Why Would Someone With Trauma Think They Have Made It All Up?
By Dr. Betsy Usher
Part of the confusion are questions like, “Am I the abuser?” “Why didn’t I know I was being abused this whole time?” “Will anyone believe me?” “and “Did the trauma of abuse even happen?”Where do these common thoughts come from and why would anyone be confused on if they were abused or not? I’m going to discuss three different parts that play into the picture of why someone would question their own trauma story including: childhood experiences, gaslighting/blame shifting, & brain functioning.
Most of the time when we are talking about C-PTSD we are talking about childhood. Now of course individuals can develop C-PTSD in their adult years from abusers. However, majority (not all) of individuals who develop C-PTSD as adults actually had it all along, aka since childhood. These individuals were not cognitively or emotionally mature enough to understand what was happening to them in childhood; they had nothing to compare their confusing childhood too. Many individuals still may think their childhood was normal, may have forgotten a lot of what they went through as children, and may be close to their parents as adults, which leads to resistance of viewing their childhood for what it actually was. I can’t tell you how many patients of mine that have C-PTSD and come to me as adults thought they had a normal childhood come to find they had misunderstood most of what they thought was normal.
Those who know they had a dysfunctional childhood either had overtly (obvious) abusive or neglectful parents, (left them alone a lot, sexually/physically abused them, were viscously cruel and mean, verbally assaulted them in obvious ways such as calling them a loser, slut, burden, and or were not present in their lives at all). The rest of that had dysfunctional families had what we call covert abuse which is what I will talk about in this artcile.
Historically humans are terrible historians on their own memories. We are not good at remembering details and facts. Research has shown time and time again that we encode our memories a certain way and recall them differently, yet we are SURE we remember the facts. What we usually remember are the feelings. However, trauma is all about perceptions. It doesn’t matter if the facts are true or not. I know that sounds strange because of course we want to know the facts. However, if we perceived something to be traumatic then it was and if we didn’t, it still may have been we just repressed it.
The parent first and foremost needs to meet the child’s needs not the other way around. In a covert dysfunctional family, as the child grows the parent feels burdened by the child’s growing needs and autonomy (independency). The parent takes the child’s growth as a direct disobedience against them. These types of parents have a life they are living and want the child to fit into it, when the child doesn’t the parents see it as rebellion/disobedience. However, the parent’s job is to adjust to the child’s needs and to meet them where they are at. The child is seeking love and validation and is met with frustration and invalidation. Invalidation leads to a lack of emotional growth and confusion about how the child understands how they feel.
Example: A child says they are feeling anxious, the invalidating parent says, you aren’t an anxious child, you are just excited about the swim meet and winning next to your friends. Instead of, “I can see your anxious, anxiety is so difficult to manage, it can feel very overwhelming and isolating, what are you needing from me to help manage your anxiety today.”
The dysfunctional parent is never available for emotional conversations, yet they are right there to drive you to swim practice and maybe even have a snack for you to there from after school. They can provide all the hardware like going to your recitals and football games, making dinner every right, tucking you in. However when it comes to talking about how you feel, they are gone. This can lead to a feeling for a child that they are not seen, heard, or understood, they are unlovable. The child then begins to invalidate themselves, developing a mean inner critic that critiques them for every thought, feeling, and behavior they do. The parents then have an opening to make you the scapegoat.
A scapegoat is a person who holds all the problems (projections) of the family. One or both parents/caregivers was very critical and most likely covertly where it was made to feel like it was your problem. They would jab you with hints of disappointment or you didn’t do good enough and maybe they didn’t even have to say it, you just felt it.
You constantly wanted their approval and never got it. Yet they did so much for you, of course it felt like it was you. They most likely let you know how much they did for you if you ever complained, which made you feel guilty that you didn’t appreciate all they did for you. This invalidated you further, confusing you further of your reality. You were attempting to share how you felt, or possibly were questioning their actions or words, yet you were met with resistance and punishment.
Gaslighting/ Blame shifting
Seen but not heard. We have all heard of this before. The covert dysfunctional family has this motto with emotions and uses gaslighting and blame shifting to protect the children from speaking out, breaking the no boundaries rule, and overthrowing the king and queen. This is usually done unconsciously, meaning not on purpose, they do not know they are doing this next part. Gaslighting is confusing the victim/survivor’s reality.
The child speaks up and states that last week the parent said they could go to the party(which they did), the parent says, “what are you talking about, I never said that!” Confusion confusion confusion. The daughter begins to cry, mom says, “Omg you are so sensitive,” (gaslighting). This is taking away the child’s reality that they are hurting and upset by telling them their emotions are too much. The child’s emotions are never wrong or too much. The child says you are always so mean mom, never letting me do anything. The mother states, “I’m mean, you are horrible to me, I never can do anything because I’m always driving you around to soccer practice, and piano, and your friends places, and yet you treat me horribly.”
That my friends, is blame shifting.
You share how you feel, they tell you that you are that instead. What should have been said was, “I hear you that you feel I am being mean to you right now, that is not my intension yet I understand how you could see it that way, not letting you go to the party is disappointing.”So this child now is totally confused about what their parent had told them and now says differently and they now are the one to blame for, well, everything, and that their feelings are not valid.
Imagine this happens for most conversations, for over 18 years.Then imagine this person gets into a relationship with a new abuser in their adult years. They think their childhood was normal-ish, and that they are unlovable, that they don’t make sense, they must have a bad memory, they feel they do everything wrong, and don’t have boundaries or self worth. The do not see this new partner as abusive because It’s familiar; it’s normal because their family was normal to them. As an adult old childhood feelings begin to surface unknowingly. It’s C-PTSD.
This relationship could be easily 5-20 years before the survivor wakes up and realizes they are being abuse. Moreover, they are still confused when they wake up. What is real? This person did all this nice things for me and at times are wonderful, yet they are abusive, this can’t be…..The abuser now is completely unable to accept responsibly for anything and blames the survivor for them being the abuser or better yet that they have made this whole thing up.
They were never validated for their dysfunctional childhood because they believed it was normal. They don’t have anything to stand on for truth. In fact, their parents still covertly abuse them and they don’t know. Now another person is doing the same. They do not have self worth nor have ever had anyone see, understand, respect, or believe in them. So……they must have made it all up. They must be confused. They may even be the abuser……yet they are not.
The Brain & C-PTSD
Chronic stress leads to a hormone called cortisol. On over production of cortisol destroys the myelin sheaththat is wiring the part of the brain called the corpus callosum. This leads to the brain struggling to have a clear connection to experiences. Aka, confusion over past events. When we are creating a long-term memory our experiences go through the hippocampus, which takes those memories and stores them away. When we are in times of stress (fight or flight or chronic stress) our experiences break apart and become fragmented, some make it through the hippocampus, and some don’t ever.
This means some stressful memories are pieces of the story or maybe none of the story. Memories may have never made its way into long-term memory causing the person to distrust their mind completely. It has also been discovered those who have had trauma like C-PTSD/PTSD have smaller than normal hippocampus.
Although, I barely scratched the surface of childhood trauma and it’s impacts, only focusing on how it may be why someone believes they made up their trauma, there is so much more to how dysfunctional family dynamics in childhood and adulthood may lead to a serious breakdown of a human including trust in their own memories