It Wasn't That Bad

I used to explain my childhood with a few blithe words, sailing about the waves and whitewater without so much as a splash. "It wasn't that bad," I would say smoothly, my voice even and calm. If I wanted to go a layer deeper, I would add, "My parents had it worse," as I gazed into the distance for a moment, then deflected with a deft, "What about you?"

It was a perfectly executed move, enough to survey the troubled territory from a distance without ever slowing down. I maintained the borders of my self-denial while sharing just enough to let the other person know there was something there that we weren't going to visit. My tone implied that I'd dealt with what I considered ancient history and was now on safer shores.

Besides, "My parents had it worse," so who was I to complain? Plenty of people had it far worse, if we were keeping track. From this perspective, my childhood trauma was a small blip on an otherwise ghastly sea of human suffering. No need to linger. I wasn't going to require anyone’s attention. I had toughened up. I was over it.

If I could convince them, maybe that would make it true.

Reckoning with Developmental Trauma (and CPTSD)

Psychotherapy and personal development talk about shame as a barrier to healing. But there is a more insidious layer to navigate before we can get there.

We must face the denial.

Until we get to know the shapeshifter of denial, our attempts to heal the past remain superficial at best. We polish our memories, not wanting to remember the fear or suffering under their shiny surface.

We might wonder why we don't feel much of anything, but we don't relate it to our willful amnesia about the past. We may feel burdened by our aging parents or caregivers, on a short tether of tolerance, without understanding why.

Our denial is adaptive. It’s trying to protect us from pain it doesn’t know what to do with. But keeping us from seeing it means we don’t get the push we need to heal.

Denial keeps us from going digging where we've buried pain from the past. To conserve energy, our nervous systems maintain the status quo, at the cost of our thriving.

All our nervous systems want is survival. Why rock the boat and try for more, when we’re doing okay?

Keep going. Don't look back. One foot in front of the other. Don't complain.

Denial is cemented by our culture's unwillingness to hold parents and caregivers responsible for abuse and neglect. "Honor your father and mother," is one of Christianity’s Ten Commandments. Even in our secular world, that dictum is hammered into our values and expectations. It assumes telling the truth about our childhood experiences is implicitly dishonoring and disloyal — as if it's morally preferable to mask the pain.

By not speaking up about what happened to us, to people who can help us heal, we carry shame that isn’t ours. That shame rightfully belongs to the people who hurt us.

The truth is that denial forces us to carry the past far longer than we need to. It persuades us not to look too closely at the origin of our suffering, even when it impacts our adult relationships.

Denial stops us from holding our parents and caregivers accountable, as flawed humans. It keeps our pain and anger bottled up inside, slowly accumulating pressure that shows up in our bodies and emotions.

We are condemned to repeat what we refuse to heal — whether we’re aware of it or not.

Telling the truth about our childhoods, to the right people, collides us into the fear of speaking truth to power.

We often feel disloyal when sharing about our caregivers' shortcomings or lack of skills. It can feel like speaking about our experiences will somehow hurt them — even within private conversations with a trusted friend, partner, or trauma specialist. Saying it out loud often evokes betrayal and disloyalty so visceral that we fear they must sense it, as real as a slap across the face.

We also stay complicit in protecting the people who hurt us because we're afraid to jeopardize the relationship — even if our caregivers have passed.

We may fear that acknowledging what really happened may shift our ability to remain kind towards and connected to them.

We may fear we'll be punished for speaking family secrets that we were told — explicitly or implicitly — were our duty to keep private.

The fear of speaking up makes it easy to deny the abuse or neglect. Both of these fears are the signs of trauma that wants to heal.

It takes courage to be willing to share what we experienced. Speaking up about it makes it real. When we say it, we start to feel it — and grieve.

Misplaced Empathy and Healing CPTSD

One of the most common features of developmental trauma and CPTSD is called empathy reversal. Instead of feeling anger at the perpetrators and compassion towards ourselves, we reverse the direction. We feel compassion towards the perpetrators and anger, often bordering on contempt, towards ourselves.

We get the order mixed up.

Empathy reversal leads us to say, "It wasn't that bad," or any other number of emotional bypasses that diminish the weight of our suffering and keep us complicit. Empathy reversal blocks us from connecting to ourselves with kindness and care.

Instead, we copy a version of the perpetrator into our inner worlds and model their harshness, rigidity, and contempt towards us. That's how we treat ourselves.

"Stop complaining or I'll give you something to complain about," their voice might echo in our heads. Or "I don't know why you're so sensitive. It wasn't that bad."

In our adult relationships, this looks like any number of patterns that keep us stuck in the same safety strategies we learned in childhood. We might minimize or dismiss our feelings of emotional upset because that's what our caregivers did to us. We might prioritize others' needs and wants over our own, because we don't feel worthy of taking up space or attention.

The first step to healing developmental trauma and CPTSD is to address the denial that keeps us at arm's length from ourselves.

At some point, the denial demands too high a cost — perhaps through a string of tumultuous relationships, lost connections, or the growing awareness that we're self-sabotaging our goals and dreams.

We must travel back to the past to turn the spotlight of empathy and forgiveness away from the people who hurt us and shine it unapologetically back on ourselves.

Here's how:

1. Notice when you're skipping over emotional content from the past.

The bypass usually arrives in conversation, with a familiar phrase like, "My parents had it worse," or "It wasn't that bad." The denial and coverup happen automatically, so you might notice this after the fact. That's fine. Bring yourself as much awareness and compassion as you can.

2. Decide if the person you're sharing with is a good person to disclose to.

Unresolved relational trauma makes it easy to overshare with people who aren't emotionally safe or relationally connected. Take your time to discern if you have the trust and intimacy required to appropriately share. Most people aren't a good fit to share our trauma with. Recognizing that there are safe people to talk to can help to soothe the feelings of disloyalty and shame.

3. If you’re with a trusted friend, speak to reality without bypassing the pain.

Pause and correct yourself. Say something that indicates the territory of past pain and loss, without needing to go into detail or explain. Be brief. For example, "It's hard to talk about, but I did have a hard time growing up." Or "I don't need to get into it now, but my childhood wasn't that great." You don't need to be specific. Just say something different than the usual emotional bypass.

4. Self-soothe in the aftermath.

Grief, doubt, fear, a sense of betrayal, or disloyalty are all common in the aftermath. Take care of yourself. You are beginning to share what's real after decades of prohibition against speaking your truth. Remember, even if they're no longer around, the power your caregivers have over you is likely a felt sense in your body and still has a hold. This is a good time for self-care.

5. Get support to go deeper.

Find a trusted friend or a trauma specialist (like me) to do focused work and heal the patterns of developmental trauma and CPTSD. Trauma healing has a tangible and immediate impact on your relationships. It can shift long-standing conflicts or lift you out of shut down into opportunities for greater intimacy and connection.

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When we don't do the work required to reckon with the past, we repeat the same relational patterns. When we’re stuck in denial, we bypass the territory we must traverse to grow and heal.

When we have the courage to see what's truly real, we care for the parts of us that have been longing for our attention and care. New terrain opens up to explore in ourselves and others. We create new opportunities for intimacy, depth, joy, aliveness, and connection.

It's not easy. But it’s possible and well worth it.

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