The Trauma of Guilt
As human beings, most of us have an instinctual directive to protect the ones we love. It also usually is heightened by age/experience. We tend to feel a responsibility to protect those younger, less experienced, or generally more innocent than we are. In turn, we feel a sense of personal guilt when we fail to protect them.
I want to share a story about my mom. She has always been such a stoic presence in my life, always pushing through hard times with resilience and toughness. Every time I would talk to her about being stressed and overwhelmed with things in my life, her response and advice would always be to “stop thinking about it.” As a very anxious person with a brain that runs on overdrive, this concept always frustrated me. I always thought “wow, it must be so nice to just turn your thoughts off and compartmentalize specific things in your brain.”
I had always chalked it up to her childhood, she grew up in suburban Chicago in the 60s, and her parents got divorced when she was 7 years old, at a time and place where that was just not done. She lived with her mother and younger sister in Chicago and her dad moved away to Buffalo, where he remarried and had another daughter. This was a very hard time for her mother, my grandma, being the only single divorcee in a Chicago suburb…she faced judgment and criticism from all the suburban housewives who thought she would “steal their husbands.” So naturally, she sought out the company of single gentleman and started dating. I had always known this part of the story, and had known that because of her demanding job and romantic life, she didn’t have much time to look after my mom and aunt.
The part of this story that I did not know was revealed to me a few years ago at a very emotional dinner. I was at dinner with my mom, dad and sister, and we were all talking about my aunt (now a grown woman) who has unfortunately lived a very lonely life with no career, friends or partner to speak of. We were lamenting about her at the table when all of a sudden my mom came to her defense (something she has not really done ever in life) and started choking through tears saying “you don’t understand, you don’t understand, we had a hard childhood. Our mother dated a bad man…” You can assume where this story goes, but suffice it to say that their mother dated a man who had, more than one time, sexually assaulted both my mom and her sister, who were just 7 and 3 years old…
My mom went on to sob through dinner explaining how she had never really told anyone but also that she had “gotten over it” and forgiven her mother many years prior. What she went on to say and what really stuck with me was that she had not forgiven herself…as a 7 year old, for not protecting her younger sister. She is now 65 years old and has carried this with her for her entire life. Not only carried her own trauma from being sexually abused at such a young age, but this perpetual guilt of not protecting her sister. This not only gave me a much deeper understanding of my mom, but also a new perspective on abuse, and the vicious consequences that seem to stretch endlessly through human existence.
How will she ever reconcile with this guilt? I am 100% certain that my aunt does not blame her for any of this. You can’t rationally blame a 7 year old for not knowing what to do in that situation, but on the same token I understand the guilt that my mom has carried. Her younger sister has pretty much floundered through her entire life, not graduating high school, or going to college, marrying a dud and going through bankruptcy, to end up alone in Florida with not a friend to speak of. There is no doubt that her trauma from such a young age affected her development and view of the world, but at what point does she have to take responsibility for her own happiness and work through her trauma? I don’t have that answer, I think it was an impossibly dark situation that no one of that generation had the tools to deal with.
This is why organizations like Breaking Silence are so incredibly valuable - creating a safe space to have this open dialogue without shame and guilt. I am going to work to create new dialogue with both my mom and aunt, and hopefully through more open, honest and real conversations, help them to find peace and forgive themselves.
Post Brought to you by Guest Author, Travis
