Dogs deal with separation just like small children.

For them, a loved one who has gone is the same as a lost one forever.

There is no concept of time for animals and small children

British scientists John Bowlby, James and Joyce Robertson, who studied children separated from the family, described three stages through which a child goes through, left without a mother for a long time.

The first was defined as "protest": chagrin, dissatisfied crying, search for the disappeared mother, the desire to return her. It is curious that the child, reuniting at this stage with the mother, usually becomes simply unbearable for a while - as if in punishment to the mother for abandoning. Giving an outlet to irritation, the child returns to normal. He regains his balance, although he is still very sensitive to the long absence of his mother.

With more prolonged separation, the child is at the stage of "despair": he is very quiet, unhappy, detached and lethargic. Stops playing. It seems that he has lost interest in everything in the world. Before, when there was no correct interpretation of the situation, the hospital staff concluded that the child stopped worrying, calmed down. But in reality, the child at this stage has almost come to terms with the fact that the mother will never return. Once home, he goes through the experience much longer. Seemingly completely devoid of confidence, he becomes even more attached to his mother. May remain depressed for a long time. Before entering the norm, it usually goes through a stage of "protest" and can be very difficult. As strange as it sounds, this is a good sign.

Well, the third stage is “ alienation - the most serious. After “despair”, if the mother is absent, the child recovers outwardly. He revives, looks no longer so unhappy, again begins to play and react to others. Previously, the medical staff believed in this case that the child had returned to normal. We now know that in fact the child has only superficially regained its balance … by destroying the love for the mother. At this price, he can cope with his loss.

It's not so scary to lose your mother if she is not loved. The reunion between mother and child who has gone through the stage of "alienation" can be sad for the whole family. The child seems to be changed, insincere, emotionally distant - for the reason that his love for his mother is dead, or, so to speak, frozen. It is the most difficult to get him out of this stage.

(Robin Skinner, John Cleese "The Family and How to Survive in It")