Your traumas catch up with you... when you do not process them...

An unprocessed trauma can manifest through certain behaviors, feelings, and/or thought processes that, over time, are not healthy in your daily adult life. It can influence you to the point that you start to identify with this trauma. You are this trauma (in your feelings) and, to a certain extent, feel (unconsciously) attached to this pain. You know no other way. Love and positivity can be frightening, and pain seems supposedly safe.

You always have a choice in how you deal with trauma

Some behaviors and/or thought processes serve as survival mechanisms. To cope with the pain and sometimes also to 'survive' within the (family) circumstances. However, it is important to examine and heal this behavior and/or thought process, along with the trauma that caused it. Otherwise, you will remain stuck in pain and may continue to attract (similar) traumas.

As a child, you may not always have a choice, but as an adult, you do. Nowadays, you can receive very good help with processing trauma.

Everyone deals with trauma differently. Some flee to avoid feeling the pain. Others freeze or become paralyzed and thus suppress the pain. Or you may quickly go on the attack and defend yourself to avoid turning inward!

I learned as a child of heavily traumatized (grand)parents to escape into my fantasy world for years, to cope with the outside world and my inner pains.... That was my survival mechanism. And because I had no awareness of their traumas, I attracted (similar) traumas myself, causing the unprocessed traumas to continue to accumulate.

Traumas catch up with you

What do I mean by that; traumas catch up with you? When you do not process traumas, you usually lead a (partly) unhappy or unfulfilled life.

Many people think that pushing down pain helps them move forward. But the opposite is true. It keeps haunting and manipulating you and, unfortunately, often unconsciously as well. The traumas continue to catch up with you.... In other words, you cannot escape it, and the consequences occasionally rear their heads. Unless you reflect on your life, realize that things are not going as desired, and seek help.

Example; My father

My father was someone who tried to push down traumas his entire life. The pains and traumas he experienced were too intense. As a child of so-called 'bad' parents, he went through too much in his childhood and carried these pains into his adult life, causing him to continue attracting pain.

Everything my father stubbornly tried to suppress came out from time to time; in his manner of reacting, feeling unhappy, and being unable to imagine that someone could love him and/or have good intentions. I will focus here only on the last part of his life. Unfortunately, my father passed away in December 2024.

My father 'fed' himself by watching TV. Day and night, he listened to stories about the war in Ukraine. He himself was a victim of WWII, and because he had not healed the traumas, his focus remained on war. Consequently, he was mostly a bundle of negativity. The war continued to rage within him and was supposedly 'safe' for him. This was his comfort zone. However, by doing this, he kept the war alive within himself!

A person who is (heavily) traumatized cannot be positive for (long)!

In the last weeks of his life, the unprocessed traumas surfaced one by one. It was very painful to see and experience. Especially because the pains were often (unconsciously) projected onto us since dealing with them was unfamiliar to

my father. He could not stop those feelings; they wanted out, and he lost control over them.

As a teenager, my father was called a traitor, and during his dying process, he called one of my children a traitor. My sister and I became the opposing party, even though we fought day and night to make things as bearable as possible for him. He began to discriminate because he himself had been discriminated against in the past. He shifted from intense sadness to anger and rage. And he relived the shame again, but now in a different form... My father continued to attract pain upon pain.

His traumas had caught up with him!!

He could no longer avoid it, not even during his dying process! Pains want to be heard and felt. That is what pain desires so that it can heal and usually presents itself in a vulnerable moment. In a weak moment in my father's life, having to leave the home in which he had lived until the age of 92, the unhealed traumas came to the surface intensely. And shortly after, the dying process began (unexpectedly).... it was all too much, even though I had quietly hoped to be able to build a good bond in his new place. We had cautiously begun this again.

My father did try; to express himself towards me, and he told stories about his life when I asked him to later and also during my visits to him. I found that very admirable of him. He could tell well and was such a charismatic man with many talents, but the traumas caught up with him....

In my practice, it amazes me every time how people dare to share their traumas and can also uncover the traumas of their (grand)parents. Only then can real healing take place!

Warm regards,

Monique Angèle van de Laar