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Beside

A stack, not a single story

Layers of trauma

Talk to the layer that is in the room. If the body is in survival, skip meaning. If the wound is institutional, private empathy without naming the system can feel like gaslighting. Select a layer.

  1. 01The eventWhat happened
  2. 02The bodyNervous system and survival physiology
  3. 03AttachmentWho was there, who wasn't, who caused it
  4. 04SelfShame, fragments, 'I am the trauma'
  5. 05Memory and timeFlashback, blank, omen, delay
  6. 06MeaningWorldview, justice, future, God
  7. 07LineageWhat was inherited
  8. 08SystemsInstitutions, identity, the room around the room

Layer 08

Systems

Herman insisted trauma is political as well as psychological. Sandra Bloom, MD, showed how organizations recreate trauma dynamics. Resmaa Menakem and Kenneth V. Hardy, PhD, locate some wounds in racialized bodies and institutions, not only in private events. Nadine Burke Harris, MD, and Vincent Felitti, MD, showed that adversity stacks with poverty, racism, and neglected care. Conversation that ignores the system can sound like gaslighting.

How it can feel

  • Being asked to heal in the same building that harmed them
  • Having to educate you about their world in order to be comforted
  • Legal, medical, church, school, or military processes that re-injure
  • A sense that 'getting over it' means accepting injustice

Talk here

  • Name the institution when the institution did the harm.
  • Ask what would make this conversation safer in their body and in their context.
  • Offer practical solidarity (rides, childcare, believing them at work) not only feelings.

Skip

  • Do not 'both-sides' abuse or racialized violence.
  • Do not make them the spokesperson for a group.
  • Do not confuse your discomfort with their lack of gratitude.

Who this draws on

Judith Lewis HermanSandra L. BloomResmaa MenakemKenneth V. HardyNadine Burke HarrisVincent J. Felitti