Posts Categorized: Help for Trauma

Sexual Trauma: Why Trump’s Locker Room Talk Matters

Posted October 14th, 2016 | Michelle Hollomon

After all, Donald Trump was only saying things that women have heard all their lives, so why does Locker Room Talk matter? Sexual Assault affects one in four women, and with it comes trauma, shame and fear.

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When I first watched the Washington Post video of Trump, I felt sick. I felt slimed. I felt triggered. Because I study and treat the symptoms of trauma, I knew that his words were having a traumatizing effect on my body. My body was repulsed, sickened like it had been injected with a poison. When I heard Donald Trump talk about using his celebrity and power to force himself on women and grab their genitals, I shuttered. Donald Trump used his power, celebrity and position to degrade and even force himself sexually on women like a predator. It took me back to times when I was the object of that kind of language and treatment. Maybe you too.

Locker Room

Past Trauma

You know what I’m talking about: boys who called a girl a sexual name. Or the man at the bar touching you when you walk by. Or the teacher leaning too close. We’ve all had these moments that send chills up our spine and a knife through our gut.

When women hear, see or experience degrading sexual banter or behavior, they can be triggered to re-experience the trauma of past sexual assault. If you feel slimy, it’s because you’ve just been slimed.

What is Sexual Assault?

Sexual Assault is a crime of power and control referring to sexual contact or behavior without the victim’s consent. Maybe hearing Donald’s sick banter made you remember times where you were the victim of this kind of treatment. Locker Room Talk doesn’t happen in a vacuum, and we are seeing that as more women speak out (Temple Taggart and others.) If there is Locker Room Talk, there is undoubtedly degrading behavior to follow.

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Here’s Why Locker Room Talk Matters

  1. It’s Assaultive: language that tears women down, minimizes them into an object of chase, or separates them into their body parts is an assault on women’s value. Hearing Donald trump talk that way about women and women’s anatomies can be re-traumatizing for those who’ve been sexually assaulted.
  2. It’s silent permission: when someone with power, fame, money or control talks this way, our culture becomes desensitized and accepts it as normal.
  3. It’s Sexually Violent in Nature: Using force, power, celebrity or even the element of surprise to grab, touch, fondle, push, rub, kiss or bump a woman sexually is violent and threatening in nature. Yes, Violent.
  4. It Objectifies Women’s Bodies: calling a woman’s anatomy vulgar names in a demeaning way separates her humanity from her parts. The woman no longer is a woman (human) as much as she is an object to be owned, used, or dismissed. Objects, unlike humans have no inherent value other than what they can provide their owner.
  5. It’s Devaluing. Treating, talking about, referring to women as less than the full and valuable humans they are is wrong, sexist and archaic.
  6. It’s Shaming. Shame has a way of making a person feel like there is something inherently wrong with them on the inside. Locker Room Talk shames the woman into feeling less than, deserving of abuse treatment, and unworthy of anything better.
  7. It’s Triggering. Hearing it may trigger you and even re-traumatize you. It makes us remember the times we were talked to like that. In my case, hearing Trump say those words took me back to a time when a powerful male with influence and followers, talked about me like that. The heart races, the cold sweat comes, shallow breathing, panic feelings, and flash backs- these are all signs of being triggered from past trauma.
  8. It’s Debilitating. Locker Room behavior rattles a woman to the point where she starts doubting herself. In attempts to make sense of it, she may ask herself things like, “What did I do to cause this? Why did he pick me? What should I have done differently?” Locker Room Behavior and Sexual Assault causes the victim to feel falsely responsible. Victims feel guilty as though they had a part in it.

Sexual Assault is Traumatizing

The women coming out now who are describing their sordid and unwanted sexual interactions with Donald Trump, report being walked in on while undressing, and kissed, groped and touched without consent. When someone forces himself into your space, making you feel emotionally, physically or financially trapped into conceding, you feel powerless. Your power, your privacy rights, your boundaries have been violated.

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Locker Room Talk is not victimless. Unwanted groping, kissing, touching and leering is more than just awkward and uncomfortable- it is traumatizing.  Getting away with something because “you can” shows a disregard for other’s needs and value. It shows Trump’s lack of moral center and conscience for how his actions affect others. We call that sociopathic behavior in my profession. We call that pathology. We call it dangerous.

If you’re with a man who minizizes Trump’s lewd acts and language, be aware of ways he may be minimizing you too. If you’re with a man who excuses locker room talk as “boys will be boys,” it’s ok to be alarmed, and mad, and sickened. These feelings are a message from your body that you deserve better.

Making Something Dead, Live Again

Posted April 13th, 2016 | Michelle Hollomon

Have you ever felt like a situation was so hopeless that it would never get better? Like something was so far gone that nothing could restore it? In business, one might say it’s time to “cut your losses.” In fishing, “find a new fishing hole.” Miners find a new claim. But what about a life? A relationship? A dream?

Happy Spring to the best people on earth! Hello to the dirt diggers, the sprout planters and those waking from hibernation. Today we will see what it takes to get a scarred and dying thing to flourish and thrive.

In the late 1800s, when horse drawn carriages delivered gloved and corseted ladies to high tea, and silk hatted gentlemen bet on horse races and played croquet, Robert Butchart was making his family fortune mining limestone on Vancouver Island in Canada. Limestone was a main ingredient for cement and Butchart’s Canadian quarry supplied the Portland Cement company with what it wanted. This cement was used for the developing infrastructure of cities and buildings all over the world. Mining metals, gems, oil and ore has been the backbone of development and progress for centuries, but as you may know, leaves the land spent- gouged- barren and scarred.

By 1904, Robert had made his fortune mining, by depleting his Vancouver site’s limestone resources. The extracting process was about to be replaced by the planting process.

Robert and his wife, Jenny not only built their mine on this resourceful property, it was also the land on which they built their family home. After shutting down the quarry, something remarkable happened.  An unprecedented plan for refurbishing the massive and exhausted pit was devised. I would have loved to been there for the conversation between the two of them. Maybe Jenny said something like, “You had your turn, and I thank you for it. Now, I’ll take my turn.”

Jenny got to work. They ordered tons of top soil from nearby farmland to line the floor of the used-up quarry. They hired hundreds of gardeners to carry out the work, and spent years designing one of the most beautiful places on earth. Under Jenny Butchart’s supervision, the quarry was reborn as a garden. And what a spectacular garden!

 

I’ve visited three times now, and never tire of it. The flowers, the life, the creativity- yes- these things are breathtaking. But it’s the story of the thing for me. It’s the story that keeps me coming back. What was once a devastated, used, bombed out, chiseled up, abused piece of hillside is now a paradise for everyone. What was gutted and used for forward progress could have been left that way. But someone loved it enough to restore it. Someone could see it’s potential for beauty even through the scars. Jenny Butchart dreamed of what it could be and worked tirelessly until she achieved her vision.

Jenny’s dream was nothing short of divinely inspired, and if you have visited Butchart gardens, you have experienced what I mean. The gardens are massive, incorporating not only the quarry itself, but  expanding to the edge of the sea side. Once the quarry was refurbished, Jenny continued her plan with new gardens- a Japanese garden, an Italian garden, a Rose garden.

Are there parts of your life that have been scarred by the hands of someone else? Maybe those wounds were unintended or even well- intentioned, but the hurt happened anyway. Are their disappointments, traumas or losses that have left you exhausted, spent or scarred? Maybe it’s time for a new dream. Maybe it’s time to cast a vision for yourself that restores and refurbishes what has been taken.

Steps to Refurbishment:

  • Dare to Dream Better– I don’t know what Jenny was thinking all those years ago, but I know she could see passed what was to what could be. She dared to dream more than what her reality presented to her. We, like Jenny can focus on potential.
  • Dare to Dream Bigger– Jenny and Robert could have stopped when their fortune was amassed and their quarry was empty. But they had bigger plans. We like Jenny, can focus on the opportunity that reality presents us instead of the problem.
  • Dare to Start Small– hauling dirt probably didn’t seem any more exciting then than it does now. But a foundation of fertile soil was the needed first step. Taking the first step to accomplish your dream is often the hardest and dirtiest. Any good gardener knows it takes way more dirt than you ever thought it would. Don’t give us, keep haling dirt until you’re ready.
  • Dare to Keep at It until your Dream is a Reality- I can imagine that Jenny’s dream of one giant English garden looked like a messy mud pit for a good portion of the starting stages, but I have a feeling she kept the vision alive through the dirty years until it was planting time. We, like Jenny, must keep the vision in our mind’s eye even when our reality doesn’t look anything like the dream.

What Resilient People Do to Cope with Relationship Shock

Posted June 9th, 2015 | Michelle Hollomon

“I know this is hard for you to hear. It’s hard for me to say. But it’s time for me to make this decision. I want out…”

Or…

“I’m just not in love with you anymore…”

Or

“There’s someone else…”

Or

“I’m sorry to tell you this, but he’s gone. He died this morning…”

Words like this coming from someone close to you are devastating. One moment, you’re life is predictable, and the next you are reeling through time and space without direction or an end in sight. Last week we talked about the Relationship Shock Wave that comes out of no where and turns your world upside down. 

A Relationship Shock Wave like secret financial debt, secret affairs, secret sexual abuse, or unexpected death can put you in a child-ego state of powerlessness. You may feel as powerless, small and confused as a child. But the truth of the matter, is that you are an Adult. You are strong, and smart and capable. This Relationship Shock Wave may put you into your child-ego state of helplessness, but you don’t have to stay there. Here is a helpful comparison.

Child Ego State

  • Compulsive and reactive – “Have to” language 
  • Your fate is controlled by others
  • You’re only as important as the bigger people say  
  •  You know insufficiency, lack, and emotional poverty    
  • You don’t know enough to affect real change  
  • You don’t have enough to change my circumstances   
  • You’re not big enough for people to listen to me or take me seriously.

You may have a “flooding” experience when a Relationship Shock Wave occurs. The shock reminds your body and unconscious of something you’ve been through before like a trauma, abuse, abandonment, upheaval. The body feelings and trauma feelings come back in a wave and overwhelm you. The Relationship Shock puts you in a younger, powerless ego state and you feel helpless. This is normal to feel this way at first, but don’t let the flooding  stage debilitate you.

The truth of the matter is you are not that little person any more. You are a big person now, with big person power. You have choices today that you didn’t have back then. You have experience and capabilities and resources that you didn’t have back then. You are stronger now. 

Let the Truth of the matter pull you back to reality- the reality of your adult ego.

Adult Ego State

  • You accept Personal Choice and Responsibility  
  • You use “Want to” language instead of “have to” language
  • You destiny is up to you  
  • You’re as important as YOU say you are
  • You believe in abundance, sufficiency, and emotional health  
  • You know enough of what you need to know, and you will know what you need to know, when you need to know it  
  • You have enough of what you need for now, and you’ll have enough when you need it next
  • You’re big (smart, pretty, resourceful, skilled) enough for the task that’s required of you right now.

Everyone gets stuck in feelings from the past, and there is nothing like a Relationship Shock Wave to trigger flooding. However, resilient people, like yourself, work hard to enter back into their strong adult ego state. You’ve done hard things before, and you can do hard things again.

The Truth of the Matter is that this time around, you know you’re not alone. 

What Resilient People Do to Overcome Relationship Shock

Posted June 1st, 2015 | Michelle Hollomon

How do resilient people move through Relationship Shock? They master specific skills that help them recover. 

When you experience a Relationship Shock, you may feel scared to death., petrified,  frozen in fear, trapped, damned if you do, and damned if you don’t.  

These are words that describe how you might feel when bad things happen: like finding out your husband cheated, or wants a divorce, or finding drugs in your teenager’s room, the sudden death of the grandma who raised you, or getting a call from your dad you haven’t heard from in 17 years. Shocking news can sucker punch you, leaving you with no breath, no worldly idea what happened, and no direction to go next.

This Frozen Feeling is shock and bewilderment. It can render you powerless to make necessary choices and take necessary action. But you can be resilient when hard times hit. Resilient people are able to take any problem and turn it into an opportunity to grow, to live, and to give. Here are some steps to Moving Through a Relationship Shock Wave.

  • Get moving– Get out of bed, out of your chair, and move. When you’re mind can’t think straight because of the mental tailspin you’re in, then move your body. Walk, run, move. Movement releases the pent up fight or flight energy your body produces to survive. You have survived, you are a survivor, now it’s time to release the endorphins and stress hormones and move. Get the heart rate up, pound the pavement, let the body convince the mind that its strong and capable.
  • Concentrate on what you do know, not on what you don’t– there are many things about your shocking circumstance you don’t know. Don’t let your questions rule the day. Questions come from a powerless place. Statements come from a place of power. State to yourself the Truth of the Matter and let your mind settle on it. The more mental energy you give the questions, the crazier you will feel.
  • Conquer denial with grieving what’s gone. You lost something. Something died. Maybe it was your trust, your innocence, your safety, your security or your relationship. You had it, but now it’s gone. Grieve it. Take account, line by line of what you’ve lost and grieve it all the way through. To pretend that you never lost it, or deny that it’s gone, or that it’s no big deal, sinks you further into denial. Your grief goes underground where it has the power to fuel addictions, depression and panic. Grieve what you lost, and let it go.
  • Accept Reality – Your reality after your Relationship Shock Wave can never be the same as your reality before the Relationship Shock Wave. Your reality is different now. You’re different now. Don’t paint the past like it was perfect, because you and I both know, it wasn’t. Set your mind to accept the new reality because it is IN REALITY that you will find your power. Accept the situation AS IT IS, not as you want it to be, or how it was, but AS IT IS.
  • Find Gratitude for WHAT IS- Because you are still here, be grateful. Because you have survived the Relationship shock, five thanks. Record, honor and accept what has been lost. The loss is significant. But so is what is left behind. When you grieve the loss, and accept reality fully, you will find gratitude for WHAT IS.
  • Choose Love over Fear- Fear is a leach you don’t even feel until it has drained you half dry. When you become aware of being anxious over all you can’t control, choose LOVE instead. Choose to be loving toward yourself. Choose to receive Love from God. Choose to reach out to loving people. Quiet your mind with Love.

Your situation is temporary, and the pain you feel will not last forever. Resilient people move through the stages of grief and trauma one step at a time, knowing each step makes them stronger, not weaker.

How about you? What have you done to recover from grief, trauma, divorce or loss? What has helped you be resilient in the face of difficulty and tragedy?

“Love Casts Out All Fear”

 

 

 

The Secret We Can’t Afford to Keep

Posted May 25th, 2015 | Michelle Hollomon

Maybe because it’s the clients who come for run-o-the-mill depression and anxiety always have a story- a story that begins with, “I’ve never told anyone this before…

Maybe it’s because my friend just texted me for PTSD resources because her childhood friend is finally getting treatment for the trauma in her past.

Maybe it’s because at bible study, the ladies talk about it like it’s real, and it happens, and it happens to one in four women, and if it hasn’t happened to us, it’s happened to our friend or our sister or our mother.

Maybe its because the recent Duggar family reports of sexual abuse are now in magazines and blogs and the news. What was well hidden is finally reaching the light of day.

It’s probably because of all these things together, that I’m overwhelmed with the damage of Sexual Abuse in our society. Sexual Abuse is real. And it hurts. And it stays with you long after its expiration date.

“For I will restore health to you, and your wounds I will heal, declares the Lord.” Jeremiah 30:17

My college students and I were discussing the pros and cons of reading Fifty Shades of Grey last semester. I teach at a small Christian college with a diverse population of kids from the farm, the hood, uptown, and fresh out of their mamma’s kitchen classroom. You can imagine this sparky debate. After the banter died down, I simply sighed and said, “But your brains. Your brains just can’t handle that kind of stimulus. They’re not even fully formed yet, and your sexual experiences haven’t even culminated in marriage yet, and geesh…. Your neuro-pathways, and synapses, and desire and pleasure centers will learn to feast on trash so they won’t even recognize homemade ice cream as being good. And why is abusive sex glamorized, anyway? When, in our society, did it become sexually gratifying to be used?” I don’t know if those 18 and 19 year olds even knew what I was rambling on about- me with my hopeless shoulder-shrugging, and old-fashioned ideals.

But I know.

I know that the victims of an oversexed culture are always, ALWAYS the children.

I know that sex learned through domination takes a really long time to unlearn.

I know that sex learned from pictures that display submissive women and heavy-handed men warps the brain to only find desire in that set-up.

I know that sex learned at the hands of a trusted big person taking advantage of a trusting little person brings years of shame and worthless feelings.

I know that sex abuse begets sex abuse begets more underground sex abuse. That Shame begets Shame begets blame and underground deviance.

And no one could ever convince me that there is no real evil, no real Satan, no real wickedness because I’ve seen its handiwork on the ravaged soul of the victim.

And I also know that every abuser, whether we think him/her wicked, vile or sick, has once been a helpless victim of abuse him/herself.

And I hate it all the more that some of this sexual abuse happens in “nice Christian families” that look so “perfect” on the outside but are hiding a secret they feel too ashamed to share. It reminds of the “white-washed tomb” analogy Jesus used to describe the religious leaders and law makers of His day.

 

 “The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit.”  Psalm 34:17

Sexual abuse happens in trustworthy settings like families, friends’ houses, schools and chapels. The victim always feels responsible at some level, and takes the blame and shame upon themselves. Upon finding out, adults often feel compelled to keep it quiet fearing shame or scourge may befall them all.  They also fear what might happen to the abuser- will he be fired? Will he be angry? Will he retaliate? When the only appropriate question is, “Will he offend again?” Their inaction increases the felt shame of the victim, heightens their feelings of worthlessness, and gives silent permission to the abuser.

Bringing the abuse out into the light gives it a chance to heal. Exposing the darkness drains it of its power. Secrets serve to shame, but bringing pain out of hiding releases the pent up energy for healing.

“And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you.” 1 Peter 5:10

So, if this is talking to you- if it’s ringing in your ears and pounding in your chest, then you know it’s time. It’s time to give yourself the priority your abusers never would. Reach out to a professional, a counselor, a specialist to talk. Healing can’t happen all by yourself in the dark. Journal your thoughts, your prayers and your pain. Record what’s been taken from you, and express your grief in a support group or counseling office. Tell a trusted friend that you are working through painful stuff, and you need their support and prayers. I know forgiveness is scary, but it will set you free.

And please, tell yourself that it wasn’t your fault.

Over, and

Over again. 

My “Relationship Savvy” blog gives you tips, advice, and flippin’ fantastic feel-goods to help with your most difficult relationship challenges.

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