Commonality From The Book Trauma And Recovery

Here are some sections from this chapter that I think are very important.

Traumatic events destroy the sustaining bonds between individual and community. Those who have survived learn that their sense of self, of worth, of humanity, depends upon a feeling of connection to others. The solidarity of a group provides the strongest protection against terror and despair, and the strongest antidote to traumatic experiences. Trauma isolates, the group re-creates the sense of belonging. Trauma shames and stigmatises, the group bears witness and affirms. Trauma degrades the victim, the group exalts her. Trauma dehumanises the victim, the group restores her humility.

Repeatedly in the testimony of survivors there come a moment when a sense of connection is restored by another person’s unaffected display of generosity. Something in herself that the victim believes to be irretrievably destroyed- faith- decency, courage- is reawakened by an example of common altruism. Mirrored in the actions of others, the survival recognises and reclaims a lost part of herself. At the moment, the survivor begins to rejoin the human commonality.

The restoration of social bonds begins with the discovery that one is not alone. Nowhere in this experience more immediate, powerful, or convincing than in a group. The therapeutic impact of universality is especially profound for people who have felt isolated by shameful secrets. Because traumatised people feel so alienated by their experience, survivor groups have a special place in the recovery process. Such groups afford a degree of support and understanding that is simply not available in the survivor’s ordinary social environment. The encounter with others who have undergone similar trials dissolves feelings of isolation, shame, and stigma.

Groups have proved invaluable for survivors of extreme situations, including combat, rape, political persecution, battering and childhood abuse. Participants repeatedly describe their solace in simply being present with other who have endured similar ordeals.

Since Vietnam i had never had a friend. I had a lot of acquaintances, I knew a lot of women, but I never really had a friend, someone I could call at 4am in the morning and say I feel like putting a gun in my mouth because it s the anniversary of what happened to me. Vietnam vets are misunderstood, and it take another Vietnam vet to understand us. These guys perfectly understood when I started to talk about certain things in my past and my experience. I felt an overwhelming relief from this. It was like a deep dark secret that I had never told anyone before was released. An incest survivor uses almost the same language to describe how she regained a feeling of connection to other people by participating in a group. I’ve broken through the isolation which had plagued me all of my life. I now have a group of women who support me who I have no secrets from. For the first time in my life I really belong to something. I feel accepted for what I really am, not the facade I carried. When groups develop cohesion and intimacy, a complex mirroring process comes into play. As each participant extends herself to others, she becomes more capable of receiving the gifts that others have to offer. The tolerance, compassion, and the love she grants to others begin to rebound upon herself. Through this type of mutually enhancing interaction can take place in any relationship, it occurs most powerfully in the context of a group. With the group there is a spiral of group acceptance which increases each members self esteem and each member in turn becomes more accepting towards others.

Here is what some victims have said from the group experience.

I look to the group experience as a turning point in my life and I remember the shock of recognition when I realised that the strength I so readily saw in the other women who have survived this ”violation was also within me!”

I am more protective of myself. I seem ‘softer’. I allow myself to be happy sometimes. All of this is the result of seeing my reflection in the mirror from the group.

I am better able to take in the love of others and see this is cyclical in allowing me to be more loving to myself, and then also to others.

Groups provide the possibility not only of mutually rewarding relationships but also of collective empowerment. Group members approach one another as peers and equals. Though each is suffering and in need of help, each also has something to contribute. The group requisitions and nurtures the strengths of each of its members. As a result, the group as a whole has a capacity to bear and integrate traumatic experience that is greater than that of any individual member, and each member can draw upon the shared resources of the group to foster her own integration. In one community survey, women escaping from battered relationships rated women’s group as the most effective of all sources of help. Different groups are also helpful at different stages of survival for the victim.