本文探讨了创伤的本质，认为创伤并非单纯的负面情绪或行为模式，而可能是一种对特定环境的适应性反应。作者指出，当人们在面临危险或威胁时，做出相应的反应，例如恐惧、焦虑或回避，这并非一定是创伤，而可能是合理的自我保护机制。文章通过一系列例子，如战争、政治迫害、性侵犯等，说明了在特定环境下，人们的反应可能是基于真实风险的评估，而非心理疾病。作者认为，我们应该重新审视创伤的概念，并理解创伤个体可能拥有比我们更准确的风险感知能力。

🤔创伤并非总是负面情绪或行为模式，它可能是对特定环境的适应性反应，例如在战争中听到巨响而感到恐惧，这是一种正常的自我保护机制。

⚔️在经历过战争、政治迫害、性侵犯等创伤性事件后，个体表现出焦虑、回避等情绪或行为，这可能是对自身环境风险的正确评估，而非心理疾病。

💔例如，如果一个人在过去被多次情感虐待，那么在未来的亲密关系中变得更加谨慎，这可能是合理的自我保护策略。

🚗如果一个人在经历车祸后感到恐惧，这可能是因为他们意识到自己驾驶技术存在问题，而不是心理创伤。

⚠️在与“创伤”个体交流时，应该先假设他们对自身所处环境的风险评估可能更加准确，而不是简单地认为他们需要克服心理障碍。

Published on November 8, 2024 9:45 AM GMT

I thought of this a couple years ago and figured it was so obvious that it wasn't worth posting about, but people are still discussing trauma endlessly, and I have not seen an explanation written anywhere, so here's this.

Trauma is when someone is wrong. We do not call any behavior or emotional pattern "trauma" if it is obviously adaptive.

If you are in a war and you lie down and panic when you hear loud bangs, nobody will call you traumatized. When the war is over, they will say you are traumatized. If a bomb lands nearby and you survive because you took cover, then they'll say you were smart and acted fast.

If 10% of your country got murdered a generation or two ago for not going with the political majority, you are completely sane for shutting off the thinky brain in politics. (The USSR, China, Korea, Vietnam, Nigeria, Sudan, Afghanistan, Cambodia, Ethiopia, Lebanon...)

If you got raped (and half your friends did too) and you are anxious and distrustful, then maybe you don't need therapy, maybe you are just correctly calibrated about your own social sphere.

If you got ostracized and called creepy in school, you might have a good idea of what actually happens when you ask girls out in public.

If you got emotionally beat up by all your exes, then being less open is probably a good idea.

If driving a car makes you want to throw up since your last accident, you might be a bad driver.

You might think people's emotions are often super wrong, but have you heard the things people's logic says? Even crazier! Have you heard the things therapists say? They say just go out and do whatever and it will all be fine don't worry about it!

I have heard it said that if you're worried about your driving then you're probably a safe driver. The last person I met who was seriously worried about their driving totaled her car a week later. Everybody (including me) was telling her she was fine and shouldn't worry.

I do think the folks trying to get over their trauma are probably correct that it is misplaced and they can move on, but maybe the prior when you meet a traumatized person should be that they have better data than you on what the actual risks are in their personal world.

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