Everyone remembers their childhood. For some, childhood memories are cherished and amazing beyond description. However, for others, childhood memories are terrible experiences that leave them traumatized. Childhood trauma occurs when an event or circumstance disrupts a child’s sense of safety and security, leaving him or her helpless.

While children are resilient and able to cope with any situation, traumatic experiences during childhood can have lasting effects on adulthood if they are not addressed.

Childhood trauma could result from physical, verbal, or sexual abuse, child neglect, serious illness, bullying, or separation from a parent.

There are times when one is flooded with grief about the kind of life she needed as a child, which she was deprived of so painfully. It is during those times that the person grieves for the safety, love, and care that her parents or caregivers should have provided. Things she deserved but could not get.

This is the case with a friend of mine named Freda. We connected while studying at university. During those days at university, she rarely talked about her childhood, which led me to believe she had a typical childhood. I mean the type where you are showered with love and affection by your parents. In addition, you can play and talk about anything and everything with your parents. How wrong I was.

She paid me a visit on New Year’s Eve and spent 7 days with my family. It was during her visit that she opened up to me for the first time and narrated her ordeal as a child.

According to her, a certain female child in the neighborhood was abused by her uncle and cousin. The only people she calls family. Freda’s childhood memories flashed before her eyes with cinematic clarity.

In the retelling of her ordeal, I discovered that years had passed with deep pain and sorrow buried and hidden deep inside her. All these problems stem from childhood abuse.

I had no other way to describe her but as a freshly awakened full-fledged adult, who suddenly encounters strong unexplored emotions tied around anger, confusion, panic, and fear; all swirling inside of her after thirty-five years of being held emotionally captive.
If you were abused as a child, any pathetic story about a physically or sexually abused child can inadvertently trigger unpleasant memories.

Freda grew up in a house marked by physical, emotional, and verbal abuse, which destroyed her childhood. Unfortunately, this haunts her in adulthood. She was that little girl growing up in a house filled with gruesome and unspeakable acts.

A little girl without basic human rights. The right to be loved and treated with kindness and respect. In addition, there is the right to grow into one’s own identity and not simply be used for others’ whims.

Whenever she thinks about the things she has lost, it isn’t just about the innocence of the child within her that was destroyed and broken. She also thinks about lost dreams, forgotten hopes, and a small understanding of inner peace.

Young children deserve genuine love, affection, care, and childhood. They should be accepted and allowed to make mistakes regardless. Unfortunately, Freda had to worry and make sure everyone was okay. She hoped her family would stay in a pleasant mood and not fly into a rage.

When she sees a young child being showered with genuine love and care, she grieves more. This is because it hurts that she lost all of that and can never get it back.

Her pain and trauma can only be traced back to her aunt and husband. These two were her closest family, yet they lived like strangers in the house.
At seven years old, Freda lived with an uncle who was a malignant narcissist.

This is a man who resorts to anger and violence when things don’t turn out the way he wanted. The sound of his voice alone sent cold shivers down her spine. He was paranoid and snapped at the first perceived slight disagreement with anyone.

At first, there was physical abuse, in the form of beatings at the slightest provocation, before he started sexually abusing young Freda. The first time he had his way with her, he ridiculed her as she cried painfully.

His voice filled with cruelty immediately echoed, “Don’t even dare tell anyone, nobody will believe you.”

The vicious tigress, who was her aunt, always raged irrationally. She would scream about objectively trivial matters. It’s no wonder; any kind of yelling makes Freda’s anxiety go crazy.

Within that house, it felt completely normal to be screamed at, ignored, and tossed around.

Her earliest memories involve being whipped at the slightest provocation.

These people taught her how to be angry and miserable because there was always a situation pushing her to anger and misery in the household.

Freda also learned to lie and not feel guilty about it because it was the only way to avoid punishment. This punishment comes with physical violence and deep wounds.

Being introverted made her situation harder. These two people had difficulty understanding her quietness and love of solitude.
Their definition of her was “outcast”. They felt she couldn’t fit into the family unit.
She learned at an extremely young age to be strong in the face of abuse and pain.”Tears” for her meant weakness.

In those dark and tough times, she often thought the only way out of hell was to die.

Now, as an adult, every time Freda thinks she’s doing okay and almost moving past her abuse, something triggers her. She suddenly finds herself trapped inside the mind of the scared little girl, hiding in the corner praying no one sees her.

I found out from her that she acts like a hurt and angry child dealing with emotions even though she is over thirty-five years old. Of course, this leads her to make unwise choices based on emotions and not reality.

The truth remains that the inability to deal with emotions even as an adult is one of the major issues with childhood trauma.

People damaged by abuse tend to suffer mental health issues such as borderline personality disorder, conduct disorder, and a variety of other disorders.

They have a huge battle facing them, and to heal, they must see it for what it is and the cause.

They have to take it easy on themselves and learn to control their issues as much as they can.

They may never fully heal but they must not beat themselves up as these are the results of being abused.

Knowing their triggers is huge but so is emotional regulation. This is to prevent their anger from blowing up into a rage, where they do or say things they regret.

If you were traumatized as a child, here are ways to cope and live a normal life.

You need to acknowledge that such trauma occurred and as a child, it was not your fault. Denying it or pretending it never happened is never a wise way to deal with it.

It is normal to have a feeling of helplessness carried over from your childhood to adulthood leaving you a victim in life. You have to realize that your past life controls your present life when you see yourself as a victim. To control your present, you must use willpower to conquer your pain.

To develop a strong relationship and gain support, you need to connect and communicate with others. Communication and connection with people will also help you understand yourself, others, and the world at large. Avoid isolation at any cost because being alone will constantly remind you of that lonely child who suffered one form of abuse or another. Joining a support group such as childhood survivors will also be to your advantage.

EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) trauma therapy is very effective and remarkable. It helps patients with childhood trauma.

This is a form of psychotherapy that allows people to heal from symptoms and emotional distress caused by disturbing life experiences. With EMDR, the mind can fully recover from psychological trauma much as the body recovers from physical trauma.

Besides EMDR, Eckhart Tolle’s meditation can be life-changing. It can help us see our pain in a different light.

Eckhart Tolle Meditation can be described as a guided method or technique that features an awakening practice for the brain.

It enables the brain to come up with random and periodic thoughts that keep the mind busy most of the time. This meditation focuses on the human brain’s thought process.

People with childhood trauma have benefited from this method in seeing that they are not their emotions. This is even if they feel extremely real and overwhelming at times.