Traumatised or not traumatised?

Everything goes through periods of being fashionable. Or to sound smarter about it, we construct our worlds through language. And one of my current pet hates is that everyone is traumatised by everything. Stoicism and fortitude have disappeared, these are no longer fashionable words. When last have you heard them? If someone dares say that they are not traumatised by an armed robbery or by whatever, they are clearly mistaken. Everyone knows they should be traumatised which means that they are in denial or suppressing their true feelings. Our society has decided that when we have bad experiences that we have to receive trauma counselling.

An entire industry has arisen around this belief; numerous institutions provide training in trauma counselling. Numerous NGOs owe their continued existence to their providing trauma counselling. When some disaster happens somewhere in the world, the mental health professionals are there, providing trauma counselling. The psychologist who suggests someone is fine and would be better off without any intervention from the mental health industry is regarded as either incompetent or blunted by his or her experiences.

In reality the entire concept is bizarre. When you have had a bad experience, the last thing you need is a stranger asking about your emotional reaction! You need to know that you are safe, you need food, water, warmth, whatever you have lost and you need comfort, preferably from your own family or community. You definitely do not need do-gooding strangers who do not know you, who are not part of your community and who will disappear from your life as soon as they have either done their little bit or been attracted to some other disaster.

There are a number of studies now that indicate that early interventions by mental health professionals can cause the problems they were designed to prevent. They, in general, do more harm than good. These studies confirm that people who have had bad experiences need their families and friends during stressful times. Most people will be fine following dreadful events; around ninety per cent of people will experience no long-term symptoms.

It is not only that everyone is supposed to be traumatised when experiencing something bad, we as a society appear to have strange ways of dealing with really terrible events. Every time there is some truly horrific incident on the news and the sound bit ends with: "They are receiving trauma counselling" I have to wonder what this says about our society. We do not have to worry further about the type of society we have created - they are receiving trauma counselling. They will be fine, no matter how horrendous the event - they are receiving trauma counselling. We no longer have to think about shattered lives - they are receiving trauma counselling. We have no further responsibility, we have created the structure to deal with horror - they are receiving trauma counselling.