The Fruits of Posttraumatic Growth
What trauma introduces into our life is not all bad.
This feels like an inflammatory statement to make, but hear me out. I came to this conclusion by working my way backward from now, back to the trauma.
I was musing about my catβs life, and how he is living better for longer than either of his vets or the life expectancies I found about cats with Stage 3 Chronic Kidney Disease (CKD) ever guessed he would. He is definitely sick and he has his good days and his bad days, but overall he is doing shockingly well for being a year and a half into entering Stage 3. The first study I found with an actual estimate gave him less than 400 days. Yet here we are, vaguely 500 days later. Summerβs still here.
Why is this the case? Is he just lucky? Thatβs part of it, Iβm sure. But the other part of it is that he has the greatest variable to survivability he could have asked for: Me. Hypervigilant to a fault with over a decade of researching, analyzing, and synthesizing studies and anecdotal experiences about medical treatments, I was born to play caretaker to this cat. The strange thing is, I have my trauma to thank for these skills.
I can read Merlin β a member of a species that is infamous for being exceptionally good at hiding discomfort β with uncommon clarity. Every subtle tail flick, every five degrees of ear angle, every partially tensed muscle is detected and accounted for. This old survival mechanism that I no longer need to utilize gains new life in my observation of this creature whose life Iβm responsible for. I am grateful to have this ability.
And I can read academic papers and other information sources on a consistent basis, with a learned understanding of experimentation that allows me to adjust his care efficiently. Weighing what would be most high impact, tweaking one variable at a time, and employing a researcherβs detatchment to observe which treatments we implement help versus harm. This behavior was born out of a series of severe illnesses I suffered, followed by chronic illnesses that appear to only be getting worse with age. The cherry on top was becoming responsible for my motherβs medical care. The necessity of being well-informed in the realm of medicine translated to being able to better care for my cat.
Now, if you went back in time and asked a teeny tiny Carly if theyβd rather not need to be able to read the room the instant they entered it in order to feel safe, of course theyβd pick having attentive and non-abusive caretakers. If you went back and gave them the choice to suffer through rubella, near anaphylaxis, and a hospitalization for meningitis and kidney infection, OR be completely healthy, yet again, of course theyβd pick being healthy.
The trauma was by definition, a fucking terrible experience. And for many years, particularly in the case of the programming I received from my caretakers that, βIn order to be safe, I must be liked,β I was poorly served by what it taught me. It wasnβt until I saw and truly accepted how different my life is now that things changed. It is incredible the amount of resiliency, cleverness, and empathy I gained as a result of having survived and, more importantly, having processed my trauma.
I couldnβt tell you what compelled me to write this. Maybe itβs my quiet prayer of gratitude and hope that these two gifts born of darkness continue to help keep the light of my soulcat alive. Maybe itβs just the increased time for introspection I have in the evenings recently making me truly appreciate how far Iβve come from the scarred, suicidal tornado of a human wrapped in fishnets and rage I once was so long ago.
Or maybe itβs the fact that in two different conversations this weekend with old friends I hadn't spoken with much while I underwent Eye Movement and Desensitization Reprocessing (EMDR), we marveled at how different we are than the versions of ourselves that existed when we first met; in discussing our respective journeys of healing, each conversational partner reacted with cautious curiosity to my changed state.
βEMDR, huh,β they echoed back at me.
βI keep hearing about that,β they both said.
And all I could tell them was the truth: βIt has forever altered the path of my life in a way almost 20 years of therapy never could.β
It is encouraging to hear Iβm not the only person talking about this absurd-sounding βpurple hatβ science, that the word is spreading. I am a skeptic by nature, but as they say, seeing is believing. I just had to go to the lights. Others are catching sight of them, too.
I think often about how to heal this sick, fearful world β Iβm a social scientist after all β and while there are important systemic pieces that I believe must be in place, I believe strongly that healing the individual is also necessary to heal the whole.
Imagine a population that has worked their brain like itβs a quad muscle, with the tearing resulting in it just becoming stronger and better able to be utilized for what we want. Or a generation raised by that healed population, with no need for initial injury and instead having those lessons passed down to them without having to suffer the pain that taught their caretakers. Itβs a lofty dream, perhaps, but I truly believe that whatever is dreamable is achievable.
I am living, thriving proof that trauma can be just the beginning.
