Trauma recovery is not an uncommon way of describing psychological treatment for trauma-related problems. It actually is the name of many clinics, practices, and/or is a central theme describing how psychologists conceptualize their work. It is a misnomer. The term connotes that trauma is a state or condition that one overcomes, is relieved from, or transitions out of. The heart of these connotations is reductionistic and hollow. Like a skeleton without flesh. The heart of a traumatic experience is about relationships with others and the experience of self and the world. It is an experience involving loss, wounding, and suddenness. It is an experience but may not actually flow like a narrative or story but rather, a series of flashbulb moments, often jagged, jarring, or jolting. The moments rupture consciousness. Some moments fit in well into an overarching narrative. But more often they hang there ringing with the truth that life is fraught with death, pain and suffering, and dramatic twists of fate. Trauma disrupts us from habitual and comforting assumptions about the world. And what follows trauma are reverbations, the “wake” of reminiscence both heartening and heart-rending, hopeless and hopeful, rich with, and absent of, meaning.
We have choice. We make meaning. We do have SOME control. A little. Sometimes a lot. Choice to disclose. To tell a friend. To see a therapist. To take a medication. To be with family. To stay busy. To breathe. To pray. To forgive. To become aware. To change course. To change period. In viewing the traumatic experience as a resource for understanding one’s place and purpose in the world, we re-awaken personal agency—the power to direct the flow of our lives with loving intention and purposeful action.
*From a brief introduction to a series of lectures and experiential trainings in posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) theory and treatment to colleagues in Chemical Dependency Services, Kaiser Permanente San Jose, February 3, 2015.