Use Your Damn Skills

In trauma recovery, we very often confront issues and conflicts surrounding our core identity. 

Many people reading this might feel like we don’t even HAVE a core identity. 

Every time I write about how something we “recover” in trauma recovery is our true self, several people comment to the tune of, “I don’t know who my self even IS.” 

That’s part of what abuse, neglect, and other trauma does to us: it confuses us about who we are. 

In some cases, trauma even seems to rob us of who we are. 

Many trauma survivors get through their experience in “fawn” mode— extreme people pleasing. 

Anyone who “fawns” can tell you how easy it is to lose ourselves in a “fawn” response. We literally become who we think “they” want us to be. 

Other survivors get through their experience by “freezing” or “fleeing”— neither of which allow us to st with who we are, figure out what we’re all about, develop our personality or interests or values. 

And, of course, when we’re lost in the “fight” trauma response, almost all of our meaningful personal development stops— because we have to devote all our resources to either winning or not being destroyed. 

The very common trauma response of dissociation, on the other hand, often quite literally has us floating away from ourselves— not feeling present, not feeling real, not feeling connected to ourselves OR our surroundings. 

Is it any wonder so many of us come through trauma not feeling like we even HAVE an identity? 

Many people describe feeling that their entire “personality” is just a collection of trauma responses— and it’s not hard to understand why. When we’re busy surviving, we just don’t have the time, space, or safety to truly develop who we are. 

Fast forward to now— here we are, working a trauma recovery, for the first time asking ourselves meaningful questions about who we are and what we’re all about. 

That is to say, figuring out, for the first time, who we are and what we’re all about. 

For many of us, it’s not a simple question. It might even provoke anxiety in us. 

For some of us even thinking about the question of who we are and what we’re all about scrapes up feelings and fears that we’re about to be criticized, shamed, or ostracized. Because that’s what happened, again and again, “back then.” 

For others the project of fleshing out our personal identity might feel like a “trick”— as if the only reason anyone would ask us to define and refine who we are is so they can attack us or manipulate us. 

Here’s the thing: our personal identity is integral to our trauma recovery. 

Why? Because it’s who we are and what we’re all about— our personality and our values— that is going to inform the entire “why” of trauma recovery. 

And make no mistake: the “why” of trauma recovery is also the “why” of staying alive. 

Figuring out who we are and what we’re all about starts with thinking about what we like. 

What books we like. What poems we like. What shows we like. What music we like. 

I’ve written before about how attached trauma survivors can get to our entertainment and media— and this is one of the reasons why. When you grew up in the pressure cooker of abuse and/or neglect, it’s often our books and shows and music and other entertainment that gave us ANY opportunity to reflect on or develop who we are. 

Now, in recovery, we can use our favorite stuff to consciously, intentionally, shape who we are. 

Don’t get me wrong: the stuff we like is only a starting point. But it’s an important starting point. 

Look at the stuff you like, then take a step back, and ask: if all I knew about this person was that they liked this stuff— that they strongly connected to this music or these books or these characters on these shows— what could I surmise about them? 

Slowly but surely, we figure out who we are. Who we choose to be. Who we were meant to be. 

Slowly but surely, we shed “their” ideas and beliefs and demands about who we “should” be. 

Slowly but surely, we realize that creating ourselves, maybe even from the ground up, is actually one of the best things about recovery. 

Starting from scratch can be overwhelming. 

But it can also be the best thing we ever do in or new, recovery life. 

You don’t owe anyone an apology for feeling angry. 

You don’t owe anyone an apology for feeling, well, anything, actually. 

We don’t ask for our feelings. We experience our feelings. 

Our feelings very often represent gut-level understandings of whether something is “for us” or “against us;” safe or dangerous. 

The fact that our nervous system registers something as safe or not-safe isn’t a reflection of the kind of person we are, or what our priorities and values are. Feelings are, much like trauma responses, largely reflexes. 

Cognitive therapy emphasizes how our feelings are frequently reflections of our thoughts and beliefs, and that’s true enough— but we need to understand that those thoughts and beliefs are rarely conscious or chosen. Most of the time our thoughts and beliefs are very much on autopilot, determined by our conditioning. 

Many people reading this have been conditioned to feel guilty for things we feel— especially anger. 

We’ve been conditioned to believe that we have no “right” to feel angry— under any circumstances. 

We’ve been conditioned to believe that anger is only experienced or expressed by bad, destructive people. 

We’ve been conditioned to believe that anger is the enemy of emotional progress and peace. 

We’ve been conditioned to believe anger is “immature.” That it necessarily leads us to being “mean.” 

None of those things are true. Not inherently. Not all the time, for everyone. 

Anger is a normal human emotion. The only reason it exists at all anymore is because it was selected for at some point in our evolutionary history— which means it has survival value. 

Anger, in the best of circumstances, provides us with energy and focus we need to defend ourselves, our loved ones, and our resources. 

Anger is often the first step toward crawling out of the emotional pit of depression. 

And I can assure you: anger is very often an INVALUABLE part of trauma and addiction recovery. 

We don’t need to apologize for getting or being angry. That’s an emotional reflex. Every human being in the history of human beings has gotten angry at some point. 

We may choose to apologize for how we’ve expressed or responded to angry feelings in the past— but that’s very different from apologizing for experiencing the emotion itself. 

I’ve seen many trauma survivors only start to make real progress in recovery when they’ve gotten in touch with their anger. 

I can tell you, in my own journey, there have been certain positive things I simply would not have ever done had I not gotten good and angry first. 

When we get angry at the right people, situations, and institutions, the world changes. 

Getting angry is often he first realistic step toward holding certain people and institutions responsible for the pain they’ve caused. 

Trauma recovery asks us to refuse to demonize who are are and what we feel. 

We may not be thrilled that we feel angry at some times— and that’s legit. I don’t like feeling angry. Anger usually exists because something has happened, that should’t have happened. 

But resist the urge to stigmatize your anger. 

Resist the urge to deny it or disown it. 

Own your anger. 

It’s really important— and, in trauma recovery, really useful.  

Trauma recovery can be very lonely. There’s no need to deny it. 

The experience of trauma itself tends to be really lonely. Really isolating. 

Often we just don’t have the words to convey to another human being what we went through, or what we’re going through. 

How can we convey it to someone else? We barely understand it ourselves some days. 

Why do we not remember large chunks of our past? Other people seem to remember theirs.

Why do we re-experience, sometimes in vivid detail, events and places and people that we know are years behind us? 

Why do we sometimes re-experience the consuming emotional reality of our past, but without the memories? 

The experience of trauma tends to be overwhelming; and confusing; and it often leaves us feeling more than a little “crazy.” 

Given all that: how can we possibly explain to another living soul what it’s like to be inside our head, inside our heart, even inside our body (or outside our body, if we dissociate) when we’re triggered? 

The very idea of trying to communicate any of it to another human, let alone meaningfully connect with another human being over what we’re experiencing, can itself trigger all kinds of anxiety and shame. 

So— we very often don’t even try. 

We keep it to ourselves. 

We pretend we’re, you know, “fine.” 

(It’s an old Twelve Step adage that “FINE” actually stands for “f*cked up, insecure, neurotic, and emotional,” and that’s always seemed to me to be appropriate to trauma recovery as well.)

All of which leads us to feel very…alone. Which, actually, is quite okay with us, at least sometimes. 

Every trauma survivor reading this can affirm that alone is sometimes quite preferable to the alternative. 

Alone, for some of us, is the safest we ever feel. 

Alone is predicable. Alone is controllable, more or less. 

But then— sometimes alone is lonely. Very lonely. 

Sometimes people ask why I write about trauma publicly. It’s not because I think my internet presence is going to “heal” anyone, though I do hope at least some of the things I write give some survivors food for thought and/or a starting point or two. 

I mostly write about trauma on the internet to decrease this overwhelming feeling of isolation so many survivors experience. 

That feeling of isolation, of loneliness, can get in our head 

It can give Trauma Brain and the internal prosecutor ammunition for their arguments about how we are “The Exception” to all this “you are worthy” and “you can recover” stuff. 

That feeling of loneliness and isolation can chip away at our already finite bandwidth— and in recovery, we need all the bandwidth we can muster. 

You need to know you’re not alone. 

You need to know you’re not the first, or last, survivor to experience exactly what you’re experiencing. 

You need to know that you’re not “The Exception” to “everyone has worth” and “it wasn’t your fault” and “you can recover.” 

You may feel lonely at times in your recovery journey. I feel lonely at times in mine. 

But that doesn’t mean you are alone. 

And it doesn’t imply all those mean thoughts are true. 

Breathe; blink; focus. 

“Medical PTSD” is a term we use to talk about trauma sustained and perpetuated in a medical setting. It’s technically not a diagnosis— but it’s a syndrome of stressors, triggers, and symptoms that, in my experience, is very distinct, and very real.

Many people reading this know what it’s like to suffer from complicated medical conditions— often multiple complicated medical conditions. 

Many people reading this know what it’s like to struggle with chronic pain— including forms of “mystery pain,” pain that medical professionals can’t seem to fully explain or pinpoint the origin of. 

Often, complicated medical conditions occur in people who also have a history of childhood abuse or neglect— but not always. 

What many people “out there” don’t seem to understand is, the experience of having a complicated medical condition, including a severe injury, chronic pain, or a serious illness, especially over time, is itself a trauma. 

It’s a trauma that can be seriously compounded by having negative experiences in health care settings— including dismissive or abusive behavior from health care professionals. 

I wish I could say those kinds of situations are rare— but, in my experience, they’re not. 

In our culture, we’ve made seeking health care frequently inconvenient, often uncomfortable, and almost always expensive— and that’s in the best of circumstances. 

When patients with complex or chronic medical situations are treated poorly by medical professionals— behavior that might include condescension, gaslighting, or neglect— the experience of seeking health care can turn into a complex traumatic stressor. 

People who struggle with complicated medical issues can’t just opt out of them— they find themselves having to engage with health care delivery systems, sometimes every day. 

It’s easy for such people to feel trapped— in much the same way survivors of complex trauma feel trapped in inescapable, painful relationships and situations for years. 

When we think of how to heal from traumatic stress, we often start with the premise that to heal from trauma, one has to be out of the traumatic situation. One needs to be safe. 

For people struggling struggling with complicated medical situations or chronic pain, there is no “getting out of the traumatic situation.” There is no safety from it. 

And when one has been abused or otherwise traumatized in a hospital or other medical setting, their ongoing care forces them to be exposed to the setting of their trauma, again and again. 

When a survivor s struggling with Medical PTSD, it’s very common for them to avoid seeking medical care, for obvious and understandable reasons— but, depending on what medical conditions they’re struggling with, this can put their health or life at risk. 

It can be difficult for survivors to get people to take Medical PTSD seriously. They tend to be met with a lot of “suck it up— you need to go to the doctor, so go.” 

When we’ve been traumatized in a specific setting, like Medical PTSD survivors have, “suck up up” isn’t so easy. 

Remember, trauma responses are not “choices.” 

The most important thing survivors of Medical PTSD need is support and validation. 

Medical PTSD survivors have often been disbelieved and belittled— much like many other trauma survivors— and they very much need safe spaces and relationships in which they do not have to hide or minimize their pain or impairment. 

Being a trauma informed professional of ANY kind means knowing about Medical PTSD. 

Just like living with trauma is, itself, a trauma, having trauma linked to medical care is, itself, a repeated, complex trauma. 

We need to approach it, and ourselves, with compassion. 

Many complex trauma survivors go through the day feeling like we’re “in trouble.” 

Not only do we often feel like we’re “in trouble”— we often experience shame for feeling it. 

After all, what the hell is that about? We’re adults. How on earth are we “in trouble?” 

Some survivors leap to the conclusion that they must have a “guilty conscience”— why else would we feel “in trouble” all the time? 

I can assure you: feeling “in trouble” is not necessarily a sign of a “guilty conscience”— nor is it any kind of indication that you are, in fact, “guilty.” 

It’s very often a product of trauma conditioning— specifically, being blamed and shamed when we were growing up. 

Many trauma survivors were heavily conditioned to believe that everything is our fault— and everything is our responsibility. 

(This is one of many reasons, by the way, why I believe the assertion that trauma survivors have a “victim mentality” is almost always bullsh*t— if you’ve ever met a trauma survivor, you know that we hav ZERO problem “assuming responsibility” for everything that’s ever happened in our world. Or, you know, the rest of the world, for that matter.) 

Many abuse survivors, specifically, were explicitly told that what was happening to them was their fault— and if they tried to escape “responsibility” for their situation, they would be punished and ostracized. 

When you’re growing up in that kind of environment, you learn to not question or reject the blame and shame that is being shunted you way. 

You learn to accept it. 

Fast forward a decade or two, and you find yourself trying to navigate the world as an adult who has an overdeveloped sense of fault and responsibility. 

Any trauma survivor can tell you: we can find ways to make ANYTHING negative that happens in the world around us our fault, somehow. 

(Conversely, any trauma survivor can tell you: we can find reasons why ANY positive thing that happens in the world around us is mere coincidence, clearly not connected to anything we did.)

Survivors of neglect in particular struggle with feeling “ in trouble.” 

When you grew up mostly ignored, you find yourself inventing reasons why you were so “bad” that the people who “should” have been interested and invested in you, “weren’t.” 

When you’re used to coming up with reasons you’re bad, it’s a short leap to finding reasons why you’re “in trouble.” 

The feeling that we’re “in trouble”— and the conviction that everything is our fault and everything is our responsibility— are all about trauma conditioning. These are attitudes and beliefs that were programmed into us from an early age— not evidence that we’re actually “in trouble” or “at fault” for something. 

Trauma recovery is about undoing that programming, and reconditioning ourselves in attitudes and beliefs that serve us, rather than hurt us— but it’s not easy. 

That old record has been playing for so long, we barely even register it anymore. It’s become the background music of our lives. 

For trauma recovery to “stick,” we not only have to tune not the record being played— we have to scratch it. 

At first that’s gonna feel weird. After all, we were told that you don’t scratch records— if you do, you’ll be in trouble, right? 

There’s that “in trouble” thing again. 

Doing the things we need to do to work a realistic, sustainable trauma recovery will make us feel like we’re “in trouble”— because we will be defying years of conditioning that were created by some of the most important people in our lives. 

It’s gonna be scary. It’s gonna feel like a risk. 

But I’m gonna ask you to scratch that record. Scratch the hell out of it. 

Yes, you would have been “in trouble” for scratching that record once upon a time. 

But not now. 

Not ever again. 

For trauma survivors, holidays very often carry high risk for emotional flashbacks. 

One of the main things that makes holidays, holidays, is that they are often steeped in tradition. 

Many people and families do the same things, or same types of things, on holidays, year after year, decade after decade. 

The traditions and rituals associated with many holidays are often so old and so culturally pervasive, that it’s impossible to imagine any point in history where people in our culture wouldn’t know what activities, music, and symbols were associated with particular holidays. 

One of the main reasons many complex trauma survivors in particular can find holidays triggering is, the cultural tropes that surround holidays represent a piece of our past we cannot seem to escape, no matter how hard we try. 

Part of what makes trauma recovery, trauma recovery, is that it allows us to move further and further away from our past. 

Often, moving away from our past— intellectually, emotionally, and even geographically— is one of the most healing things in trauma recovery. 

But on certain holidays, it’s like the past follows us. We can’t get away from it. 

When something is associated with an event or period of time that was painful for us, and we can’t get away from it— our nervous system beings to panic. 

Feeling, or being, trapped is maybe the LEAST favorite experience of the traumatized nervous system. 

Not being able to avoid or ignore certain holidays can very much stoke a sense of inescapably, which can easily trigger our nervous system into trauma responses. 

For survivors of abuse at the hands of a family member, certain holidays were when they were forced to see or spend time with their abuser. 

Many survivors had the experience of trying to disclose about the abuse they had experienced, but being told, essentially, to shut up and tolerate their abuser’s presence at holiday gatherings. 

Other survivors experience holidays as reminders of how alienated from their family and culture they feel. 

It’s hard, when the culture around us is celebrating gratitude, to feel like we don’t have much for which to be “grateful”— and, on top of that, to feel shame ABOUT how “ungrateful” we feel. 

Because, you know, we “should” be grateful— as we’ve been reminded, over, and over, and over again. 

Sometimes holidays can stoke a thought process in survivors that it’s actually our fault for how lonely and unloved we feel— that if we only loosened up and “forgave” our abuser or family, maybe we would have a seat at that table. 

All of which is to say: Trauma Brain and the internal prosecutor will ABSOLUTELY use the occasion of holidays to torture us. 

It means we need to be extra vigilant in our trauma recovery around the holidays. 

Trauma Brain will absolutely take the occasion of a holiday to reconnect us, vividly, with holidays from years past. Many survivors find ourselves thrust into emotional flashback, again and again, during the holidays— and it doesn’t help that, often, holiday gatherings are literally being held in towns and even houses where we grew up. 

The internal prosecutor will absolutely take the occasion of a holiday to make the case they’re always making: that we’re the problem. That we’re the weirdo. That we’re “choosing” to be apart and aliened from our family. 

The good news is: all the trauma recovery stuff we do EVERY day, will support us during the holidays. 

Grounding, Containment. The flashback rundown. The oxygen joint. Grounding mantras and totems. Self-hypnosis. All the tools, skills, and philosophies we use to pull off this thing called “recovery” on ANY day— they will ALL come in handy on a holiday. 

We can get through this. The rules of recovery are the same. Breathe; blink; focus; do the next right thing; and take this one day at a time. 

I am thankful for YOU, by the way. 

Our gut reactions are our gut reactions. We do not choose them; we do not have to feel shame about them; we do not have to apologize for them. 

Our feelings are our feelings. We do not choose them; we do not have to feel shame about them; we do not have to apologize for them. 

Trauma responses are nervous system reflexes. We do not choose them; we do not have to feel shame about them; we do not have to apologize for them. 

Every time I talk about the emotional and psychological reflexes we experience after enduring traumatic stress,  I get pushback. 

Invariably, someone says that we need to “take responsibility” for our trauma responses. 

I understand what they mean: the entire point of trauma recovery is to reduce our vulnerability to trauma responses and increase our ability to direct our thoughts, emotions, and behaviors after a reflexive trauma response. 

When I say “trauma responses aren’t choices,” I am not saying we are ultimately powerless over how we feel, think, and behave in trauma recovery. 

What I am saying is that our choices only come into play AFTER our gut-level, instinctive emotional and behavioral response. 

We can get horribly wrapped around the axle if we insist on blaming and shaming ourselves for thoughts, feelings, and reactions that we did not choose— that we are vulnerable to because of conditioning. 

“Responsibility,” by definition, involves volition. “Response-able.” 

If a thought, feeling, or behavioral reflex hits us without our consent— literally “hits” us— volition, or “choice” has not come into play. 

I am aware that lots of people out there in the culture assume— and say— that trauma survivors “choose” certain behaviors. I am aware that there is a cultural narrative about the “victim mindset” supposedly embraced or celebrated by trauma survivors. 

The people who think that have no idea how trauma recovery actually happens in the real world. 

In order to realistically take responsibility for what we do AFTER we get hit with a trigger and a reflexive emotional or behavioral reaction, we have to make peace with the reality that we usually do not see them coming and we certainly do no ask for them. 

That is to say: we cannot control trauma responses, any more than we can control allergy attacks. 

Can we make ourselves less vulnerable to trauma responses (much like we can also make ourselves less vulnerable to allergy attacks)? Of course. 

Can we choose how we deal with the fact that we’ve been triggered and a trauma response has been set in motion? With time and practice and support, yes. 

But we need to get very real about the fact that we are not ourselves when we are triggered— and that is not an excuse. That is a really we have to grasp in order to meaningfully change anything. 

We do not need to be “forgiven” for experiencing trauma responses. Trauma responses are not something we “do” that requires forgiveness or repentance. 

That said, in my experience, using the language of “forgiveness” can be useful in changing how we relate to our vulnerably to trauma responses— which, as everyone reading this can affirm, tends to stoke a lot of shame in many survivors. 

So: forgive yourself for being vulnerable to triggers. 

Forgive yourself for being vulnerable to trauma responses. 

Forgive yourself for things you did not choose and did not want— past and present. 

Forgive yourself for even needing to think about trauma recovery. 

There’s nothing TO forgive— but forgive yourself anyway. 

One of the reasons why passive aggressive behavior can trigger trauma survivors so badly is, it often hooks into all these doubts we have about ourselves. 

We know trauma does a real number on our feelings of self-worth and self-efficacy (which, combined, add up to what we call our “self esteem). 

We know trauma has a way of convincing us we are simply not up to life’s challenges. 

We know trauma has a way of convincing us that we are not worthy to even FACE life’s challenges— let alone conquer them. 

As we work our trauma recovery, we often confront the lies Trauma Brain and the internal prosecutor tell us about our self-worth and self-efficacy— but, as every survivor reading this will affirm, it’s often an uphill battle. 

Our nervous system didn’t get this way overnight. Changing the way we process information and relate to ourselves in recovery takes time. Trauma recovery is literally a process of reconditioning ourselves after years of harmful conditioning— in many cases, actual brainwashing. 

As we go about this project or reconditioning our nervous system, day after day, we can be particularly vulnerable to certain interpersonal patterns— and a pattern we are particularly vulnerable to is passive aggression. 

You know the behavior I mean. It’s even sometimes exhibited by people who call themselves our “friends.” 

Passive aggression is when someone seems to have a problem with us— but the don’t express their problem with us directly. 

They say hurtful things that sure seem to be about us— but maybe they say them to other people, or in a social media post, or in another context where we’re likely to see or hear it. 

And they say it just obliquely enough that it’s not an obvious attack or criticism. 

Passive aggression is nothing new in human relationships— but why can it trigger trauma survivors so badly? 

One reason is, it’s a form of gaslighting. 

When somebody obviously seems to have a problem with us, but then denies up and down they have a problem with us, it can have the effect of making us feel “crazy”— when in fact we’re having a normal response to incongruent or confusing signals. 

Another reason is, many complex trauma survivors in particular grew up in households where we had to be hyper aware of even the smallest shift in the emotional “temperature.” 

Passive aggressive behavior can set off all kinds of alarm bells for complex trauma survivors, because it reminds us of family or other contexts where we had to take signals of potential aggression or discord seriously as a matter of safety. 

A third reason why passive aggression can trigger trauma survivors so much is, it often reinforces negative narratives about ourselves that we’re already struggling to reality test and challenge. 

Many complex trauma servers hav been head-f*cked by people who said they were our frends— and then betrayed us in various ways. 

We’ve been head-f*cked by families who were supposed to have our back— but didn’t. 

We’ve been head-f*cked by churches that represented they were places of safety and spiritual truth— but then turned out to be dangerous places run by disingenuous people. 

Nobody likes passive aggression. It’s an immature, unkind way to communicate. 

But passive aggression can push particular buttons in complex trauma survivors, for reasons that become clear as we understand more about complex trauma. 

Unfortunately, there’s no easy answer to the question of what to do when a “friend” chooses to make passive aggression a main way they communicate with (or, rather, about) us. 

But first thing’s first: we have to recognize when we’re triggered, and manage the feelings of unsafely and self-reproach that can get stirred up inside. 

You know the drill. Breathe; blink; focus. 

Many people who fall prey to high control groups— many of which we would call “cults”— were conditioned to do so by their families and churches growing up. 

Vulnerability to coercive control has nothing to do with intelligence. 

It has a LOT to do with what we’ve been primed to believe and respond to. 

When we’re kids, we do not have the psychological skills or tools to evaluate claims made by the adults around us. 

When we’re kids, we instinctively seek out interpersonal safety— and that, more often than not, means fitting in with the group around us as best we can. 

We don’t know what’s “true” or “real”— but we do know what we’re “supposed” to do and say in order to fit in with our family or church. 

In certain families and churches, we learn that, in order to be relatively “safe,” we need to keep questions or criticisms to ourselves. 

In certain families and churches, we are taught that to question the adults who hold positions of authority is “sinful.” 

The mythology of many religious traditions specifically include stories about how spiritual luminaries believed their creed without question, doubt, or hesitation— and we are strongly encouraged to follow their example. 

We get this message again and again, implicitly and explicitly. We get that message so often that many people reading this know exactly the stories I’m talking about— they’re so familiar to us that they’re just part of our cultural fabric. 

All of it amounts to years of conditioning. Every day, our ideas about what “truth” looks and feels like, what “leadership” looks and feels like, what “loyalty” looks and feels like, got conditioned. 

Then there was all the conditioning we got at home— much of which reinforced and was reinforced by what we were taught at church. 

We were explicitly taught to honor and obey the “leaders” of our household— our parents or caretakers. 

In certain families, there were consequences for not honoring and obeying them— such that we developed a reflexive habit of suppressing doubts and questions. 

Fast forward to adulthood— it’s not like all that conditioning just goes away. 

There is a myth that vulnerability to high control groups or cults has something to do with some sort of psychological “weakness”— but I don’t agree with that. 

High control groups and cults certainly do prey on people who are wounded— but I think the biggest vulnerability to coercive control now, is having been raised in a form of a high control group growing up. 

Our early conditioning impacts what we understand to be appropriate in communal or spiritual contexts. 

Our early conditioning impacts what we understand to be appropriate behavior from spiritual or organizational leaders. 

Our early conditioning impacts what we understand to be “loyal” or “disloyal” behavior. 

And our early conditioning impacts our ability and inclination to leave a group when we’re no longer in sync with its message or goals. 

I’m not saying that everyone who grew up in a heavy handed familial or spiritual environment will go on to become involved in a cult. 

But I AM saying that lots more people are lots more vulnerable to cults and other high control groups than we realize.

It’s also worth noting that not every cult or high control group is spiritual in focus— but our early exposure to high control families and churches absolutely makes us more vulnerable to political and ideological cults as adults as well. 

It is not about intelligence. It is not about “strength” or “weakness.” 

It is about programming, priming, and conditioning. 

People who get swept up in cults or high control groups are victims— not just of the group they get involved with, but of their early conditioning as well. 

If we could “just let it go,” we would. 

If we could “just get over it,” we would. 

If could “just”…anything, we would. 

The fact that so many survivors struggle so much with their trauma responses means that we CAN’T “just” get over it. 

It doesn’t mean we’re “not trying hard enough.” 

It means that traumatic stress damages us in ways that we literally can’t overcome without specific skills, tools, philosophies, and support— this thing we call “trauma recovery.” 

So many survivors come to the trauma recovery paradigm as kind of a last resort. 

They feel like they’ve tried everything, and still trauma responses are kicking their ass. 

As it turns out, “trying everything” often amounts to doing what our culture often recommends trauma survives do— try, in various ways, to deny, disown, or ignore their trauma. 

Many survivors try to exercise it away. 

Many survivors try to starve it away. 

Some survivors try to f*ck it away. 

Many try to drink or drug it away. 

(I have lots of experience with those last two.)

All of which usually ends up where it has to end up— us, back at Square One, drowning in emotional and/or sensory flashbacks, wondering what we have to do to “get past it” like everybody tells us we “should.” 

One of the hardest things to accept about trauma recovery is that there s no bypass. 

There is no magic bullet.

Trauma recovery involves coping on the one hand, and processing on the other. 

Coping and processing may take lots of different forms for different people, but realistic, sustainable recovery always involves those two elements. 

In my experience, many will come along promising a bypass to the hard, often painful work of coping and processing— and those bypassing methods tend to be very seductive to survivors who tend to be burned out, tired, and hurt. 

We really want to believe there’s a way out of this without doing the work of getting through the day, one day at a time, and processing the thoughts, beliefs, memories and meanings associated with our trauma. 

But there’s not. 

There never has been. 

There’s the work of trauma recovery— and all the stuff we do to avoid the work of trauma recovery. 

Here’s the thing: we are not born knowing how to do this work. And if we grew up in the kind of families that infect complex trauma, we sure as hell weren’t taught how to do this work growing up. 

Nobody isn’t doing the work out of laziness or stubbornness. 

It is my experience that almost 100% of trauma survivors, when they are exposed to what recovery is and can be, catch on and do what they have to do to recover. 

That does not mean it is easy. And it is certainly not “quick.” 

If you are reading this, recovery IS for you. 

It is not too late. You are not “too old.” 

And you do not need a miraculous bypass. 

You are up to this challenge and this project. 

It all starts with breathe; blink; focus. One day at a time.