There is a quote I hear sometimes in relation to trauma which goes, You can measure a man by how much suffering he has endured. I have been told this a lot by people and I find it absolutely ridiculous. Really? You can measure suffering? Suffering is the important deciding factor in how much worth someone has? Life is not about suffering. There is no "badge of honor" when it comes to suffering. It can show that a person is strong that they survived their ordeals, but the badge of honor should be credited to the strength of character of the person regardless of their suffering.
Making it about someone's pain just gives more credit and more power to pain and I find it to be kind of dehumanizing to be honest. It implies that suffering is objective, that it can be "measured", that some people's suffering is "greater" than others (Suffering in this instance does not mean mental pain, it most often refers to the events themselves). It just rubs me the wrong way on so many levels.
Things like, there are children starving in Africa, when people talk about something bothering them. The subtle, grating guilt-trip. I heard things like that constantly growing up and it completely takes away your ability to appropriately feel sad or upset about something because it is obvious that other people have it "worse" than you do. Any platitude that objectifies suffering completely f*cking guts me.
Any platitude that provides chaotic reasons for events like everything happens for a reason or time heals all wounds. Everything does happen for a reason but that reason is usually completely irrelevant to the victim at all. Most often the reason simply comes down to that a person is born, becomes a psychopath and starts terrorizing as soon as they're old enough to talk. The reason in this situation is that the victim has entered the picture at the wrong time in the right place.
Time doesn't heal wounds, strength does. Healing is not just something that "happens". There are no "mental scabs". If you have PTSD healing is always a choice, it is always conscious, and it requires a hell of a lot of effort. Platitudes related to time grate on my last nerve because it takes away credit from people who are working hard to get better.
