Tuesday, February 23, 2021

Trauma Resources (A Very Incomplete List--A Place to Start)

I've been meaning to put something like this together since the beginning but have always hesitated because I fear my list not being comprehensive or authoritative enough. I worry it may miss something others may find helpful, or may include something someone finds unhelpful or even harmful.

We're all different, so some of what helps me may not help you. But having a place to start may be helpful for some people, so here are some resources that I'm aware of that may be interesting and/or useful to others. If you feel it may be helpful to you, feel free to review them and make your own decisions about which may suit your needs.

I'm keeping it small for now, and including only those resources that I've either reviewed/used myself or intend to review/use in the future. 

Several of the books on the list, I'll confess, I own but haven't read yet or have only skimmed.

Even the ones that have helped me immensely, I view as resources rather than authorities. It's rare for me to agree with every word someone else writes.  (For example, I previously wrote about how "Trauma & Recovery," my favourite book about trauma, nevertheless caused some harm to me as I explored here)

Learning about trauma can be triggering so please consider your own limits in deciding whether or when to review any materials about it. I've found it helpful to learn about trauma, but have sometimes had to pace myself.

This will be skeletal at first but I will add to it and revise it as I come across new sources (or remember the ones I've previously benefited from).

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As always, please note that I am a lawyer, not a mental health professional of any kind. I have no expertise in trauma or mental health. Also, please note that any opinions and views expressed in this blog are solely my own and are not intended to represent the views or opinions of my employer in any way. 

I am very grateful to have received a 2019 "Clawbie" Award for this blog (which reflects the importance of this topic): https://www.clawbies.ca/2019-clawbies-canadian-law-blog-awards/ 

For some of my external writing on this topic, see: 



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Sunday, February 21, 2021

"Self-Love" Musings, Why It's Not My Goal

"We must love ourselves, or else...."

"No one will love us?"

"We can't truly love others?"

Speaking for myself, I reject those rules about what love is or must be.

Self-love may be problematic for some of us. In particular, shame/self-loathing can be a core symptom of Complex PTSD, as I explored here.

We may be overflowing with love for humanity and compassion for all sentient beings. Kindness towards others may be the animating principle that we aspire to guide our lives.

Except for ourselves.

It's possible (for some of us, at least) to love humanity and hate ourselves. Or simply exist in a complicated relationship with ourselves that isn't loving. 

I know this because I've not only experienced it in myself but also observed it in others. Some of the most loving, humble, gentle, compassionate, caring people I know are those who struggle with deep self-hatred. Some of these deeply loving people have tried their very best to "heal" that self-hatred. They've perhaps tried to medicate it, and/or "cure" it with therapy, or philosophical aphorisms. But it's persisted. And its persistence has deepened their sense of shame and been used abusively by others to further isolate/blame them. 

I feel sad when people don't love themselves (except for myself, because it's complicated and asymmetrical, as I wrote in the previous post cited above) . I want everyone to have self-love who can (as I wrote here), but those who lack it don't necessarily lack the experience of true, vibrant, rich, deep, meaningful love. And we aren't being kind IMO by trying to pressure, cajole or shame people into believing the love they do get to experience isn't valid and real.

As for those sayings about how we "must love ourselves OR ELSE," it always perplexes me that they never seem to explain why. It simply seems to be taken as self-evident. And maybe it is for some people. If some people need to love themselves before they can love others or receive love from others, I'm not here to tell them they're wrong or that they shouldn't pursue that goal. That may be how it works for some people. 

My own view? It's complicated. And flexible. And personal.

As it happens, I wrote my MA theses (here 🤮) on "the ideal of unconditional love." It was rushed and terrible. It could use many more edits and less pompous convoluted writing. A lot of what I started unpacking there requires further development before it can be useful. I was also only 22-years old. But I did derive some wisdom from the experience, I think. 

Here is what I learned: the concept of "love" (like so many other concepts) isn't something obvious and inert. There's considerable debate about what it means: not only about how we experience it but how we should experience it and aspire to do as it directs/suggests. How we view it may also depend on such complex things as how we view our own and others' personhood, how we construct self vs. "other," and how we orient ourselves to whatever we view as "good." There may be a correct answer, but no one has authoritatively provided it. There is room for differing approaches (which is where autonomy comes in). We can perhaps learn from each other and have constructive discussions, but not simply dictate the answer for each other, IMO.

So with those caveats, my own tentatively evolving view (for myself)?

Love (whatever it may be) is not something rigid and narrow that can be experienced only one way. 

In my view, love can be experienced a variety of different ways. We can experience love in our relationship to ourselves and/or in relation to others. We can even experience it more abstractly and/or generally (love of humanity, love of community, love of life, love of knowledge, love of "goodness").

If we experience disruptions along one or more of the usual axes, it doesn't mean we are shut out from experiencing love and allowing it to flow in and through us in a way that works for us. 

Perhaps we've been so deeply hurt that turning that light towards ourselves is profoundly uncomfortable and maybe even dangerous for us either temporarily or permanently (especially if it's in a forceful pressured way). Perhaps we've had to erect a forcefield around ourselves, because the questions that are raised by efforts at self-love are too painful and disruptive right now. Perhaps we surrendered our sense of self-love to survive difficult things we've been through. Perhaps we focussed on love for others instead because that provided a way forward in the darkness, whereas love for self would have resulted in us needing and/or wanting to give up. Perhaps we were put in impossible situations where we had to choose between loving ourselves and loving others who meant too much to us for us to relinquish our care for them. The ways in which our self-relationship can be disrupted and fractured are complex. Just as the way we may rebuild afterwards may be (as I explored here).

But the good news, in my view, for me and some others I know at least, is that if self-love doesn't work for us, we can love in the ways that do work for us. Our love can be every bit as precious and real in doing so. 

With this in mind, rather than push towards self-love those for whom it doesn't work (does shaming and pressuring people into loving themselves ever work anyway?), we can acknowledge that there are many ways to love, and affirm the value in the love that others are able to experience. 

Self-love can still be cultivated in those who wish to pursue it (I'm sure many will and I applaud it), but it's a personal choice as to when or if to start down that sometimes very difficult path. 

In any event, I did a previous twitter thread on my thoughts about an approach that may work for me, and rather than try to re-invent it, I'll simply post (a somewhat edited/expanded version of) it here:

If you have difficulty loving yourself, but no problem loving others, one thing that *may* work is to love your own capacity for love and its manifestations/activity. I can’t currently "love myself" the same way I can love others but maybe I can love the caring itself. It’s the best part of me in action--not me as object. 


I personally find most of the talk of self-love problematic anyway in how it constructs what is self vs what is other. It just doesn’t work that way for me. In loving others, I can love myself more readily because that action aligns with my values and my sense of beauty, and it's loving what is active and expansive in myself rather than simply loving myself as an object within narrowly constructed boundaries. 


It’s okay to have our own ways of valuing what’s most important to us in our experience of ourselves. We don’t have to accept others’ ways as our starting point. What we most prize in ourselves is ours to choose even if it’s actually goodness that is outwardly directed not inner-directed. 


So I may not be able to direct that love inward in the same way, but I can love that manifestation of what I value and who I am and can shut out all the voices commanding “love yourself.” They don’t work for me. 


That capacity to love those around us is something that can be tended to, cherished and maintained without all the sticky thorny questions that “self-love” as object can involve for some of us. Being made an object may be what damaged us in the first place. 


Anyway, just my own reflections. Sometimes the way these things are constructed doesn’t work for all of us so internal reflection about what may work and what does reflect our values and needs can be important. 


Telling me to love myself as much or more than I love others reinforces a dichotomy that set me apart from others as an object & disconnected me from my basic humanity. And was weaponized against me. Choosing to love more expansively can be gentler & less divisive. 

It’s like my trauma isolated and separated me from others to target me for shame and damage. The solution for me isn’t to focus on myself in that same disconnected conception. It’s to rebel against it and simply love in the ways I still can. And to cherish/value that love without demanding that it do and be more to count as real. 


Me not “loving myself” doesn’t necessarily mean I’m doing it wrong. It means I’m doing what works for me. It’s a form of self-love in its own way too, though I wouldn’t call it that because it reinforces the self/other distinction 


But I totally get that others--if they can--may need and/or wish to focus on the self within those boundaries and create safety there. That’s not possible or palatable for me personally but it makes sense too. When we’ve been ruptured there’s more than one way to rebuild & move on.

It's the beauty of being human. There are so many ways to adapt and survive. Let's not force one narrative on everyone, please. 

   



As always, please note that I am a lawyer, not a mental health professional of any kind. I have no expertise in trauma or mental health. Also, please note that any opinions and views expressed in this blog are solely my own and are not intended to represent the views or opinions of my employer in any way. 

I am very grateful to have received a 2019 "Clawbie" Award for this blog (which reflects the importance of this topic): https://www.clawbies.ca/2019-clawbies-canadian-law-blog-awards/ 

For some of my external writing on this topic, see: 







 

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Thursday, February 18, 2021

"Us v. Them"

 I originally spoke up about trauma and mental health in the legal profession because I noted a dangerous trend in my profession and others of constantly assuming that members of those professional spaces aren't like the people "out there" who can be traumatized and experience mental health consequences. In the prevailing discourse, professionals who deal with traumatized people are spoken about as if they couldn't possibly have their own trauma. I raised a concern about that kind of "othering" discourse that had harmed me, and also, I believed, harmed those whom we are supposed to help (by wrongly assuming that they couldn't be among us, that they couldn't enter our spaces, that they are inherently "other").

I've written about that dynamic in the context of my own profession and have advocated for a more inclusive discourse.

That said, there's another danger. When the movement to recognize the lived experience of professionals becomes an end in itself, the voices of lived experience trying to explain what it is like to be on the other side of the divide can get erased. The reasoning goes, explicitly or implicitly, "Stop telling us about your lived experience, as if it's something we need to learn from. We have our own lived experience too that we are embracing; therefore, we don't need to learn from you. We've got it covered. Stop forcing an us vs. them narrative!" 

I'm not okay with that either for a few reasons that I'll explain.

Although people with professional status can have their own trauma and can carry that in ways that deserve recognition and support, there are also privileges, power, and other biases that go with that status that can't be ignored.That lived experience counts and deserves recognition, but it doesn't mean the voice of "lived experience" is covered, and no further listening or learning is needed. 

For instance, I know what it's like to experience a substantial amount of trauma, but if I ever had to navigate the legal system with that trauma, it would not necessarily be the same experience as someone with that same trauma who lacked my years of knowledge, training and sense of comfort/belonging there. That's not to say I might not have a difficult experience in many of the same ways others lacking my training would, and maybe even some unique challenges. But I can't assume that my own experience will be like someone else's.

For one thing, someone who chooses to enter a particular profession is more likely to see some value in the way that profession tends to approach things, which is already a bias in itself. They're more likely to see that profession as having something important to offer. While their own experiences may remain a touchstone of authenticity (and even lead them to challenge some practices and biases within the profession), the biases offered by their professional role and education may interfere with them seeing other types of lived experience as clearly. 

More generally, no one's lived experience can erase or speak for others. Many, if not most, of us have some privileges that others lack. Even without special privilege, we all have a different perspective, and different needs, histories, etc. Humility is called for in all situations, especially when we occupy a position of power in relation to others. 

So what about the "us vs. them" dynamic that I've already recognized can be so harmful? Should it be discarded altogether?  

In my view, absolutely not.

Whether we like it or not, when we occupy a role that involves power over others, we need to recognize the inherent "othering"and division that are involved by virtue of the power and vulnerability that in fact exist. While excessive and unwarranted othering needs to be discarded, so we can minimize that power dynamic and its harms, we nevertheless, in my view, still need to recognize the inherent "otherness" to which the more vulnerable party is subject, which will be exacerbated if we aren't careful to humbly examine our role in it. 

We are not similarly situated when we step into those power-differentiated roles. Humble recognition of those differences is essential to avoid doing harm. An ability to relate across those differences is key, so we must always be attentive to any excessive othering that occurs, but in my view this must always be accompanied by an honest and realistic recognition of that divide enacted by that power differential. 

In any event, there is no one "lived experience" voice, even among those who are very similarly situated. Humans are complicated, as I described here. 

There is always otherness, which need not be a bad thing. When approached humbly, it can be a magical and wondrous thing to learn about the ways in which those around us are not like us. "Otherness" is not inherently bad and should not be constructed as such. 

Our own lived experience may provide all kinds of insights, but isn't some elevated platform or box to tick that ensures we understand everyone else who possesses it. I've written about this before and will again, but the bottom line is I think welcoming lived experience perspectives within professional spaces is important because we should have diversity and inclusion of a broad range of experiences within professional spaces. Those lived experience perspectives can offer value by providing a check against harmful inaccurate stereotypes that might otherwise proliferate. They can thereby introduce greater humility and expanded insight into possible viewpoints and experiences, but never a replacement for listening to those who are directly subject to the exercise of that profession's power generally and/or in any given instance. We will never be able to include all perspectives and should never deceive ourselves into believing that we have done so.

In my view, my lived experience is there to expand my own insight about things I've witnessed or experienced directly, but also to inform and expand my own humility about those and other phenomena. That humility isn't like a hat I can throw on only in some situations. In my view it requires ongoing examination and practice. It's a way of seeing the world and my relationship to those around me. It applies not only in professional situations but also amidst the power dynamics of everyday social space in complex ways.

I happen to have quite a lot of lived experience of past trauma, poverty and dysfunction within my own history (yay, complex PTSD!) which I feel has helped me develop a more nuanced view than might otherwise have been possible of the differing ways in which trauma can impact someone (because I do indeed contain multitudes) both from my own experiences and what I've observed over a lifetime, and from the experiences of those close to me, almost all of whom (in my early life) were visibly suffering the effects of trauma. 

But, despite all that trauma, I commit to always also recognize that part of my lived experience is of attaining three university degrees, becoming a lawyer,  and being able to move as if I belong in spaces that terrify and intimidate others (in addition to other privileges I draw on within those spaces without even thinking about it). Those are parts of my lived experience; I need to recognize them too.

So no I never want to get rid of my awareness of how "us v. them" in fact operates in spaces I occupy. I pledge to minimize that divide in whatever way I can, but pretending it doesn't exist is not the answer. Shutting it out just allows the biases, privileges and power differentials to operate unchecked with a cloak of invisibility and inexorability that I'm not okay with fuelling. Collapsing one side of the divide to pretend the divide isn't there is itself a great harm.

I have lived experience, you have lived experience, but when we step into a seat of power and speak from that role, humility needs to be something we actively and consciously practice. If we don't acknowledge the reality of how "us v. them' in fact unavoidably operates, we will feed it.

I refuse to fuel it in that way. I refuse to acquiesce when I see other professionals doing it (to me or others).

No amount of lived experience excuses us from the need to listen to others about the impact of our actions and the impact of the systems in which we operate. 



As always, please note that I am a lawyer, not a mental health professional of any kind. I have no expertise in trauma or mental health. Also, please note that any opinions and views expressed in this blog are solely my own and are not intended to represent the views or opinions of my employer in any way. 



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Tuesday, February 2, 2021

"Hierarchy of Suffering"

This is a tricky one, so bear with me. 

These are just my initial thoughts on a complex sensitive issue. I stand to be corrected if I'm missing some nuance here (and to correct myself if I later have additional thoughts).

A common saying these days is "There is no hierarchy of suffering." I agree with it. There's something important in this. Everyone's suffering is absolutely valid. No one gets to tell someone else that the suffering they're experiencing doesn't count. No one's suffering should be discounted on the basis that someone else has it worse. I also hope no one will feel a need to dismiss their own suffering this way (which is a common feeling many trauma survivors have--mine doesn't count because it wasn't as bad as others who had it "worse"). 

It is a critical starting point from which we should never stray.

But like other platitudes, it has an icky side: when used as a means to silence those who've been through severe trauma and/or have obstacles in the way of their healing that others don't. When it's used to keep them from speaking about what makes their experiences different from others who may be speaking. To erase all suffering that occurs outside the margins of what is typically visible on the basis that it's all the same. 

Of course, there's such a thing as different degrees, complexity, treatability of suffering. We don't even need to compare our suffering to others to know this. We've all suffered in a variety of different ways in our lives, some of which had a greater impact on us than others. Some which resolved more readily. We certainly would never say all physical injuries/conditions are the same. A tension headache that comes on periodically but is relieved with advil is not the same as a brain tumour that causes constant severe suffering and a dramatically shortened life. (note: I have no lived experience of either of these conditions so I apologize if I've missed some nuance here)

So what's really happening here? What are we getting at? Everyone's pain matters. And we know our own pain best. If something hurts you, no one else gets to invalidate it by saying it's disproportionate to whatever its apparent causes are or whatever your current circumstances are. Pain is pain. And there won't always be an obvious source. The pain doesn't need to "fit" a cause. It is valid all on its own. 

But of course there can be differences. Repeated severe trauma (especially in childhood) can have profound effects that can substantially increase our risk for all kinds of other types of illness and suffering, including early death. And we deserve to have the reality of it taken seriously. We deserve to have people available to treat it who are competent to address its complexity and severity--who understand what makes it different. Not just dismissed as unnecessary to hear about or specifically address because "it's all the same." 

That said, it's not something to be enforced by silencing other people's pain. It's about listening to people and validating what's actually happened to them and what they in fact experienced as a result. If someone says, "my suffering is immense" then we don't look to what happened to them and say "that's not a good enough cause." The causal relationship is not always straightforward. Nor is there any reason why it should have to be. Pain is pain. It doesn't require further justification. It deserves compassion, regardless of how it may have been caused, or whether a cause can even be ascertained. 

But the problem with insisting that there are generally no differing degrees/types/severity, is (1) It's an absurd and invalidating form of erasure when it dispenses with the need to listen to what people actually endured; (2) It conceals actual hierarchies that otherwise operate. 

When used to conceal and reinforce existing hierarchies, this type of approach says "Well, we all have trauma and there's no hierarchy of trauma, so you need to buck up like the rest of us, and recover through the things that work for us." It erases critical differences which isn't okay either. It says "You are not allowed to share the aspects of your suffering that are unique and different--the fact that for you suffering was a constant theme rather than an occasional experience, the fact that it's exacerbated by ongoing injury from systemic racism, ableism, homophobia, transphobia, etc. to which others aren't exposed." It's all just the same; therefore, we don't need to listen to people's experiences. And in fact when they try to tell us, we silence them and say no you may not speak about the ways in which your experience of suffering isn't reflected by the prevailing discourse because "there is no hierarchy of suffering."

So then whose pain becomes the norm? And whose becomes invisible? When there's "no hierarchy of suffering" what gets to be visible? IMO, all too often it's the experiences and realities that otherwise are dominant. The ones that are already promoted as 'normal" by existing hierarchies.

There are in fact vastly different ways in which people can suffer, all of which matter and count, but of course they can be different. Repeated trauma from which there is no escape tends to have different effects beyond single incident trauma. This is something we know and will hear if we listen to people who have been through it (as well as to science). That said, other forms of suffering (including single incident trauma) can also have enormous effects all on their own, which we know both from listening to people who've endured it and listening to science that listens to those people. 

So the only way to know the type, degree and severity of suffering is to listen to people and believe them. My suffering is immense. I've been through a lot, but I'll (1) never silence someone who has been through "less" but experiences the same degree of suffering from it; and yet at the same time, I'll (2) never silence someone who has been through things I haven't--e.g., repeated trauma in addition to ongoing systemic racism--by saying it's "all the same." 

The answer is to hear it all and be prepared to have nuanced validating discussions about it. And no we don't have to "grade it," but we don't get to silence it either or absurdly pretend that it's all the same and that all kinds of vulnerabilities and inequalities don't play a role. If we silence it, we won't be able to redress it. And there are indeed inequalities that need to be redressed. We can't use a language of "sameness" to wave those away. There are things happening we need to stop. 

We can be open to both similarities and differences, without a pre-determined "hierarchy" but also without a dismissive erasure that says "well it's all the same--so who needs to hear from you--we can just extrapolate from our own experiences"(in a way that reinforces existing hierarchies and absolves those in the mainstream discourse from having to hear from those whose experiences tend to be marginalized/ignored).

The answer in my view: listen carefully and attentively to lived experience (and whatever science flows from genuinely taking it into account in an inclusive way). Don't silence it in either direction by declaring it "too little" "too much" or "all the same." Just listen.

As a survivor of repeated trauma, for whom an experience of safety was often the exception not the rule at critical points in my life, my experiences are indeed different in some crucial ways from what I hear many others sharing. I don't expect there to be a grading system and I would never silence someone or discount their suffering just because what they've been through is different from what I have, but I expect to be heard about the impact that has had on me even if I have to use strong terms to adequately convey it, even if I have to say that my experiences aren't reflected in what I hear others saying (not as a matter of judgment or comparison, but as a matter of fact). At the same time, there are many ways in which my suffering was lessened by the way the world accommodated me, as it may not have done for others (e.g., it wasn't compounded by experiencing the racism minoritized people have to endure on an ongoing basis), so I don't assume that people who've experienced something different than I have are all in "the same" place. My complex trauma doesn't relieve me of the responsibility of listening to and learning from the complex trauma of a residential school survivor, for instance. I have trauma too, but it's not "the same." It doesn't relieve me from the responsibility of learning about what others have had to endure and the impact it's had on them.

I listen. And I try to learn. From both similarities and differences. With an openness and non-defensiveness about both (as a goal, though none of us can ever be perfect at this).

In my view, we can benefit from the recognition of both the "sameness" (our "common humanity") and the differences (arising from our own experiences). We need to stop erasing these in the name of some platitude in either direction. If we don't acknowledge the ways in which we are similar, then we miss out on connection and solidarity. If we don't acknowledge the ways in which our suffering can be different, then we miss out on validation, accommodation and inclusion.

We can do both. It's all valid. It's all very real and very human, but it's not all "the same."
 


As always, please note that I am a lawyer, not a mental health professional of any kind. I have no expertise in trauma or mental health. Also, please note that any opinions and views expressed in this blog are solely my own and are not intended to represent the views or opinions of my employer in any way. 

I am very grateful to have received a 2019 "Clawbie" Award for this blog (which reflects the importance of this topic): https://www.clawbies.ca/2019-clawbies-canadian-law-blog-awards/ 

For some of my external writing on this topic, see: 




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