Pushback
We cannot change our past, but we can change the way we are affected by and how we feel about the past, including traumatic events.
“So tell me about this DR stuff you’ve been writing about.” Stirring his coffee, my friend leaned in closer to me from across the table, with wide-eyed anticipation.
“You mean, EMDR?” I asked.
“Yes, E-M-D-R”, pausing at each letter as he wrote in his notebook.
I took a long hard draw of matcha, looked at my phone, then Googled a definition of EMDR for him.
This is the definition I got from the American Psychological Association’s website.
“Eye movement desensitization and reprocessing is a structured form of psychotherapy used to help patients with PTSD resolve upsetting memories.”
My friend is seeing the ongoing middle of my story. I had mentioned EMDR in a previous offering, but what I did not talk about was the beginning, the seeds of chaos that fractured my earliest traumatic memories. I spent months of sessions with my therapist piecing together fragmented scenes of childhood physical and emotional abuse into an understandable narrative. These incomplete memories would cause such negative visceral reactions that emotional detachment served me well from childhood to adulthood to remove myself mentally from unbearable scenes. As I had mentioned earlier, this dismissive emotional habit became my standard operating procedure and helped me cope with traumatic situations. Or so I thought. Bessel A van der Kolk’s research has shown that trauma is not just stored in the neural networks but in other systems of the body as well. So, while I believed my past was safely under wraps, traumatic lava percolated beneath the surface of my consciousness. I conveniently chose to forget, but my body remembered.
It has been a few years since my EMDR sessions, but as my therapist cautioned me, memories will come up, unexpectedly revealing more of the previously hidden picture. Therapy and the growth that comes from it might never be fully completed, but EMDR did bring about transformation in my life. Trauma no longer defines the arc of my life. The traumatic events in my life will always be part of my story, but that’s where they remain today–as story.
I know no one who has had a perfect childhood, perfect adolescence, or even a perfect adult life. We have all had emotional high points and low points in our lives, some of these events more severe than others. We cannot change our past, but we can change the way we are affected by and how we feel about the past, including traumatic events.
In a few weeks, I will publish a series of reflections explaining how therapy, contemplative practices, and even the bilateral rhythmic nature of running help me to be aware of emotional confusion that may come up and how to better confront rather than dismiss such events. I will show how improved self awareness has deepened my interpersonal relationships and in turn, has made intimacy more possible.
One of my readers left this comment on the post I mentioned earlier:
Grateful to Steve for normalizing trauma work in men—will be of great benefit to them, and to the people who love them.
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.I grew up in the John Wayne hero generation. My father modeled, encouraged, and rewarded an independent spirit, a look-out-for-number-one attitude. Big boys don’t cry; be stoic, suppress, and control were all part of the game in becoming a true man. And as I became an adult, my faith tradition emphasized a mistrust of emotion, teaching reliance upon logic. I and the women in my life are grateful for my personal pushback against this misinformed thinking.
This. This is why I write. I tell stories not just for the sake of storytelling but to inspire and perhaps move someone to action, to take back their life. My friend was visibly impressed with my EMDR testimonial, but I’m not going to suggest that EMDR is necessarily the right therapy for him. Still, he’s willing to try, to take the risk of finding out.
Yes, he can find that it’s not the right therapy for him, but what is the worst that can happen? At the very least he will have more insight, more self awareness than he had before.
What if he finds that his life is forever changed because he took the step to try?
As we finished our drinks he concluded with this:
“I’ve been living with the weight of some things my entire life. I wonder if before I die, with this kind of therapy, I might reach some resolution to these issues.”
I’m hoping he will.
Steve, this is such a beautiful piece, for so many reasons. I'm sorry you too experienced trauma from childhood emotional and physical abuse and it is so beautiful that you are healing and sharing that journey with others. Boys get sad, men get sad. My heart is grateful to you for doing the work. This, "I conveniently chose to forget, but my body remembered." so true. We think we've got it all worked out, and maybe in our heads we do, but the body remembers. I am also excited to read your series on running. I started running at the age of 18, as a way to process anger and emotions that I couldn't name. I ran regularly, every other day, as a routine that was just enough to keep me sort of sane, but then there would be other times where I just couldn't process my emotions and I knew I needed to go for a run and I would feel better, more able to cope with life. I knew running was a balm, but I'm so curious to read what you know about it. ❤️
“...the ongoing middle...” Yes—isn’t this where life happens, where we live? At least for some of us. This has certainly been my address the past few years. Thank you for sharing. The last couple lines give me hope that “the ongoing middle” might take different shapes before the end.