Six Variations and Seven Roots of Trauma

When the child becomes an adult, he is likely to have “frozen emotions” too. So his relationships will tend to have little emotional depth. Since he felt abandoned as a child, then he is likely to easily abandon any adult relationships he forms, even those of friendship. His childhood dependency needs were not met, and now that he is an adult he does not want to become dependent on anyone. He does not care about people or society. He may neglect his friends: his attitude to the loss of friendship may be “so what?”

He may develop a deep sense of apathy. The form of depression he may suffer is that based on self-pity. The unconscious idea that sustains this form of depression is there is no fairness in life. A dominant emotion in his subconscious mind is likely to be bitterness [¹]. The memories of his failures in relationships leave a bitter taste in his mouth.

Rejection can have the effect of making the adult an outsider, and because he feels this way he is no longer motivated to attain social success and achievements. He feels alienated. To survive, he may intensify his focus on narcissism and become absorbed even more into his own internal daydream world. He may lose the sense of meaning and purpose to his life. He drifts through life, becoming a loner. He may feel that life is meaningless, and this may give rise to the desire to embrace nihilism [²] – or, if the person is sufficiently mature, he may engage in the search for meaning in his life.

The adult may compensate for the distress of trauma by doing things his way, not anyone else’s way: this predilection enables him to hold his head up high, despite what life does to him. He may follow a life of adventure, since normal day jobs are so boring and unfulfilling for him. He may decide to become independent of the parents (that is, he may have a strong need to reject them, that is, do to others what was done to him) and go his own way in life, wherever it may lead him. He may reject any offers of emotional support because he prefers to be self-sufficient.

Repudiation of the Theme

I consider what beliefs the child will form when it feels that it is not to blame for being rejected, humiliated and victimised. I look at the different influences that the father and the mother exert on the child.

He may desire to go his own way, whatever the cost. He may ignore ethical rules or moral obligations so that he does only what he likes to do. If subjected to the unpleasant demands of society, such as the necessity to have long-term unrewarding 9-to-5 jobs, he may gradually fall to pieces as his internal stresses gradually increase. He may centre on aloneness, the feeling that he depends solely on himself and no-one else. He may separate himself from all traditions. He may become a rebel and non-conformist, even a charismatic leader who flaunts the usual rules. The ideal of independence attracts him. He needs to be free of any dependency on, or obligation to, others. He goes his own way in life; he gets satisfaction by doing the best he can, even if his best does not amount to much.

He may prefer to have impersonal or short-term relationships in his social and sexual life. This is because he finds it very difficult to handle emotional relationships and hence prefers to abandon them when the relationships get too emotionally difficult.

Acquiescence of the Theme

He feels that he has no say in his life. There is no freedom for him. His feelings are captured in some familiar phrases: he feels like a puppet on a string; or he dances to the tunes of others; or he is just a cog in a machine. He feels trapped in uncongenial circumstances, which can lead to apathy (a “what’s the point of doing anything” mentality). He has a sense that something has died within: what has died is the reliance on tradition and community support.

He may see his home as a fortress against the world, where he can be secure and safe. He needs a place of security and safety so that he can function reasonably well in the world. His home is his place of recovery from the distresses of having to function within social and economic realities. He needs to stay within his boundaries, his comfort zone. If he is pushed beyond them then he may start falling to pieces. He is unwilling to take risks. He tends to give up too easily when things go wrong – he may feel overwhelmed by his difficulties. He may develop a susceptibility to various kinds of addiction.

His need for security means that he is willing to abandon freedom, especially political and social freedoms. He will support authoritarian systems so long as they meet his needs. In the world of BDSM (bondage, domination, submission, masochism), he may be willing to become the slave of a Dominant person, someone who will take charge of him and look after him. He readily rejects his identity as a free person and just as readily he adopts the identity of being a slave.

His sense of identity may have decreased almost to zero, or he may regard his sense of identity as being something that is completely useless. His psychological confusion may increase to the point where he sinks into depersonalisation [³], as a way of abandoning that sense of identity and the bitterness that goes with it. On his spiritual journey, he feels abandoned by God.

Other factors may come into play and add their influences to the sense of being crushed. Then the adult may become submerged into mental disorders and confusion, and often these are related to his two identities. Now the father gives the boy a sense of having an individual identity, whilst the mother gives him a sense of having a social identity. This difference affects which mental disorders an adult may experience, if he becomes excessively vulnerable. [ I explore some forms of mental disorders and madness in a later book].

Quick Comparisons

The extreme negative responses to these themes can be briefly summarised according to how the person feels about himself.

Punishment: the person doesn’t want anything better.
Denigration: the person doesn’t deserve anything better.
Rejection: the person abandons anything better.

Having one’s self-esteem crushed by punishment makes one passive, due to the influences of guilt (in self-hate mode) with fear.
whereas
Having one’s self-worth crushed by denigration makes one submissive, due to jealousy (in self-pity mode).
and
Being rejected generates apathy, due to self-pity.

The last article in these four articles on Six Variations and Seven Roots of Trauma is next. It shows the abuse diagram for all the three negative themes.

[¹]. Depression, unconscious ideas, and emotions are all featured in my three articles on Emotion on the Home page. [1]

[³]. The next article Six Variations and Seven Roots of Trauma-4 has a section on Depersonalisation. [3]

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Ian Heath
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