Soulfood

The Weaponization of Trauma

Victim communities have become somewhat popular. Support for victims is important – we need to love them, believe them, help them. And we also need to be careful not to promote victim entitlement – beliefs and practices that don’t lead to healing but perpetuate destruction. How do we approach our wounded brethren with grace and persistence in seeking healing?

Weariness of Being Wounded

Working with wounded people requires patience. We can’t rush healing. We have to be willing to sit in the ashes. We can’t fix their pain or heal their wounds. We have to be diligent in discerning when to turn a victim’s focus on external sin and suffering to counseling goals for their internal growth. When someone is still in harm’s way, that is not the time. We who are not in abusive situations are slow to see how we need to grow. And we who are not in the midst of darkness and oppression turn to things instead of God – how much more should we be gracious with and patient towards those whose lives are in danger and who suffer in darkness!

Temptation to Resist Growth

Healing is hard work. It is risky and requires us to feel things we want to avoid feeling. There is fear of looking for help and instead being re-wounded. There is a fear of being blamed, shamed, and disbelieved. We must be willing to lay down our lives in reassuring them they are not to blame, not disbelieved or discounted, and that we do not shame them.

Victims are rightly sensitive. There is fear of moving towards others – hyper-vigilance leads victims to hunt for evidence of intent to harm, of disbelief, etc in the way we speak and act towards them. It is not uncommon for victims to misinterpret us or wrongly assign meaning to our communications. As helpers we must understand this – we don’t push, we disclose, we’re kind, we reveal what we are thinking, we apologize when they feel hurt by us.

We also resist growth because we question God’s love for us. We who aren’t suffering abuse are quick to doubt God’s goodness and kindness and apt to view him negatively – how much more should we expect trauma sufferers to feel this way towards God? So we are patient, but we point to Scripture and the trajectory of lament.

Healing is also hindered by a learned helplessness and a feeling that a person has no agency and is powerless. Scripture does teach that innocent people do suffer unjust evil at the hands of others. But we must be alert to signs that a person is moving from being victimized to having a victim mentality. A victim mentality might actually prevent a person from improving his situation and hinder their own healing. We must have a category for innocent sufferers and not blame, shame, or dismiss. Sometimes choices are limited and in the moment when a victim is overpowered by an oppressor. In the moment, from the outside we might wonder why someone didn’t flee. But we must understand that in addition to flight, fight/freeze/fawn are all responses that can influence a victim’s choice of actions in that moment. Each person’s past experience (or lack thereof) with abuse, suffering, and/or trauma shapes their response in these moments. Situations and circumstances likewise influence the response to oppression. In being attentive to their victimization and resisting any semblance of blaming them for what happened, in the aftermath part of our work is to convince them of their agency, that they do have power over what happens to them and can make their own choices going forward. This is hard work!

If a person lives with a victim mentality for a long period of time they become unable to see God at work in their lives. The Psalms are replete with victims who move from a victim mentality to a new hope in God’s providence and a new sense of agency.

Trajectory of Lament

The psalms of lament teach us how to move from victimization to healing and trust in YHWH. There are more psalms of lament than any other type of psalm. As helpers, we are helped by them to enter into the depths of the suffering of our wounded brethren. But we are also given psalms of ascent to encourage us to sing these prayers with and for one another. They remind us that we have a collective purpose and that we are on a shared pilgrimage. We need to remind each other who we are and to whom we belong.

Psalms of lament are also not only for speaking of suffering, but also prayers for God to act.

We also pray for the wounded persons we are belong that as they enter into the psalms of lamented, that they will look outside themselves at others who are suffering and be willing to participate in the sufferings of others. What victims learn is to be shared with, by singing over, other sufferers who are coming behind us or limping beside us, speaking sweet truths to others.

Ways that the Unhealed Wounded Might Wound

Self-pity, hopelessness, and depression are self-centered responses to abuse. We all focus on our own suffering when our pain is acute and it is understandable for a season.

Failure to have empathy manifests as an attitude that “my wounds eclipse everyone else’s.” Placing our own pain, however catastrophic it may be, over everyone else’s is destructive to relationships. Those who have been through trauma are not exempt from the Bible’s exhortation to bear the burdens of others and enter into their suffering with empathy and compassion, comforting them with the comfort with which we have been comforted. We have to learn to identify with people whose level of distress is different than our own. We have so much in common with fellow sufferers and our suffering should move us towards one another, not towards self-isolation.

There is a demand to be understood (attunement). There becomes an expectation that everyone should be an expert on how to walk with trauma sufferers, and a condemnation of those who fall short (which is generally everyone). It also spirals into more hurt as the expectation will surely be disappointed and then the victim falls into self-isolation teeming with resentment and bitterness. It allows them to classify and be critical of others who don’t meet the expectation, labeling them as “unsafe.” There is a reasonable expectation that if someone is sitting next to you when you are sobbing that they should notice and try to comfort you in some way. But it is not healthy to label others unsafe because they fail to perceive all the things and all the pains. Only the Lord can perfectly love and care for victims of abuse. As their list of unsafe persons grows they become trapped in isolation, only able to hear those who keep them trapped in their hurt by only affirming everything they are feeling rather than seeing things in a way that will bring them out of destructive patterns of thinking that will hinder healing.

We can help them communicate what they need and what would be helpful in caring for them. We help them to be patient with others, remembering that if they are disoriented in their own stories, the people around them are even less able to orient themselves to the story of the suffering person. We guide them in discerning who is helpful, who is unhelpful, and who is harmful. It matters to us if people are indifferent to their pain. We can help them talk to unhelpful people so that their community can be more helpful. We can help them see there is a huge difference between “this is what I need” and “this is what I am owed.”

Self-centered suffering (the vulnerable narcissist) – the word narcissist is often used improperly and we should be careful in using it when their is no clinical diagnosis. Increasingly counselors are seeing a subset of strugglers who are hyper-sensitive to rejection and negative emotion and many seek out attention by proclaiming themselves to be victims. Sometimes these people have been abused by others, sometimes they claim abuse when there hasn’t been abuse, other times they wrongly elevate hurtful things to abuse. This type of narcissistic person comes in for counseling, and they can be very persuasive. We must be alert. The vulnerable narcissist will destroy relationships and communities in their attempts to keep attention on themselves and the alleged abuse they have suffered. They are very difficult to counsel because they use the alleged abuse as a shield and accuse those who challenge them of victim-blaming and deflection.

Abuse victims who abuse – very often abusers have a history of being abused. Past trauma primes people to act abusively – but that doesn’t excuse abusive behavior. Often times those who have grown up in abusive homes see abusive behavior as normal and don’t understand it as harmful. We need to help them see that it is not normal, and they can change. Everyone can learn and grow in Christ!

Wolves who act wounded (oppressors who play the victim) – how to tell? Victims will sound and act like victims. They will have a series of detailed abusive incidents. They are going to talk about how they’ve tried to avoid abuse. They will talk about how they’ve been controlled. They will be genuinely afraid of their oppressor, and hesitant to get help. They will doubt themselves, and wrongly assume some responsibility. They’re going to make excuses for or empathize with their abuser. They might be apologetic towards helpers – I’m sorry to put this on you, I hate to bring it up, do you think I’m wrong? If they have acted wrongly they are quick to confess specifics and admit behaviors they know they need to change. They sound confused, anxious – like traumatized people.

Wolves who act like victims – how to discern oppressors who claim to be victims?

This can be hard – and we can get it wrong. Some helpful guidelines:

An angry victim will share the traits above with other victims. Anger alone doesn’t reveal that someone claiming to be a victim is actually an oppressor. However – an oppressor who claims to be a victim tends to be aggressively critical or demeaning towards their “oppressors.” Their anger is self-righteous anger rather than fear-based. They are gong to seem overly calm and confident. They don’t have any fear or apprehension of confrontation. They will be overly charming and charismatic. Their words are clear. They tell persuasive stories. They are likable. They lure us in. They will discuss incidents in very vague and general terms, and describe circumstances that are inconsistent with other facts. They’re going to evade questions and try to control the conversation to discuss what makes their situation look good, or divert from more pertinent, revealing questions.

Their language will carry a sense of entitlement, or jealousy, or obsession. The focus will be on their rights and the ways they have been violated. They will be critical of the “system” when it isn’t getting them what they want – you as a counselor, the police, etc. They often have a second motive, to get something else that they want. They may be smug about the consequences they are hoping to have happen to their “oppressors.” They show no concern for their “oppressors’” wellbeing.

This is hard work because it is so complex! But a Jesus is with us, and he knows how hard it is to love well those who are being hurt and hurting others.

1 Peter 2:21-23

[21] For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you might follow in his steps. [22] He committed no sin, neither was deceit found in his mouth. [23] When he was reviled, he did not revile in return; when he suffered, he did not threaten, but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly.

Do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with your God. All three need to be in balance – don’t leave out walking humbly! (Micah 6:8)

Ultimately we want to point the way and lead sufferers to their loving Father:

Jeremiah 31:9[9] With weeping they shall come, and with pleas for mercy I will lead them back, I will make them walk by brooks of water, in a straight path in which they shall not stumble, for I am a father to Israel, and Ephraim is my firstborn.

Lord, have mercy and bring healing!