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Don’t Blame It All On Trauma
Overlap between PTSD and ADHD shows that it’s always both nature and nurture.
In the 30-plus years since I started working as a psychiatrist there’s been a huge surge in therapists focusing on trauma. For the most part this is a good thing. We know that trauma, defined as an experience that is perceived as dangerous, violent, or threatening, plays a large role in determining who develops post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), substance abuse, depression, anxiety, and personality disorders.
Helping people work through trauma has enabled many to lead healthier, happier, more predictive lives.
But overemphasizing trauma has its downsides. It can lock some people into a stance of victimhood. Focusing on particular trauma experiences can cause resentment among others who feel that their own adversities are being minimized, a situation that plays a large role in our currently contentious politics.
Life presents dangers, but seeing trauma in even the slightest threat can render the term meaningless. Furthermore, viewing trauma as the source of all human misery can blind suffering individuals, and their therapists, to other factors that might contribute more substantially to that person’s anguish and dysfunction.
