Your Trauma Isn’t as Bad as You Think It Is
“It’s not that bad. I mean, some people have it way worse than me.”
I have heard these words more often than I can count. Every time it’s heartbreaking. It’s a direct cut to their own experiences.
Nobody should ever feel invalidated in their experiences.
Everyone deserves the chance to be heard and understood.
Yet, there’s this funny thing where we downplay our own trauma to validate others. Meanwhile, invalidating your own trauma.
You think that someone else has it worse.
There are so many horrible things in the world people are faced with. They’ve been raped, their family murdered, their sisters traded for cattle.
Except, trauma is not meant to be a competition.
Comparing trauma and tragedy is a useless act because we all experience it in different ways.
There is always going to be someone who has it ‘worse.’ But worse is relative.
You can’t compare pain. It’s something we all have, but it’s different for everyone.
We look at each other’s problems and think we could never handle them.
If we all threw our problems in a pile and saw everyone else’s, we’d grab ours back.
Your experiences are valid. There is no need to downplay them for someone else’s benefit.
We downplay the tragedies we face when we see how bad others have it. But that doesn’t take away the hurt or pain from your experience.
Pain is not exclusive. Other people’s tragedies do not invalidate your own. There’s plenty of trauma in the world to go around.
There is not a single person on earth who does not experience tragedy or is exempt from trauma.
Pain makes us who we are, and we can use it to our advantage. We can leverage it to better understand others and ourselves.
We’ve all felt it, so we can be empathetic to others.
You are not alone in your pain. Know that.
I’m here, feeling it right beside you.
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