Last week I had some flashbacks. One was of me being physically abused. I’m allowed to be scared of that. It’s not supposed to happen to anyone!
The other was me being stripped searched when I was locked in a mental hospital many years ago (it’s a long story- i knew i needed help but may have gone about it the wrong way).
It reminded me of being sexually abused (inappropriately touched). I felt revictimized and traumatized. Also, I felt powerless again. I had to let people do it or I would be in trouble.
Half of me wishes that someone noticed all this trauma before when I was younger so I could have got help then and maybe things wouldn’t be so hard now.
I think sometimes the true trauma takes quite a while to surface. When things first happen, we know it is there, but every day without it gets better. Then over time you might think you are working through it, until triggers show up and prove you wrong. To really get past the whole of it, it often requires looking at it from the outside in after the initial period has passed.
But in any case, you can only move forward from the place you are at now, and we all probably wish we had done things different over time in many of these cases.
My mom keeps bringing up me being in the psychiatric hospital when I was 15.
I keep shutting her down because it’s hard to take about and I don’t want to think about that place.
Some traumatic/triggering things happened there that she doesn’t know about.
Like I mentioned above: I was stripped searched before I could get settled.
Also, I had a very bad headache the first night because I only ate breakfast, missed lunch and wasn’t allowed dinner because I was admitted after that time.
I told them about me having a headache but they wouldn’t listen so I put my head down because the light was bothering me.
They told me I couldn’t do that and aggressively grabbed me and took me to my room.
I don’t understand why- I wasn’t bothering anyone. Also, there was points for “being good” they took them all away after that incident.
And I was crying and they asked why.
Maybe because you just traumatized me more.
Unless you have some reason not to do it, it might be very helpful to let your mom know that the hospital was a very traumatic experience for you. With or without the details, if she understands this then maybe she will not bring it up and trigger you.
Sometimes people on the outside don’t realize they are causing triggering moments. Your mom may feel that bringing it up is simply a reminder that there are other forms of help if you are struggling, in hopes that it gives you some comfort. But if what it causes is anything other than comfort, she might not understand without you telling her.
And though I have never been in such an in patient facility, I have met people that have and had similar experiences. One stated that intake seemed designed to take away a persons dignity. In his case he mentioned that they often questioned him on why some of his answers changed after a few days, and then they would get angry when he told them he was high as a kite when they did his intake interview. Being he was admitted for drug abuse, he found it shocking that they wanted to question the then sober him vs the stoned during intake him.
But either way, I’m sorry the experience was traumatic. Avoiding the triggers might require some communication with those close to you. Though it probably won’t be easy, long term it might be easier than allowing them to trigger you in the future.
