What Makes an Event Traumatizing?

It’s a tough question, because we love to use hyperbole in order to bring emphasis to something. For example, a student may say it was traumatizing to come into class and suddenly be expected to take a pop quiz. A mom may say she was traumatized by having to stand in a long line at the store while her child hollered. Can these things traumatize us? Possibly. Just about any negative life circumstance can produce trauma, but we have to be careful with how we talk about it. We should never make light of it.

At the core of traumatization is helplessness. Any event, series of events or season of life can produce a sense of helplessness. When this occurs, we feel backed into a corner. We feel that we’ve lost our sense of dominion. “Dominion” is the word used to describe the gift God gave to Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. He commanded them to be fruitful, to multiply, and to have dominion over every living thing that moves on earth. This is a high calling given to all humans. When we experience traumatization, we sense that our dominion is reduced, even taken away. Not by fault of our own, but because of sin trampling everything in its wake.

So what is helplessness? When your choices have been taken away, or when you’re so paralyzed that you’re unable to make the choices you want to make, you’re experiencing helplessness. At our core, we are not helpless beings. We are not meant to be at the complete mercy of someone or something else. Even babies are given a sense of dominion because they are able to cry out in order to be heard and seen and cared for. But what happens when cries go unnoticed over a period of time? What happens when a person experiences something grievous and has no one safe to ask for help? What happens when an event is so terrifying that the body shuts down and cannot respond by fighting or fleeing? This is helplessness.

Helplessness can occur in a vast number of settings and situations. This is why I cannot tell you through a blog post whether your circumstances were traumatizing. What I can say is that if you feel a strong sense of helplessness and you don’t have the resources to return to a state of dominion within a reasonable time frame, you may become traumatized. Not everyone who experiences a “traumatic event” becomes traumatized. (I use quotation marks because the label “traumatic” is culturally influenced and changes over time.) But let me give you a list of things that can easily be traumatizing:

• Abuse of all kinds (sexual, physical, emotional, financial, verbal and spiritual)
• Loss of a loved one
• Natural disaster
• Motor vehicle accident
• Combat exposure
• Captivity
• Life-threatening illness or injury
• Severe human suffering
• Serious injury, harm or death you caused to someone else

These events may seem obvious to some, but here are some less obvious things that also can be traumatizing:

• Bullying
• Racial discrimination
• Loss of a career or lifetime dream
• Financial ruin
• Being stuck somewhere without help
• Getting lost and not having the resources to find your way
• Witnessing any of the events in the first list
• Listening to stories of trauma from others (as happens for counselors and other helping professionals)
• Rescue work (such as firefighters, police officers, game wardens, park rangers, etc.)

Have any of these things happened to you? Did you feel a sense of absolute helplessness? Did your body respond by becoming numb, by heart palpitations, by shortness of breath and/or severe muscle tension? Did you have anyone you could safely tell about the event?

Finally, it’s important to note that some people experience terrible events but somehow do not develop traumatization. In my next post, I’ll explore with you how to learn whether your negative life events may have been traumatizing. Stay tuned, and please share this post with anyone you think may be helped by it.

I’d also love to receive your questions and comments. This helps me plan future posts, so please send me a reply!