Childhood "my (childhood) Trauma Is Not As Bad"

[anonymous]

I'm wondering if anyone else with childhood trauma interprets early trauma as "not as bad" in relation to people whose traumas occurred when they were more highly developed.

My trauma began at least prior to five years of age. I don't remember most of it. There are probably a lot of factors that contribute to me feeling my trauma as "not as bad" as others'. But I think one thing that gets me is not being able to remember a time before trauma.

Just wondering if anyone else with early childhood trauma experiences this feeling of being separate from people who had trauma later, and a sense that those people's trauma is somehow worse?

 

[rightkindofme]

No. I usually have more the opposite problem. I think that people who got to have a happy/normal childhood who experience trauma as an adult are better able to cope than I am. They have a foundational self to build upon and I pretty much lack that.

It also helps that my childhood traumas were many and varied and lasted for pretty much 18 years. I very very rarely hear about a story that sounds "worse" than mine. It has kind of hardened me. Usually when I hear about stories that are worse than mine... the kid died.

 

[Justmehere]

Comparing trauma is always very dangerous. Trauma is trauma and it is all awful.

Trauma as a child is generally has big effect and does so much harm because it happens to someone whose brain is still developing.

 

[digger]

Yes, sometimes my thought processes tell me that it must hit people harder for who it is something unexpected and that somehow the impact should be less if you've never known any different. For a long time I found it really difficult to associate 'abuse' with 'trauma' at all. It's totally bullshit wonky thinking - the way people are affected might be different but better/worse doesn't really come into it.

 

[illusionist]

I personally just cannot imagine what it must be like to be living a normal, happy life and then suddenly have all that taken away from you, in a flash!....it is beyond my understanding. I don't see it as worse than childhood trauma, but different. In a sense, I get to learn what is my normal, the real me, in as much as I can, and be contented in that. Someone who has trauma as an adult? Will they ever be content if they cannot get back to being the person they once were?...it has got to make the journey harder.

 

[rightkindofme]

This is a topic I think about a lot. I don't want to play the Oppression Olympics. But I do want to understand how to help people in my life who are like me or who are not like me and I feel like I get stuck in my biases.

I don't really have "pre-trauma" because stuff started so early. As a result I have a pretty disorganized personality. It's gotten a lot better in my 30's. My 20's were hard. I feel a lot of shame because I didn't get my $h!t together at all until I had kids. Playing the "mom" role is the only reason I'm doing as well as I am. I am currently living in a position of extreme privilege. I'm not in the 1%, but I'm probably in the top 5% financially. I don't have family support in any way but I have an amazing group of friends, some of whom have been in my life since middle school.

My last rape happened at 25. At this point I'm more than 8 years post-traumas. Before that I had 1-5 horrifyingly bad things happen every year of my life.

But how would that compare to someone who had one incident of assault at like 2 years of age and who was never harmed again? I have a friend who was assaulted once at 9 and she's... a completely non-functional person. She stays home and cuts herself and pulls her hair out and doesn't eat until her family hospitalizes her again.... her life is brutally hard.

I'm functional. I can hold down a job. I don't currently because I'm home schooling my kids. Which is a job, let me tell you. I function extremely well in chaos and it has been really hard for me to learn how to stop creating it.

I imagine that someone who had a nice life who wasn't assaulted till their 20's or 30's or 40's might have an easier time adjusting to "I felt safe before and I can find that feeling again" but it's my imagination talking. I have no idea. I don't understand how that would work. I've read about it, but I don't get it.

People vary so much. I come from a long line of highly traumatized people. We all get up and function every day despite our major psychological issues. Well... until we kill ourselves in our 40's or 50's. Or my brother was 21. Ok, maybe we aren't that functional.

I feel like I'm in a weird spot because I want to understand the life my children are having. They are not dealing with trauma. I'm not always the easiest person to live with, but they have good coping mechanisms. When my tone of voice is harsh they tell me, "Mom I think you said that more harshly than you meant to. You hurt my feelings a lot and I think you only meant to get my attention."

I'm praying that I'm giving them a bulwark that will help them deal with bad things that will happen in the future. Bad things eventually happen to everyone. I can't protect them forever. But I wasn't protected at all and I don't know how it works for people who got some protection.

I suppose I should go start a different thread. I'm having trouble getting parts of the website to load. Maybe I'll manage and maybe I won't.

 

[jaccat]

I've always thought of it as being different. Like others have said, those who were traumatised as adults know what they've lost. The of us who don't have a before, don't. Is that better? Just different.

My therapist has said something similar to @rightkindofme. People who have experienced no trauma, and then have something to upset their lives, find it hard to deal with because they haven't built up the coping mechanisms we have. I don't mean to offend anyone who was traumatised as an adult saying that.

What I'm trying to say is, for those of us traumatised as children, just the fact of surviving make us strong.

 

[rightkindofme]

@jaccat Ironically, I kind of meant the opposite. :) In my fevered imagination, people who had good lives before trauma learned magic coping skills I lack. The basics of self care that I struggle with.

Goodness this topic is complicated.

 

[Ronin]

No, I related differently to the world when I was a child and differently later in some respects, I don't have time for thinking of what was how bad tbh. (Let alone concern myself with how others view their issues. I'm not them. They may be suffering worse with something that to me is a oh well, life goes on, come back to this tomorrow and leave it be when it stops looking so hot with another day-issue.)

There are things I have trouble relating to that people raised differently obviously consider normal, and experiences I can't well convey. But, well. That's why most of people I'm *close* to don't fit gazillion society's boxes, traumata included.

 

[Deleted member 28986]

Great thread.

The first sixteen years of my life were filled with all kinds of abuse. I went through infant sexual trauma (which is something that makes people's skin crawl, including my own). I have no memory of it, but the physical damage will remain for the rest of my life. I know this alone constitutes horrible abuse, but I still feel like it is less than others'. I feel like I'm not worthy to comment on adult, single-incident trauma because it is so different, even though the post-traumatic symptoms are similar/identical.

I have no idea what it's like to have a life before trauma. I almost feel envious of people who can remember a before and after, but I know nobody on this forum is to be envied. It's just an irrational thought. I am shaking writing this because I know it's such a horrible thought. I try to be honest here and sometimes I think I'm too honest. I'm sorry. I don't intend to offend anyone. I'll bet in ways it's worse because they remember when it was good and they might know exactly what they want to get back to, but can't.

Now I wonder if people with adult, single-incident trauma (or whatever you call it) feel like their trauma is "lesser" than developmental trauma? I'll bet that most trauma survivors feel like their trauma is not as bad as others: Survivors went through what they went through, and they know they survived. The fear of the unknown (hearing others' trauma stories) is always worse that what we know.

I've got :hug:s for every survivor and none of us deserved it. Love and peace.

 

[anonymous]

Hmmmm Lets see if we can have two Anons in the same thread.....

I am NOT the OP Anon.

To be honest, I think that childhood trauma is worse in many ways. Adults who are traumatized do indeed have to reconcile the pre-trauma selves with the post trauma selves, but I don't see that as nearly difficult as not having developed in a normal way. There are SO many things that I will never have because of the age at which my traumas occurred.

How can you even begin to fathom that there are things out there which you will never know because you missed a CRUCIAL part of development. Its sort of mind blowing to sit and wonder what other people have that you don't.....and to know that no matter how much you heal, you will never be on an equal ground as them in certain ways. That is, you can't alter important parts of development and then think you can make up for it later. It just doesn't work that way. What is ingrained in my mind is very different than what a normal child does as their experiences with the world were very different.

 

[Chava]

I feel like I don't relate to my friends. On here I don't feel the comparisons, personally, because I want so badly to connect and not create separation. I don't understand every form of trauma but I am not categorizing them as better or worse. Not saying it's a big deal if others do because I know I create those kinds of comparisons elsewhere. Trauma naturally creates disconnection and separation from others so I really don't want to add to that here. I don't even know how bad my own trauma is because I'm still in the process of accepting, remembering, piecing bits together.

My mom thought her sexual abuse was "no big deal" and she f*cked me over with that because I was actually the person she thought was completely disgusting because she never dealt with it. She took most of her anger out on her "mini me" (me). Adult, childhood, accident, abuse, WHATEVER. How can we make these comparisons? I had some trauma that others recover from just fine but my nervous system was already f*cked and I also had no way to cope. People just need to deal with their own traumas honestly and directly and that's all I'm trying to do here. Creating further separation isn't helpful. So many of us already feel so disconnected.