Grief & Trauma

Earlier today, I listened to “Facing Our Grief” (season 2, episode 1) from Anderson Cooper’s podcast, All There Is. In this episode, Anderson talks with Francis Weller, author of “The Wild Edge of Sorrow.”

Weller is full of insight, but my three big takeaways were as follows: (1) you can’t think yourself out of grief, (2) once you’ve started working through grief, you start to live more in the present, and (3) grief helps us become more fully human.

Perhaps these were my big takeaways because I believe you can replace the word “grief” with “trauma.”

(1) You can’t think yourself out of trauma.

Years ago I used to think I could talk myself out of being triggered by those things that reminded me of my illness. EMDR therapy certainly helped me react less strongly to these triggers, but the reality is that the trauma will most likely always live within me at a cellular level.

At first this realization made me frustrated and angry. I had put in so much time and energy into addressing the trauma so I wouldn’t have to think about it anymore. Or so I thought.

Little did I know that, in addition to doing EMDR, I needed to work on cultivating self-compassion, which Weller states is also necessary when doing grief work.

Developing a gratitude practice has also been helpful for me. For those of you who know my story, I largely lost the ability to walk, talk, read, and write at the age of eleven. In my physical, occupational, and speech therapy sessions, I taught myself “scripts” for what I needed to do. Because those scripts became hardwired in my brain, I sometimes still repeat them to myself when I go about my daily life all these years later. This used to jolt me back to the past and trigger a physical reaction. However, now (at least most days) I find myself saying Look at my body! Look at what it can do!

(2) Once you’re started to work through trauma, you start to live more in the present.

Therapy, self-compassion, and a gratitude practice have all helped me learn to live more in the present. Learning to accept what happened to me and understanding that triggers are a part of living through a traumatic experience have been critical too.

(3) Trauma helps us become more fully human.

It is the trauma I’ve experienced that allows me to be more empathic and see the shared humanity in all of us.

Do you find any of these statements to be true for you?