The Love of Jesus Mindset in Dealing with Trauma Victims

The greatest tool that can be wielded when working with a trauma victim is the “love of Jesus mindset.” This means that you defend the rights of the victim to be and do anything and everything they can to have some peace of mind. You and I might not agree with how they do so, but we will defend their right to do so, possibly with one qualification: as long as it doesn’t encroach on another’s rights to live their life as best they can.

In doing so, we create a sacred field of energy in which we can do the work necessary to assist the victim in their desire for true recovery. Note that I said “their desire,” as it cannot be your desire or the desire of a relative, loved one, boss, or judge. If we have learned anything, we know by experience that change cannot occur unless the victim seeks transformative change over all else, including but not limited to coping mechanisms.

You may be able to threaten a victim into feigning recovery to keep from losing the family, risking incarceration, or worse, but the victim will not be likely to conduct the deepest work necessary to get free from the trauma unless it is their idea. Allow them to come to this conclusion of his or her own volition. You cannot make this decision for them. If they choose to never do so, love him or her anyway. If they do, know that it is a process, a lengthy, long, and winding road of discovery, reinvention, and adaptation along the way to authentic recovery and new life.

The love of Jesus mindset provides a safe and sacred space where there is no judgment. Only empathy, reflective listening, compassion, openness, and a true sense of caring. Use phrases like “I’m here to listen” and “I care about your well-being.”

Practice active listening by reflecting back on what the person is expressing. This helps them feel heard and understood. For example, you might say, “It sounds like engaging in these activities is important to you, but I’m also hearing that it has some negative impacts on your life.”

Carefully and gently explore the patterns in their behavior and help them connect the dots between their coping mechanisms and their overall well-being. Ask open-ended questions about their experiences and feelings. Let them fill in the blanks and elaborate. If they offer resistance, change the subject. This is not an intervention.

Making the necessary adjustments in a victim’s life will be difficult for them, and it may take several attempts to make the changes in utilizing their coping mechanisms stick. You can help by encouraging them to celebrate their victories, no matter how small and no matter how short the duration. You understand that this is a process, and further attempts at change will yield better, more long-lasting results.

Over time, they feel supported and can build the self-confidence to move forward and dig deeper into finding the root cause(s) of their life struggles. Little by little, they are becoming the master of their own destiny, no longer just a victim struggling against wounds from trauma from the past.

You can offer them ideas about more positive coping mechanisms that they can use as alternatives to the negative behaviors they are expressing now, but the choice of what to try is theirs. Never suggest that they do a particular thing. You will lose them if you try to tell them what to do. Give them three choices and let them pick one to attempt, or let them devise another option. Alternatively, continue to listen to them and see if they are willing to dig deeper.

Help them examine that the negative coping strategies come at a price, and allow them to discover and relate the potential risk factors to you. At their request, you could help them in the examination process and ask their thoughts on your research results. Allow them to be wherever they are in their process.

Basic healthy suggestions you could make might include embarking on a path of personal growth and change, mindfulness practices, physical exercise, relaxation techniques, building supportive relationships, self-care practices, setting healthy boundaries, and seeking out a specialist to work with.

Remember, the process of change is often gradual, and individuals may need ongoing support. Professional guidance can play a crucial role in helping them navigate this journey towards healthier coping mechanisms and improved well-being.

 

How to Help a Victim of Trauma

Recreating the scene of the crime of a victim’s trauma and unconsciously acting out in homage to one’s abuser can reinforce negative behavioral patterns, prevent an otherwise healthy and expansive quality of life experience, and greatly hinder personal growth potential, making true deep and meaningful healing next to impossible.

While victims of trauma may find solace in revisiting similar activities from their traumatic past as an effective coping mechanism, the relief realized is temporary, blocking them from confronting and processing the emotions, slaying the demons, and ultimately overcoming past trauma, emerging from the flames as true masters of their own destiny.

Revisiting, acting out, and recreating traumatic experiences and circumstances, while they may offer some relief, may severely complicate or compromise otherwise potentially healthy relationships, as the individual may struggle with trust and emotional intimacy.

Not only that but there is a tremendous opportunity to make matters worse, re-traumatizing the victim or creating a new generation of victims. Engaging in these unhealthy activities and placing oneself in trauma-related circumstances can lead to serious health risks and may come with moral and legal consequences.

How to Help a Victim of Trauma

If there is any hope for you to help someone struggling with these mind-bending dichotomies, it is vitally important that you do everything you can to first understand how the trauma victim fights for survival in manners which you could not possibly “know,” unless you were also a victim of similar trauma. Even so, everyone’s experience and how they respond to it is highly individualistic, so you can never truly know what someone is going through, but you can do your best to have an idea. And your heart, if it is inclined to truly care about someone suffering in this way, can be a bridge to a victim’s recovery.

Suggesting that someone’s sacred act of providing relief from the pain suffered from one’s traumatic past may be a huge hindrance blocking their potential for a higher quality of life must be considered with the utmost respect and caution. This new idea may threaten their very existence, for their tendency to act out in the manner they do is their key to survival, enabling them to live a somewhat normal life. They may feel as though their very life depends upon it, and they may not be wrong.

Not engaging in the activity could kill them. One such example would be John, whom I asked if he thought he might be an alcoholic. He refused such a label, admitting that he did drink every night, but unlike his father, he could quit at any time. Just to prove it to himself, he decided not to partake in any alcohol over the weekend. By Sunday at noon, he was dropped off at the hospital by the ambulance. Sunday evening, he was sent home with strict orders to drink alcohol until he could be entered into an inpatient rehab program.

Neither you nor I could have explained this to John. For this exercise to be effective, he had to come up with the idea to test his own potential for addiction. He was a strong, independent, successful individual, making his way through life. No one in his circle of life had any idea that he might have an alcohol addiction, yet his very life depended upon it. Today, he is in his sixteenth year of sobriety. But it was a process of facing and defeating his demons from a traumatic past over time. There is no quick and easy fix for this.

While I say there is no quick and easy fix, I am quickened by those words because I have seen miraculous and instant recovery, but only from a magnificent and instantaneous transformative spiritual experience. These born-again-type experiences are far rarer these days than in days gone by. Keep an open mind; you might experience such a feat, but don’t count on it.

Helping a victim of trauma, one who has spent a great deal of time learning to self-medicate or revisit the victim’s root behaviors as a key coping mechanism, will take the love of Jesus mindset.

 

Why Do Victims of Trauma Find Solace in Similar Activities?

You may have a client or a friend who is engaging in activities that are similar to those that they experienced in childhood that were traumatizing, thereby continuing the cycle of abuse and, in a sense, paying homage to the person or persons who victimized them in their youth. If you have been one of the lucky ones who have not been a victim of such childhood abuse, you may never understand. The question remains,

Why Do Victims of Trauma Find Solace in Similar Activities?

For adult victims of childhood trauma, engaging in activities or placing themselves in situations reminiscent of the traumatic experiences of their past is an effective coping mechanism. The psychological, emotional, and neurological factors behind such actions are highly complex and extremely individualized. These individuals share their ability to adapt to their environment, a successful survival instinct, and the potential to avail themselves to engage in activities that are potentially unhealthy in the long term.

If the victim was robbed of his or her personal power as a child in the traumatic event, note this is a definitive distinction of trauma in general, then restaging the event in adulthood can empower the victim, thereby offering him or her a sense of relief from the traumatic experience of the past.

They can affirmatively experience being in control of the present situation when they have had no control in the recollection of their memories of the past. Reenacting the scene(s) of the crime is conducted in an effort to rewrite the past, rebuild confidence, and, in a sense master the circumstances surrounding the trauma.

Desensitization is another way to cope with one’s traumatic past. Normalizing the activity and partaking in it regularly dulls the senses and makes it not as painful as it was in the past. This type of cognitive rationalization can be thought of as just a fact of everyday life that everyone could or should get accustomed to, thereby reducing or eliminating the pain associated with the traumatic experience.

The victim may be in search of understanding regarding the former traumatic event(s), and revisiting the trauma avails them more data regarding the predator and their own victimization. As further information is gathered and research is conducted by engaging in similar activities as an adult, the inner child believes it can make sense of what happened in the past and find a way to integrate this understanding into present-day life. It might be believed that this understanding could lead to reducing the potential for furthering this type of abuse for others in some way.

When you are haunted by memories of abuses or injustices of the past, they can show up in adulthood in the strangest ways and at the most inopportune times. Managing these emotions by creating similar circumstances to expose and deal with the trauma of the victim’s own volition, in their own way, on their own terms, places them “in control” of emotional trauma when previously there was likely little or no control, never knowing when the compressed emotions might explode into life-threatening exposure next.

With all this effort, relief is experienced by the victim in the revisiting of the traumatic events or circumstances, but the relief is not lasting. This fleeting sense of relief causes the victim to seek relief again by seeking opportunities to revisit the trauma yet again.

When victims come to the realization that even with all their efforts to reconcile their traumatic pasts are in vain and may cause more harm to themselves and others in the long run, that is when they seek out me or one of my contemporaries.

How to Help a Victim of Trauma

 

How Suppressed Trauma Affects You

Suffering from the effects of trauma or post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) can be expressed in many dysfunctional ways. When it is severely internalized, the one who has suppressed the trauma suffers even more. The people around this person are more than likely unaware that he or she is suffering at all because their internalization of the trauma is so effective. Or is it? They appear to be coping and interacting in life’s processes normally. But at what cost?

Unbeknownst to the onlookers, or even the person who is suffering from repressed trauma, it takes a great deal of energy to keep the trauma suppressed, because if it were to be released, the individual might experience a severe psychotic break or worse.

Where does the energy come from necessary to manage suppressed trauma?

The human body is a combination of mass and energy. The energy required to manage suppressed trauma is robbed from the body that hosts the trauma. This is the very same energy that is required for the body to function properly, so the body begins to deteriorate.

How does the body deteriorate due to suppressed trauma?

First and foremost, the immune system is compromised, so the person who is keeping the trauma buried deep within is prone to sickness, disease, and premature aging. Then energy is taken from the basic physiological and brain function, so organs begin to fail, bones may become brittle, depression begins to settle in, and cognition becomes problematic.

Explosive Traumatic Outbursts

Keeping all that trauma bottled up takes a lot of energy. Someone suffering from repressed trauma can get some relief by having an explosive traumatic outburst event. This is shocking to the unsuspecting onlookers who will be hard-pressed to try to make sense of this sudden break in character of their beloved family member, friend, or faithfully diligent employee.

Once completed, the outburst, which could take from hours to years, can offer a great deal of relief, and in a sense re-energize the individual suppressing the trauma giving them the ability to reset and have the energy necessary to resume a “normal” life once again.

Self-Medication

Many trauma suppressors release the pain from bottling it up by finding ways to let off steam and reenergize by engaging in high-risk activities periodically. These activities may be intimidating, even frightening, for most of us, but to them, they are highly effective coping mechanisms.

How might trauma suppressors self-medicate?

You might find them excessively “overing,” over-eating, over-drinking, over-spending, over-compensating, hoarding, gambling, using illicit drugs, engaging in criminal activity or sexually stimulating activity, having unprotected sex with strangers, or living a secret second life as a less desirable personality, among other methods of self-medication.

How do trauma suppressors affect other people’s lives?

If you genuinely care about someone who is actively hiding buried festering infectious wounds of unresolved trauma and abuse, accept the fact that this will be a tumultuous relationship. Expect broken promises, sudden surprises, hurt feelings, and ghosting, where this person may disappear without a word for periods of time or longer, even forever.

So, what’s the answer?

What can you do if you care about someone who is suppressing trauma?

Love them. As hard as you might try to help someone who is suppressing trauma, this is a highly individualized journey, and only they hold the keys to their own doing or undoing of this. Unraveling suppressed trauma is so complicated that there is no one way to assist someone through the process of overcoming trauma and abuse from the past, the trauma that for him or her is so individually horrific that the presence of it cannot be thought about or spoken of.

Can you help someone who is suppressing trauma?

Trying to help them will do you more harm than good. This is even a speculative proposition for experienced professionals. One who overcomes unresolved trauma will often seek different practitioners and modalities before finding the right combination of methodologies to successfully exit this mentally and potentially life-threatening affair.

CAUTION: Caring about someone who is dealing with unresolved past trauma or abuse can be traumatizing for you. Trying to help them? Even more.

The best thing you can do is to love them. Love them unconditionally if you can.

Try not to judge them. Pray for them, and send them all the love and energy from above and beyond you can because they need it.