Several years ago, through a workplace trauma training, I learned about a study conducted by CDC-Kaiser Permanente titled the Adverse Childhood Experiences Study. During the training, we had the opportunity to take the Adverse Childhood Experiences survey —a brief list of ten yes/no questions. After completing the ACE survey, I was surprised to see my score of 6. I had never considered my childhood experiences as traumatic, but if you knew me well enough, you knew that I’d had a less-than-ideal childhood. Among other issues, alcoholism and depression permeated my childhood family. While I had sought out professionals to help me process those experiences throughout my early adult life, I’d never examined how heavy a burden or how pervasive those experiences were to my adult self. I mostly dismissed my feelings, justifying my stoicism by mentally referencing the more severe and often violent suffering of children in all the corners of this globe.
In other words, I normalized neglect and abuse.
This single training profoundly impacted my life. Because of this school-based training, I have developed a deep understanding of not only the trauma I experienced but the myriad ways my childhood has impacted the rest of my life. I have always had immense patience and understanding for my students, knowing the wounds that can arise from difficult childhoods. Rather than extend that patience and compassion to myself, I ignored and down-played my pain. Learning about ACES propelled me on a quest for information and understanding. Over the past years, I have spent time researching trauma, reading a wide variety of articles and books. That education has allowed me to heal in ways that weren’t previously available to me.
To equate what had happened to me as ‘adverse’—to see it for the trauma that it was, I first needed to uncover decades of buried feelings. To maintain a sense of power and agency, I’d spent much of my life resisting the idea that my childhood was painful— mainly in a subconscious effort to protect others. Subsequently, I experienced a bit of cognitive dissonance in accepting that my experiences had significant repercussions in my life. I learned that it takes courage and patience to be vulnerable enough to explore the pain inflicted by people you trusted and loved. It has required even more courage and patience to forgive myself for continuing to deny my feelings after I left my childhood behind.
According to the research in the Kaiser-Permanente study, over half of the adults report experiencing at least one of the adverse experiences in the survey, which includes divorce, violence, abuse, neglect, among others. The research has also linked heart disease and depression to adverse experiences in childhood. Additionally, because those of us with high ACES have normalized trauma and abuse, we are more prone to develop fewer healthy boundaries. This lagging emotional awareness and lack of protective boundary-setting expose us to repeated abuse and trauma over time, increasing our risk for all manner of ongoing health, behavioral, and financial difficulties.
After I took the ACES, I began writing with more regularity. I disciplined myself to write thoughts that I felt might be too difficult for others to read rather than the toxically positive, ‘happy’ thoughts that had filled the pages of my old journals. I learned that accepting the reality of what had happened was a decisive first step in my healing journey. I practiced viewing the truth of what happened from my perspective, not anyone else’s, and validating my feelings. As I practiced sensing and expressing my emotions, I began listening to myself in ways that I never had and listening to myself in ways others had encouraged me not to.
When we experience trauma, but no one else acknowledges or addresses that trauma, it’s like the pink elephant in the room—we learn to distrust our interpretation of those experiences. We deny our feelings. The path toward healing begins when we look at the trauma directly. When we acknowledge our feelings about those experiences. This process of acceptance was revelatory and freeing. I began to understand that it didn’t matter if any of my friends or family members empathized with my experiences, that the only one who needed to do this was me. I needed to listen to myself. I needed to empathize with myself. I needed to have self-compassion and tenderness toward myself. I needed to allow the full range of emotion from my childhood experiences.
Writing became the way forward. Black and white words on paper allowed a kind of objectivity that had eluded me throughout my lifetime. That objectivity permitted me to heal and to build stronger emotional boundaries to nurture a healthier relationship with myself moving forward. Deepening my emotional intelligence has not always been easy, but it has made my life easier. I will always be a steadfast advocate for children, and now I’m also a powerful advocate for myself.
