Relational Trauma: What you Need to Know
To define relational trauma, we first have to understand the definition of trauma. Trauma happens when a person feels overwhelmed and unable to cope with what is happening, coupled with a perceived threat to safety or survival. It is a subjective experience. One person may feel overwhelmed in a situation, and a different person may not. This doesn’t matter. If any person feels overwhelmed and unable to cope, they can experience trauma.
Most people know that not having food, water, or shelter, and/or being physically abused, can cause trauma during childhood. It’s important to note that feeling humiliated, demeaned, rejected, unaccepted, and/or not being able to count on an adult consistently can also cause significant trauma. This is because all of these things can be perceived as a threat to survival.
Relational trauma occurs within the context of a relationship. Most often, it refers to something experienced as a child in the context of parent-child (or primary caregiver) relationships.
If a child perceives they are disliked or unaccepted by an adult, this is a type of rejection. If a child is rejected by caregivers, this would literally be a threat to their survival, since they could not survive on their own. If there is no food in the house, or if a child is ignored by parents, or if a child is micromanaged or asked to be different than who they are; these things also can be perceived as rejection, which can easily (for a toddler or young child) translate to a threat to survival.
Feeling unaccepted or rejected in early childhood can hugely damage self-esteem, confidence, and feelings of self efficacy, and this core tenant of either not being able to count on people or being rejected, disliked, or unaccepted by people is something that can stick for life.
People are most vulnerable, and completely dependent on others, during infancy, toddlerhood, and childhood. This is why things that happen to them during these years are so impactful.
Here are a few key pieces of info related to relational trauma to help illustrate why it is so toxic and can be so damaging:
1. Rejection, abandonment, and shame, as well as the threat of any of these things, can cause trauma for children, especially if this happens on a regular basis. Very often, parents don’t realize or recognize that things they do may be interpreted in these ways by their children, but they still can.
2. What parents say to children and how they treat them becomes the child’s inner voice. If a parent is impatient, rude, or scary on a regular basis, the child will likely interpret that THEY are annoying, a bother, or not worthy of other people’s time. This is obviously hurtful and puts children into a state of stress. If unaddressed and ongoing, this can turn to “toxic stress,” which negatively impacts development.
3. If parents are inconsistent, unstable, volatile, unpredictable, and/or don’t communicate consistent underlying acceptance and love, this a lack of what children need most. Individual moments of this may not be a big deal, but if this is the tone of childhood, this can also lead to toxic stress and trauma. Just as children need sunlight, they also need these things from caregivers, or there will be adverse effects.
4. Not each child would be traumatized by the same parent behavior. Ten children could experience a situation, and some could feel overwhelmed and traumatized, while others may not. Factors like personality, past experiences, how often scary events happen, and level of sensitivity are a few things that influence how a person will perceive a specific situation or event.
5. The more often (or regularly) that children experience stress in the parent-child dynamic, the less trust, in general, exists within the relationship. Less trust generally means the more severe upsets will be and, likely, the longer it will take for the child to recover from each event.
6. The nitty gritty: Because children are vulnerable and can’t survive on their own, they need primary caregivers upon whom they can depend. Healthy parents are available, reliable, and clued to children's safety and needs - like keeping them fed, watered, warm, and picked up from activities on time. When this happens, children can trust that they are safe, and their brains and bodies are free to develop optimally. If an adult is reliable some or half of the time (and this includes emotionally - meaning, yelling, shaming, threatening, or unreliability) the child’s sense of safety and security will be less robust. When children can't count on a caregiver or are treated poorly, regularly, it is likely this child will have a hard time.
7. One can have basic needs (food, water, shelter, safety) met and still have experienced relational trauma. The need to feel loved, wanted, and to belong is extremely high in humans, and especially in little ones. If you had parents who rejected, shamed, were unreliable, or were unavailable, this might mean your basic needs weren’t actually met. Many adults who experienced relational trauma struggle with anxiety, depression, low self confidence, numbing behaviors, addiction, unexplained fears, etc., and have no idea it could be because of early relational trauma.
8. Good hearted, well-intentioned parents can still (unintentionally) violate children’s basic relational needs and cause trauma. If parents have anxiety, unchecked, they might be communicating to children that there is reason to be afraid. If parents are depressed, or checked out (with substance abuse, a work project, a cell phone, or another adult relationship), they are communicating unavailability. Because infants, toddlers, and children know they can’t survive without an engaged adult, these things can also cause trauma, and especially if they happen consistently, over time. If children are in a house where there is yelling, or scary strangers, this can also cause feelings of overwhelm. The list can go on.
Whew!
That’s a lot. Right?
Not long ago, people thought what happened during infancy/toddlerhood didn’t matter, and that one may be too young to even remember things from these years. We now know that couldn’t be further from the truth.
It’s a lot to get one’s head around.
These concepts have roots in attachment theory, which is the theory that discusses the impact the parent-child relationship has on the course of one’s life. If you want to learn more about this, Google Dan Siegel, and read about Interpersonal Neurobiology.
A lot of us had less than ideal childhoods. Does that mean we’re all walking around full of trauma? (Yes… actually. I do think there are many emotionally traumatized people in this country. This is why so many people are on psych meds and so many patterns continued to be passed down. But… )
HERE’S THE GOOD NEWS:
The brain develops according to early experiences, but it is possible to heal from these injuries — at any age. The earlier, the better, as patterns and habits become more entrenched with time, but finding relief from early relational trauma is possible.
And if you want to make sure you parent in a way that promotes healthy parent-child relationships and healthy attachment? There is help for this, too.
The best way to help yourself or your child if you know you’ve experienced some of these things is to begin learning about it, using the links above, and to begin working with a professional who is trained in attachment focused therapy and interpersonal neurobiology.
Living with this type of pain can be debilitating, uncomfortable, and miserable; not to mention, make it hard to succeed in school, work, and other areas of life. Getting help can bring immediate relief and open doors that can lead to positive change.