Many complex trauma survivors have this tortured relationship with visibility and intimacy.
On the one hand, both visibility AND intimacy can feel VERY dangerous to us.
To be visible, to be seen, meant to be vulnerable.
Many of us learned that our only safety was in being as INVISIBLE, as HIDDEN, as possible.
We learned to associate relative safety with making ourselves smaller. Taking up as little space as we could. Being as quiet as we could.
This is the essence of the “freeze” trauma response: when in danger, try not to move, and hope you blend in.
Of course, to invite intimacy was to invite the opportunity to be hurt.
Why on earth would we give ANYBODY the opportunity to get physically OR emotionally close enough to hurt us?
Many of us experienced our most damaging trauma in our most intimate relationships growing up.
For many people reading this, both intimacy and visibility were, and are, VERY tangled up in fears and wounds from the past.
But then, on the other hand…there is often at least a part of us that wants nothing MORE than to be seen and held.
There’s often a part of us that absolutely HATES the idea of being invisible.
Many people reading this have had the experience of feeling invisible, particularly in certain relationships— and it making them feel hurt and furious.
Many trauma survivors have also had the experience of wanting nothing BUT intimacy— often a particularly intense kind of intimacy, for that matter.
Many complex trauma survivor figure, if I’m going to take the risk of being intimate at ALL, it’s going to have be REAL intimacy. We’re going to have to dive DEEP.
Survivors often find themselves annoyed and disinterested in relationships that DON’T dive deep— we frequently want the mind-melding kind of intimacy where we really feel connected in our GUT, in our BONES.
It’s a tug of war.
The fear of being seen vs. the overwhelming need to be seen.
The fear of intimacy vs. the overwhelming yearning for intimacy.
It’s the kind of “both-can-be-true” conflict that complex trauma survivors live with every day.
So where “should” we land on ANY of these questions in realistic, sustainable trauma recovery?
Realistic, sustainable trauma recovery asks us to acknowledge that there IS no “right” or “wrong” answer to how much visibility or intimacy we “should” tolerate.
The REALLY important thing is for us to not deny or disown EITHER our fear, OR our want for visibility OR intimacy.
The fear is okay.
And the want is okay.
We’re NOT going to avoid ALL risk by permanently boycotting intimacy OR visibility.
And we’re NOT going to get ALL our our interpersonal needs perfectly met by going all in on our desire for either visebity OR intimacy.
What we DON’T want to do is shame ourselves for either impulse.
What we DON’T want to do is tell ourselves we’re UNWORTHY of being truly seen or deeply known.
What we DON’T want to do is let our trauma responses limit or dictate our interpersonal decisions.
Neither fear NOR desire are the enemy.
Post traumatic SHAME is the enemy.
Use Your Damn Skills 