the more i talk to extended family the more i learn that it was EXTREMELY obvious to all the adults around me as a child that something had gone horribly wrong and i needed professional help, but i guess there's some sort of prime directive thing where you can suggest to the kid's parents that the kid might need help but you can never ever ever let on to the kid that you can tell something is wrong. you just have to hold on to that until the kid becomes an adult who's able to say "so i think i experienced a lot of trauma when i was very little" and then you can say "yes, i know. i didn't know what happened but it was completely unmissable that something had." okay. thank you. that's very validating. but why did you leave me to suffer and keep feeling like there was no other explanation than that i was broken and going insane. would it really have been so bad to sit me down and go "i see you. i can't help much, but i can tell something happened and you're in a lot of pain. you deserve help and support. you're not going insane." or something. i don't know. my internal experience was mostly that i had suddenly become a bad child who couldn't seem to get anything right and was always being yelled at. maybe it would have helped if someone had said something.
i don't have any kids in my life but if there was a kid i was familiar with who suddenly started randomly shutting down and/or lashing out after never meaningfully exhibiting that behavior before, i would without question try to find a way to let them know that i could see their pain. that they aren't imagining it. that even if there's no way to get them help, they still deserve it.
For better or for worse, when it comes to children, most people are more concerned with not doing harm than with helping.
