Repressed Trauma - Down the Rabbit Hole?

We may all have trauma. What is traumatic is not objective as two people who experience the same thing may respond very differently. Physician and author Gabor Maté’s famous saying "trauma is not what happens to you; it's what happens inside you as a result of what happens to you” describes this well. Everyone’s experience is unique. And many of us underestimate the effects of what happened to us had on us. This is often because our ego is holding onto the idea that we are not that affected so that we can believe that we are strong and resilient. Many of us had to self-regulate and grow fast and we now take some pride our ability to do everything on our own. 

Armed with a badge of resilience, we might not be aware of the part of us that is afraid that if we go there we will fall apart. This is part of the natural ego structure. We have protector parts and perhaps other parts that manage these parts, keeping everything feeling copacetic. Until we can’t anymore. Because if we really want to change, we may need to be brave like Alice and go down the rabbit hole to take a look at what circumstances created who currently are, at the events that led to us develop certain behaviours, ways of being, and the filters in which we see the world.

When we are resourced enough to face and begin to heal what happened to us, a sacred doorway opens to give us a wider sense of reality that includes both a larger and smaller view of ourselves as we learn something about the true nature of who we are and what we are actually capable of when connected to it. If we have repressed trauma, this means that we consciously blocked the trauma and have dissociative amnesia. This is more likely if it happened when we were very young and we were very connected to the spiritual realms. Dissociative amnesia was the response I had. I wonder where I went to escape it. Was it a nice place? Was I taken care of?  I consider complete repression of trauma probably the most magical and fascinating thing that a human can do. It is a blessing to happen…and it causes a host of long-term problems. It seals us from what is too unbearable to handle at the time and blocks and delays the healing process. While some energy of the trauma can be released without awareness of what it is related to, such as through shaking the body like animals do after an attack, our traumas must be processed and integrated.

Some people, as I did, go decades without conscious memories and even when some of the amnesia lifts, sometimes no concrete memories are recovered, perhaps because no memories were made after the first event. This lack of making subsequent memories is because the victim gets really good at dissociating and at the first sign that abuse is about to happen, the dissociation response occurs and the victim’s consciousness leaves the body. But this does not mean that the person did not suffer. The body will remember the trauma and the person will be affected in some way. Dissociation itself can be incredibly challenging as the victims can continue the process of dissociating they learned to do and throughout life, robbing them of attention and presence. It also cuts us off from feeling as dissociating causes detachment and numbness, not only to uncomfortable stimuli but a range of sensation and felt connection.

Trauma can shatter a person's core beliefs about life, goodness, and the nature of suffering. This shocking and immediate shift in reality that shakes one’s beliefs is an awakening unto itself and can lead to a rebirth of a new set of beliefs. The heart has to grow to make space for compassion for perpetrators of abuse and for ourselves for any ways that we might have recreated the abuse in our lives that caused ourselves or others pain. In a sense, the first awakening is to the darkness and the second is to the light.

In addition to plenty of therapy, plant medicines also served me in my healing. They can be effective portals for gaining insight into what is not healed and for many it provides direct revelation to repressed or suppressed trauma. But they are not for everyone, especially in large doses. In a recent journey with a low dose of sacred mushrooms, a beautiful realization came when my husband who journeyed with me asked me to tell him more about my love of Alice in Wonderland as a child. In that moment I wondered if I went to a place like that when I was being abused. I felt a rush of energy through my body, signalling a big yes. Tears fell down my face. 

Down the Rabbit Hole is indeed an apt metaphor for the confusing and surreal experience it is to recover and confront repressed memories. But I know that, just like Alice, I am a better person for it. I'm so happy for my younger self that, amidst the storm around her, she was and will always be held in magic and love.