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textualdevianceWe're often told to just "get over" something; to forgive, forget, move on, whatever.
In many cases, this is good advice. Absolutely, past traumas may indeed have lasting effects on us--may change forever how we go through life. That's reality, and people who don't understand that and tell us to "get over" something when what they really mean is that they don't want to have to give a shit about someone else's pain deserve a smack. But there is a point at which living within long-past trauma becomes its own trauma. As in the case of the 9/11 porn, for instance, we need to understand that this happened, it's over and we need to go on with the business of living nine years in the future.
But...
What if the trauma isn't really over? It's one thing to advise someone to work past something that is ancient history, so to speak, but quite another to demand that they do so when that trauma is ongoing.
A classic example is a serial cheater or abuser who demands that their partner just get over the past bad acts and forgive. Such demands may even come with the insinuation that if one doesn't issue that forgiveness, then they're the ones with the problem.
Um. No. When someone's behavioral pattern is such that they keep repeating a bad act, each individual act can't just be separated out and treated as a single incident that should be gotten over. When there is an ongoing, reasonable fear that more pain may be coming, you can't just get over the last time it happened.
Additionally, even bad things that happen to someone else can continue the pain. Being a victim of some sort of completely random, unusual trauma doesn't carry as much power to cause lasting damage as being a victim of a type of trauma that continues to happen to other people. Sexual assault, for example, is one of those kinds of traumas that can never really go away for many folks because it keeps happening, every day, to others. It's not just the fear of being a victim of the same trauma again, but the knowledge that you can't do anything to stop that trauma from happening, period. That haunted demeanor you may see in people who have experienced something like this is often less about their own experiences and more about the ongoing referred pain from the similar experiences of others.
People who have never had these kinds of experiences, or who have dealt with them by burying their feelings in general and pretending they're not bothered don't get it. They don't get that these are real, reasonable reactions to trauma that isn't actually over. And the kicker is that these people don't understand that, in demanding that people move on from something that's still happening, they're only making things worse, and making the healing process that much more difficult.
So, the next time you're tempted to tell someone to just move on from something traumatic, step back a moment and think carefully about whether that trauma really is over. And if it's not, then do what you can to make it stop before demanding that someone cater to your discomfort with their continuing pain.
In many cases, this is good advice. Absolutely, past traumas may indeed have lasting effects on us--may change forever how we go through life. That's reality, and people who don't understand that and tell us to "get over" something when what they really mean is that they don't want to have to give a shit about someone else's pain deserve a smack. But there is a point at which living within long-past trauma becomes its own trauma. As in the case of the 9/11 porn, for instance, we need to understand that this happened, it's over and we need to go on with the business of living nine years in the future.
But...
What if the trauma isn't really over? It's one thing to advise someone to work past something that is ancient history, so to speak, but quite another to demand that they do so when that trauma is ongoing.
A classic example is a serial cheater or abuser who demands that their partner just get over the past bad acts and forgive. Such demands may even come with the insinuation that if one doesn't issue that forgiveness, then they're the ones with the problem.
Um. No. When someone's behavioral pattern is such that they keep repeating a bad act, each individual act can't just be separated out and treated as a single incident that should be gotten over. When there is an ongoing, reasonable fear that more pain may be coming, you can't just get over the last time it happened.
Additionally, even bad things that happen to someone else can continue the pain. Being a victim of some sort of completely random, unusual trauma doesn't carry as much power to cause lasting damage as being a victim of a type of trauma that continues to happen to other people. Sexual assault, for example, is one of those kinds of traumas that can never really go away for many folks because it keeps happening, every day, to others. It's not just the fear of being a victim of the same trauma again, but the knowledge that you can't do anything to stop that trauma from happening, period. That haunted demeanor you may see in people who have experienced something like this is often less about their own experiences and more about the ongoing referred pain from the similar experiences of others.
People who have never had these kinds of experiences, or who have dealt with them by burying their feelings in general and pretending they're not bothered don't get it. They don't get that these are real, reasonable reactions to trauma that isn't actually over. And the kicker is that these people don't understand that, in demanding that people move on from something that's still happening, they're only making things worse, and making the healing process that much more difficult.
So, the next time you're tempted to tell someone to just move on from something traumatic, step back a moment and think carefully about whether that trauma really is over. And if it's not, then do what you can to make it stop before demanding that someone cater to your discomfort with their continuing pain.
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