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May
11
TRAUMA AND GROWING BRAVE
Filed Under Coronavirus, Courage, COVID-19, Grateful, Gratitude, Happiness, Hospital, Tears, Tears of a Warrior
By Janet J. Seahorn, Ph.D.
A few weeks ago I wrote a short article on “You Can’t Quarantine Joy”. Little did I know a few weeks later those words would need to not just be remembered but practiced. They would haunt and humble me. You see, I ended up back in the hospital after several ER visits. Luckily I only had pneumonia… Ha, Ha…. Only pneumonia and other “stuff” they couldn’t diagnosis. When first admitted I had to spend several hours on the coronavirus ward waiting for my tests results to show that I was safe to be transferred to a “normal” room. The doctors and nurses were in their protective gear. The room’s window had been sealed off with a special fan attached that allowed no outside pathogens to escape to the outside environment.
After being transferred to the “safer” ward, I had days to think about my situation and the state of the world. Watching TV was not an option. The news was too grim. My grandmother used to say “an idle mind is the devil’s workshop”. It isn’t – it’s more like Dante’s Inferno. The mind takes you to places you absolutely don’t want to visit. It took every ounce of my energy to try and keep a positive mindset, count my blessings and maintain some form of emotional stability as my body was far from feeling positive.
For those out there, both patient and supporters, here are some things to understand, to consider. First trauma does some interesting things to the mind and body. It changes you whether you want it to or not. Like a teapot that is designed to let off steam when the water in the pot becomes too hot – we are built in a similar way. When we get too overwhelmed we need time and space to let out some steam. We need space to scream, shout, cry uncontrollably. We need our own inner self to process what we’ve been through, to grieve our physical losses and our emotional sufferings. The energy it requires to constantly stay upbeat takes its toll and becomes crushing. We need moments to recognize and acknowledge that we’ve been through something horrible and we had to do it alone… in a lonely hospital room with no loved one by our side.
Therefore, wonderful and loving supporters don’t try to talk a suffering soul out of his/her trauma. It is their journey to process it, to deal with the grief and horror of it, to move forward. Please don’t say to the suffering “you’ve got to stay positive… you’ve got to count your blessings….” Do you think for a moment that we don’t know this, that we aren’t already doing this? Trust me, we would be happy to have amnesia, wave a magic wand and make all the crap disappear. Those words of support only make many of us feel guilty, weak, and ashamed to have these feelings. It’s absolutely exhausting to pretend we are great just because we survived. Give your loved one the gift of a few minutes each day to just BE. To understand and accept what we’ve been through. Many of us choose to do this in private, in the quiet of our own thoughts and hearts. What we need from you is trust. Trust we will get through what we need to get through. Trust that weeping and screaming are just a part of our wounded body and spirit’s healing process. Recognize that part of the trauma may always be a part of us, of our life experience. Trust we will be OK. You don’t have to talk us through anything. We just need you to be present, to listen, to hold our hand. Probst once said, “We do not receive wisdom, we discover wisdom within ourselves only after a journey that no one can take for us or with us.”
For all of us, remember we are stronger than we think. We grow braver through our challenges. We become more compassionate, more grateful, again, not because of what we may have lost but because of what we have endured and learned. It is good to be like that teapot, knowing we can let off steam when needed and the infusion of our tea tears become sweeter, more poignant.
And through our trauma, we do grow braver.
Thank you to all of our first responders, medical personnel, people keeping our grocery stores open and many others. There aren’t enough words to express the difference you are making every day.
