I thought about taking this column on a 90-degree turn from last month’s “Snowball” cliffhanger, but I’m feeling too guilty about stringing you along ad infinitum, so we shan’t skip a beat.
Trauma . . . it’s quite the buzzword these days . . . almost vogue.
It somewhat makes me chuckle to think of it as associated with me; I don’t exactly fancy myself as culturally relevant at age 64.
Along with making me chuckle, the notion of trauma in my life came as a surprise.
From the onset of my “trough” around age 14, trauma was not at all on the culprit list; in fact, it wasn’t even among what one would label as the usual suspects.
A physical cause for physical symptoms made complete sense to my half-German logical brain.
The emotional symptoms, I reasoned, were probably the fallout of something being amiss physically.
However, after major pathologies were ruled out, I was left to more or less live with it.
Thus began the decades- long saga of finding some combination of remedies (supplements, alternative therapies, medications, etc.) that would help me function like a regular person on a daily basis.
I hit more than my share of dead ends, but also found some things that helped.
Over time, one truism emerged: No matter which weapon I picked from my arsenal, its effectiveness didn’t last. I began to wonder if my struggles were more than skin-deep.
Thus emerged my personal premise regarding true and lasting healing in the absence of identified pathology: It is not just emotional, but more significantly, spiritual in its origin.
The three are inextricably intertwined. We are complex creatures — “fearfully and wonderfully made” — in the image and likeness of The Divine Physician.
Let me reiterate what I wrote last month: This is MY observation about MY life and MY wounds.
I would never presume to speak to anyone else’s experience, so please don’t extrapolate and flood the editor with letters (insert eyes-rolled-skyward emoji here).
Anyway, I wasn’t sure how to dig into all of that, but my very wise and intelligent daughter put me on Step 1 of the right path with a providential observation:
“Mom, I know your symptoms are real; I can see it. But have you ever thought about the possibility that their origin might be psychological vs. physical? I am NOT saying they’re all in your head. I’m just suggesting it as a consideration since standard medical tests for things like inflammation, etc., always come up normal. Maybe a therapist would be of help; it’s just a thought.”
Paraphrasing aside, it was a great thought. By the grace of God, I found a wonderful therapist who had experience in grief and PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder) recovery techniques.
She was not Catholic, but was unabashedly Christian; need I even explain why the latter was extremely important to me?
She turned out to be a perfect fit, and I worked with her through my husband’s grave illness, his death, and the grieving after his passing.
As she was very astute, she quickly saw my faith as central to my being, and I recall her desire to understand the notions of “novena” and “chaplet”.
With her permission, I promptly fired up my Relevant Radio app, and we prayed the Divine Mercy Chaplet with Drew Mariani in one of my sessions!
You just never know how God is going to use you — and your suffering.
There was more than one trauma that emerged in our work, but one is sufficiently illustrative of the havoc that said phenomenon can wreak on a person.
Around age four, I accidentally overdosed on a bottle of baby aspirin and had to be rushed to the ER to have my stomach pumped.
My sister said it took several people to hold me down, so clearly it was a violent experience for me.
The conclusion that I had a deeply held fear (and even hidden rage, as it turns out) for the medical community is probably no surprise to the reader.
What might be a surprise, however, is that the wounds from that experience went well beyond the obvious.
This became apparent in both my PTSD work, and even more so later on in Step 2 of the right path for me: Spiritual healing work with another wonderful and gifted person.
I have no conscious memory of the overdose ordeal, but it seemed obvious to me that I must have processed it as though these people were trying to kill me.
Remember, it was 1965, my life was in danger, and no one was going to take the time to gently explain to me what was going to go down.
I was pinned to a table, and unable to scream, breathe, or escape.
However, what was not obvious to me was the deeper emotional wound that was revealed: My dad didn’t save me.
In fact, he delivered me to the water boarders. He didn’t protect me. I couldn’t count on him to protect me.
Yes, you read that right. And yes, you are correct in that he had no choice if I was going to live.
But that’s the thing about trauma: It is NOT logical. It is absolutely real but not necessarily logical.
Eventually, I discovered that this emotional wound of “I can’t trust my father to protect me” somehow morphed into a spiritual one: “I can’t trust The Father to protect me.”
I don’t know how Satan does it, except that he is always looking to pounce, and we are likely the most vulnerable in our wounds (and our difficulty in letting them go). He succeeded in putting me into a rather spiritually dark place for a long time.
Trauma has far-reaching effects on the mind, body, and spirit, but it can be healed.
Tune in to the next episode for a deeper dive.
Maria Burns is a lifelong Catholic and writer who lives in Madison and is a member of Divine Mercy Parish in Madison.