By Shahida Arabi
Complex trauma survivors face a dilemma that very few can fathom: They are forced to confront present-day stressors while attempting to resolve triggers from the past. These layers upon layers of trauma take courage, support, and time to unravel. The healing journey of a complex trauma survivor who has several sources of toxic stress is multifaceted. Your day-to-day reality is filled with tiny terrors embedded within larger cracks in the psychological war zone that is your psyche.
The healing journey of a complex trauma survivor who has several sources of toxic stress is multifaceted. Your day-to-day reality is filled with tiny terrors embedded within larger cracks in the psychological war zone that is your psyche.
THE TRAUMA SURVIVOR’S JOURNEY
“Many abused children cling to the hope that growing up will bring escape and freedom. But the personality formed in the environment of coercive control is not well adapted to adult life,” writes Judith Herman in her book, Trauma and Recovery. “The survivor is left with fundamental problems in basic trust, autonomy, and initiative. She approaches the task of early adulthood – establishing independence and intimacy – burdened by major impairments in self-care, in cognition and in memory, in identity, and in the capacity to form stable relationships. She is still a prisoner of her childhood; attempting to create a new life, she reencounters the trauma.”
Survivors of bullying and other traumas face a double bind: Not only are they oppressed by their peers, but they are also often oppressed by family members, authority figures, and other life circumstances. When bullying is also supplemented with other microaggressions or tumultuous life events, the trauma is undeniably more forceful in its impact. What happens when the child is bullied at both school and the home, both meant to be safe places? What long-term effects of bullying linger far beyond childhood, when not only peers but also parental figures simultaneously terrorize the victim? Or what about the impact of chronic, severe bullying — a form of bullying which occurs for years across the child’s entire school career, rather than short-term?
SEEKING SUPPORT AND HEALING FROM TRAUMA AND BULLYING
For complex trauma survivors facing a lifetime of bullying, it can be difficult to know where to turn for help when your would-be safe places aren’t so safe. For many, the best way to find healing from childhood trauma and even bullying in adulthood is by seeking out professional help. A mental health counselor or support group can provide a safe, objective place to process your trauma away from those who may be contributing to it. Getting professional treatment can also give you healthy tools for coping with lifelong bullying so you can avoid the pitfalls associated with its harmful effects and achieve long-term childhood trauma recovery.
THE EFFECTS OF A LIFETIME OF BULLYING
When you have undergone several sources of abuse throughout your lifetime, including but not limited to bullying, emotional neglect or abuse by parents, witnessing domestic violence, and/or even sexual abuse, starting from early childhood, the simultaneous wounding from multiple violations literally rewires the brain, creating disruptions in identity, self-efficacy, and interpersonal effectiveness. According to Meadows Senior Fellow Bessel van der Kolk, trauma causes the brain to become reorganized to deal with danger, rather than mindful of present-day engagements; trauma survivors become subconsciously programmed to feel an overwhelming, pervasive sense of fear and helplessness.
The combination of trauma and bullying already poses a severe socioemotional and academic threat to victims who endure it; victims of bullying are more likely to drop out of school, commit suicide, abuse substances, struggle with anxiety and depression, and have low self-esteem. If a child is targeted for bullying without protective factors such as supportive family members or validating authority figures, this form of alienation exacerbates toxic stress in the child’s life and presents high risks to their early development. A child abandoned by their family members or school administration during difficult circumstances suffers undeniably more effects of bullying on their mental health. According to the Center on the Developing Child at Harvard University, “Without caring adults to buffer children, the unrelenting stress caused by extreme poverty, neglect, abuse, or severe maternal depression can weaken the architecture of the developing brain, with long-term consequences for learning, behavior, and both physical and mental health.”
Sadly, for an impacted child, bullying trauma stories don’t end once you finish school and grow up. The long-term effects of bullying and trauma, for example, can put you at serious risk of ongoing victimization in various forms as an adult, according to a study conducted by the Journal of Child & Adolescent Trauma. Their findings showed 60% of study participants had experienced a revictimization event as an adult after being a victim of trauma as a child. These revictimization events ranged from conventional crime and sexual assault to sibling or peer violence and more.
The fallout from bullying only continues. If you get used to being the bullied victim as a child, one of the effects of bullying on your mental health is low self-esteem. The belief that you’re weak, helpless, or an easy target to victimize becomes ingrained in your psyche, which makes ongoing victimization as an adult only a painful affirmation of this mindset.
COMPLEX TRAUMA AND COMPLEX PTSD
While singular trauma is often linked to the development of PTSD, complex trauma can cause symptoms beyond PTSD; it can result in complex PTSD. Herman first coined the term “complex PTSD” to explain what occurs when you experience a prolonged period of victimization and captivity, usually experienced in situations like long-term domestic violence, long-term child sexual abuse, prisoner of war camps, and organized child exploitation rings.
In addition to the regular symptoms of PTSD, which include hypervigilance, avoidance, dissociation, nightmares, and flashbacks, someone with complex PTSD also experiences issues with emotional regulation, consciousness, self-perception, distorted perceptions of the perpetrator, and disruptions in interpersonal relationships.
Childhood abuse can be considered a form of “captivity” and so can prolonged bullying when the child perceives no means of escape. The causes of complex trauma can thus be diverse and varied. According to trauma therapist Pete Walker, multiple sources of trauma can lead to a pervasive sense of toxic shame, a cruel inner critic, and emotional flashbacks which cause the survivor to regress back into the original traumas of the past.
Although complex PTSD is often associated with long-term sexual or physical abuse, Walker confirms that long-term emotional neglect and assault can also be a factor. And indeed, many studies confirm that verbal and emotional abuse can cause just as much damage to the early developing brain as physical abuse (Teicher, 2006; Choi, 2009; Copeland, 2013).
REENACTING TRAUMA: THE TRAUMA REPETITION CYCLE
Part of complex PTSD is what therapists call “repetition compulsion.” In his book, The Betrayal Bond: Breaking Free of Exploitative Relationships, Meadows Senior Fellow Patrick Carnes writes, “In part, trauma repetition is an effort by the victim to bring resolution to the traumatic memory. By repeating the experience, the victim tries anew to figure out a way to respond in order to eliminate the fear. Instead, the victim simply deepens the traumatic wound.”
It goes without saying that the number of traumas you experience simultaneously will factor into the strength of the trauma repetition cycle.
It goes without saying that the number of traumas you experience simultaneously will factor into the strength of the trauma repetition cycle. Traumas compounded with other traumas will increase the overall risk for trauma repetition in adulthood. It is no surprise that a study showed that children who are both mistreated at home and by their peers are more likely than children only mistreated at home to show significant mental health problems later in life. Due to the immense impact of these traumas as well as the emotional and psychological warfare that often accompanies bullying, survivors become conditioned to engage in negative self-talk, blame themselves for the abuse they’ve suffered, and continue the vicious cycle of abuse. They may struggle with a shame that should belong to their perpetrators and develop maladaptive ways of coping. These maladaptive mechanisms are attempts to survive unbearable, overwhelming lifelong trauma through destructive means that inevitably reenact and reinforce the trauma.
Complex trauma survivors may seek unsafe mechanisms to regain control (such as self-harm, undereating or overeating, abusing drugs, etc.) as an attempt to survive the experience. Toxic shame that arises from incidents of bullying and abuse can lead to behaviors such as sustaining abusive relationships, addiction, eating disorders, and reckless sexual behavior as futile attempts to avoid the trauma and create “numbing” in response to the symptoms. For example, The adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) study showed that abuse in childhood not only contributes to increased risk for health problems such as obesity, heart disease, cancer, and stroke, it also increased the risk of alcoholism, depression, suicide attempts, adolescent pregnancy, STDs, and missed work.
This reenactment of past trauma is not a coincidence — rather, it is a consequence of the trauma itself.
WHAT IS THE PSYCHOLOGICAL IMPACT OF BULLYING?
The effects of bullying on mental health are real. Even witnessing the bullying of others can affect your well-being, reports McGovern Medical School in Houston. So what exactly is the psychological impact of bullying? StopBullying.gov includes some potential negative mental health outcomes:
- Feelings of sadness
- Depression
- Loneliness
- Anxiety
- Changes in sleep or eating patterns
- Loss of interest in activities and school
- Risk of suicide
If you’re bullied, you may struggle with a range of emotions, including anger, frustration, vulnerability, and bitterness, shares VerywellFamily.com. Consequently, you can become more susceptible to self-harm or substance abuse to cope with these feelings. Long-term, you may have a hard time trusting people and have difficulty forming and maintaining relationships.
Enduring a lifetime of bullying takes a weighty emotional and mental toll on complex trauma survivors. If you’ve experienced long-term bullying, you may develop PTSD, as mentioned earlier. PTSD UK even describes bullying as a “perfect storm” for PTSD, especially due to its accompanying feelings of powerlessness and defenselessness in its victims. Because of this, you may find yourself struggling with negative traumatic memories, flashbacks, or nightmares and choose to distance yourself from triggering places or people associated with your painful bullying experiences.
SOCIAL ISOLATION, ANXIETY, AND DESTRUCTIVE RELATIONSHIPS
Another symptom of the complex trauma that accompanies bullying is increased social anxiety and self-isolation as a form of self-protection; bullied victims often withdraw from school activities to avoid the sites where the bullying took place. They may become fearful and distrusting of their peers as well as authority figures, especially if they felt those people did nothing to protect them.
This pervasive sense of distrust unfortunately does not make the survivor immune to repeating these patterns in their adult relationships. When childhood trauma is ongoing and chronic, it becomes overwhelming to the body and leaves the body in a constant state of hypervigilance and hyperarousal (Perry, 2000). Betrayal by trusted friends, family members, or even partners can cause what Carnes calls a “betrayal bond,” or trauma bonding.
COMPLEX TRAUMA AND RESILIENCE: HOW TO HEAL
Despite the complex nature of the trauma that has been endured, there is hope for healing and self-reflection. Complex trauma survivors can address their subconscious programming using diverse healing modalities, including but not limited to traditional modes of therapy, EMDR, art therapy, hypnosis, sound therapy, meditation, yoga, reiki healing, and other forms of bodywork that enables you to release the trauma on the level of mind, body, and spirit. Healing modalities should always be discussed with a certified trauma counselor to ensure that you are addressing your unique needs and triggers.
Survivors can learn to grieve the losses you’ve had in both childhood and adulthood, with the willingness to validate all the emotions that arise from complex trauma. You can begin to gain distance from negative self-talk and learn to “reparent” your inner child with self-soothing techniques. You can seek validating support networks via group therapy with other trauma survivors, trusted friends or mentors, trauma-informed survivor forums, and online communities. Most importantly, you can rewrite your narratives of helplessness to those of power and agency. While complex trauma survivors face a lifetime’s worth of bullying, you also develop a lifetime’s worth of trauma resilience in adulthood.
THE MEADOWS MALIBU CAN HELP
If you’ve dealt with a lifetime of bullying, it’s clear you’ve also experienced the difficult reality of complex trauma. To properly heal, it’s key to find empathy, awareness, and support from those who understand the trauma survivor’s journey.
At The Meadows Malibu, our compassionate therapists and individualized treatment approach can help you heal from lifelong bullying and achieve healthy trauma resilience in adulthood. To learn more, contact us today.
REFERENCES
Carnes, P. (2015). Betrayal Bond: Breaking Free of Exploitive Relationships. Health Communications, Incorporated
Choi, J., Jeong, B., Rohan, M. L., Polcari, A. M., & Teicher, M. H. (2009). Preliminary Evidence for White Matter Tract Abnormalities in Young Adults Exposed to Parental Verbal Abuse. Biological Psychiatry, 65(3), 227-234. doi:10.1016/j.biopsych.2008.06.022
Copeland, W. E., Wolke, D., Angold, A., & Costello, E. J. (2013). Adult Psychiatric Outcomes of Bullying and Being Bullied by Peers in Childhood and Adolescence. JAMA Psychiatry, 70(4), 419. doi:10.1001/jamapsychiatry.2013.504
Felitti, V. J., Anda, R. F., Nordenberg, D., Williamson, D. F., Spitz, A. M., Edwards, V., . . . Marks, J. S. (1998). Relationship of Childhood Abuse and Household Dysfunction to Many of the Leading Causes of Death in Adults. American Journal of Preventive Medicine, 14(4), 245-258. doi:10.1016/s0749-3797(98)00017-8
Herman, J. L. (2015). Trauma and Recovery. New York: Basic Books
Lereya, S. T., Copeland, W. E., Costello, E. J., & Wolke, D. (2015). Adult mental health consequences of peer bullying and maltreatment in childhood: Two cohorts in two countries. The Lancet Psychiatry, 2(6), 524-531. doi:10.1016/s2215-0366(15)00165-0
Perry, B.D. (2000). Traumatized children: How childhood trauma influences brain development. The Journal of the California Alliance for the Mentally Ill 11:1, 48-51. Samakow, J. (2013, February 20). Long-term effects of bullying: Pain lasts into adulthood. Retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/02/20/long-term-effects-of-bullying_n_2728190.html
Streep, P. (2017, January). 5 Reasons Unloved Daughters Choose the Wrong Partners. Retrieved from PsychCentral.com
Teicher, M. (2006). Sticks, Stones, and Hurtful Words: Relative Effects of Various Forms of Childhood Maltreatment. American Journal of Psychiatry Am J Psychiatry, 163(6), 993. doi:10.1176/appi.ajp.163.6.993
Walker, P. (2013). Complex PTSD: From surviving to thriving: A guide and map for recovering from childhood trauma. Azure Coyote Publishing
Van der Kolk, B. (2015). The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma. London: Penguin Books
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Bestselling author of three books, Shahida Arabi is a graduate of Columbia University, where she studied the effects of bullying across the life-course trajectory. Find her blog about abuse and trauma at Self-Care Haven.