Don’t Interrupt the Trauma Survivor As They Pick Up the Pieces of That Mirror

Don't Interrupt the Trauma Survivor As They Pick Up the Pieces of That Mirror

 

What I’m learning from others is that trauma stories can rarely be remembered and told in anything that resembles a linear arc.

The reason for this is that trauma disorganizes the continuity of the self.

Details are broken, and their fragments are retrieved in an unpredictable order.

Therapists have known this forever. They register the verbal evidence of the earthquake: patients stutter, loop back, gap out, break in with non sequiturs, change the subject, and weep.

Imagine trying to pick up the pieces of a smashed mirror. You’ll never be able to do it in the precise order or radius in which they scattered.

You’ll pick up what you can, according to the energy you have. You’ll cut yourself in the process. It will take a long time, and what you put back together will never be complete.

Problem: journalism and the law often cooperate to enforce a general societal demand that disregards this reality of the trauma story.

We ask the trauma survivor who chooses to tell their story to present something like a news story or a legal writ. We want it scrubbed of jagged emotions. We want them to present the mirror of their continuous self as though it had not been smashed.

This demand is so unreasonable, so tone-deaf, that the person trying to pick up those pieces can be easily discouraged, humiliated by the mess that somehow they must make whole again for it to be heard, let alone believed.

We say that we hope the trauma survivor is working this all out in therapy, without realizing that the way in which we listen may be playing a critical role in whether it can be worked out at all.

We don’t understand that our responses can have a direct impact on the accessibility of those memories. A denial or deflection from the listener can easily and shamefully reinforce the very repressions of denial and deflection that the speaker is trying to break through.

Most of us are neither journalists nor lawyers. But we can all be better listeners through this single practice: when you hear the beginnings of a story that sounds like it is conveying trauma, don’t interrupt. Not with questions, contexts, challenges, equivocations, or it-can’t-be-that-bad-isms.

Try to imagine that you’ve started to eavesdrop on someone picking up those shards. You can’t see the shards, and you’d need some professional training to help the person in any explicit sense.

The very least you can do is stay out of their way, and let them know you are listening. A further step would be to indicate you understand how much it costs them to speak at all. It may be hurting them to speak.

If all you can offer is a fraction of the time and space that was stolen away, that’s really something.

 

 

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Note: I am not a trauma specialist or trauma counsellor. I’m I writer who has been interviewing people who have had adverse experiences in yoga culture, in support of the WAWADIA project. For qualified trauma-sensitive support and training in yoga modalities, check out the work of Molly Boeder Harris, Tiffany Rose, and Hala Khouri, to name just a few. Also: although I did not see this (or any similar) article prior to working with the mirror metaphor, I am not the first to use it in this context.

 

Learning About the Need for Trauma Sensitivity Is a Little Like Learning About White Privilege

Learning About the Need for Trauma Sensitivity Is a Little Like Learning About White Privilege

A few days ago I critically Faceposted an infomercial featuring a Jivamukti Yoga School teacher demonstrating a series of assists on a fellow teacher as she glides through a sun salutation. Presented as appropriate for all teachers, the technique was classic Jiva, featuring hovering, intimate, near-constant touching. It was totally consistent with what’s presented in the 2014 manual Yoga Assists, co-written by Jivamukti founders Sharon Gannon and David Life along with Michael Roach.

Also consistent with the book, the video opens with and sustains a key omission. It offers no contraindications for the body-contact-heavy encounter. There is no discussion of individual needs or student consent, and no indication of any formal attention paid to the fact that touch can traumatize or re-traumatize as much as it can facilitate healing. Thankfully, unlike the book, the video doesn’t get into how the teacher should read the students chakras and use these assists to help them purify their karma.

The video may not be the best PR move for a company dealing with the fallout from a recently-settled sexual harassment lawsuit. Especially when the plaintiff claimed in an interview that the advances of the sued teacher weren’t limited to the bedroom, but also communicated through intimate adjustments in class. But the criticism in my post stayed away from all that, to focus on the simple absence of basic disclaimers.

I tried to be careful not to implicate the presenters directly. It seemed clear to me that they were doing exactly what they were trained to do. The video gave me no reason to doubt their good intentions. They were competently and artfully offering a technique that is standard across the Jivamukti platform, as many commenters confirmed. I was taking aim at the message of the presentation, not the presenters.

Continue reading “Learning About the Need for Trauma Sensitivity Is a Little Like Learning About White Privilege”

WAWADIA Update #4 /// Emerging Psychosocial Themes in Asana-Related Injuries

Ten days ago, Diane Bruni and I hosted a public event called “What Are We Actually Doing in Asana: an exploration of yoga-related injuries.” There were about seventy people in attendance at Diane’s studio here in Toronto. When Diane asked who had been injured through asana practice, virtually everyone raised their hands. Of course, we get injured doing all sorts of things in daily life. But in the majority of its discourse, yoga holds forth a therapeutic promise that its culture might not be fulfilling. What’s more is that most of those in attendance were teachers, who one might assume to be better versed in avoiding injury than most.

We were joined by Dr. Raza Awan, medical director for Synergy Sports Medicine and Rehabilitation. He gave an overview of the epidemiological research he has begun with the yoga injuries that his clinic has been treating over the last several years. Diane shared a personal account of her 20 years of dedicated practice, and how injury has led to innovation. I nervously presented some preliminary themes from my own research, based so far on over sixty interviews. Kathryn Bruni-Young spoke on her transition from vinyasa-only practice to the more eclectic (and, she claims, healthful) mix of strength and movement disciplines she engages with and teaches today. Continue reading “WAWADIA Update #4 /// Emerging Psychosocial Themes in Asana-Related Injuries”