No symptom can make you a “bad person.”
As we recover from trauma or addiction, there will definitely be symptoms we don’t like. We won’t like experiencing them, and we won’t like the impact those symptoms have on our mood, energy level, or behavior.
But experiencing a symptom doesn’t make us “bad.”
Your milage may vary on what behaviors might make someone a “bad” person— though, in my experience, many trauma survivors work hard to convince ourselves that we’re “bad” for behaviors that, in anyone else, we’d have sympathy or empathy for.
But depressions, for example, doesn’t make us “bad.” Nor does it make us “weak”— either “weak minded” or “weak willed.”
Experiencing anger does not make us “bad.” Anger is a very normal response to some of the things we’ve been through. It would be very weird if we went through some of those things and weren’t angry on the other side of them.
But anger, itself, does not make us “bad.” There are behaviors we might engage in to manage our anger that we’re not thrilled by or that do not conform to our values— but anger, itself, does not make us a “bad person.”
So many of us are so used to considering ourselves “bad” when we feel bad.
Many trauma survivors, especially before we effortfully started working our recovery, feel bad a lot. We walk around feeling like garbage. Our mood is garbage; many of our compensatory behaviors are not our favorite choices in retrospect.
Many of us were sold a story that “good” people are rewarded by consistently feeling good— but the truth is, feeling good rarely has anything to do with how morally “good” we are.
There are lots of reasons people may feel good or bad— but feeling good or bad has zero to with how “good” or “bad” of a person we are. We all know examples of “bad” people who have no problem sleeping at night. We all know examples of “good” people who struggle with sadness or anxiety.
Many of the thoughts, beliefs, and reactions we experience after traumatic stress are best understood as post traumatic symptoms— and they don’t reflect on our “goodness” or “badness,” either.
Suicidality and self-harm urges are symptoms. They don’t make you “bad,” either.
Everyone’s mileage is going to vary when it comes to whether the choices we make in reaction or response to what we’re feeling contributes to us being a “good” or “bad” person, but it’s my experience that even those choices are heavily informed by our beliefs about how “good” or “bad” we are, based on our symptoms.
That is to say: it’s real important that we not condemn ourselves because we’re experiencing symptoms.
It’s real important we get clear on what symptoms of traumatic stress actually look like, so we don’t confuse our symptoms with our personality or our basic nature.
Everyone reading this is humans, and humans experience reactions and symptoms in response to certain events. It’s how we’re designed. It has nothing to do with how virtuous or not we are.
Many of us fall into the trap of believe that, because we’re unhappy with ourselves, we must be “bad.” Because we hate what we’re experiencing, we assume we must have done something “bad,” or we must be “bad”— otherwise, why would we be struggling with this?
Humans struggle. The world doesn’t pick and choose who struggles based on how “good” or “bad” we are. Those of us who experienced trauma got enormously unlucky. It wasn’t our fault. It wasn’t our “choice.”
Even if you made what seemed to be “choices” that you think contributed to your trauma or symptoms, you’re STILL not experiencing those symptoms because you’re “bad”— and you’re not “bad” because you’re experiencing those symptoms.
The best people I’ve ever met, I’ve met in trauma recovery— and almost all of them thought they were “bad.” A “bad person.” A “bad mother.” A “bad friend.” A “bad therapist.”
None of that’s true. Our symptoms do not make us “bad,” or reflect on our “badness.”
You are as deserving of support, resources, compassion, and kindness as anyone who has ever existed.
Yes, you. I’m talking to you.
Use Your Damn Skills 