Recently, I was tasked with writing a strength-based personal story to use during my CRM trainings. As a trainer of trauma, depending on your content and audience, often it is beneficial when speaking to others to model transparency and even a bit of vulnerability. Therefore, as a part of my process of becoming certified as a CRM trainer, one of the activities is to write a strength-based personal story.This story can be about yourself and what you have experience personally or you can reframe, (confidentially of course), your experience having heard someone else's survival story.
I decided to choose the latter. Largely because the biggest component of a strength-based personal story is to discuss the resiliency aspects to the experience and address specifically things like "when did you know you were safe?" and "who or what helped you?", "what signs of resiliency do you now look back and notice?" and so on and so on. All of which are questions that I don't have clear and concise answers to in my own personal story (at least that I feel I could describe as a brief 10 minute introduction at trainings).
However, what came to mind was my own experience in a story of a close friend (which you will see that I share below). The strength-based personal story that I wrote really resonated with me. As an adult who trains on trauma and speaks on trauma often, I often forget how much trauma (besides my own) and more importantly examples of resiliency surround me. Sometimes we become such advocates and warriors for the "war on trauma" that I think what becomes most pronounced is the how much farther we have left to go. How much more we must fight. Which, although is true can make that fight feel a little bit more defeating.
If I could take one thing away from what I have learned and implemented in my own life from CRM it would be the word focus. CRM teaches us to shift our focus from thoughts and sensations of discomfort/distress to those of well-being. And to spend more time focusing on those things that may be sources of resilience for us. This concept too can be used as we continue to do the hard work of creating trauma and resiliency informed agencies, systems, practices, and policy. Spend a little more time focusing the work we (the entire trauma informed community) have done and the impact that has had. And how many other strength-based personal stories we have helped create the template for.
A Strength-Based Assignment
Growing up I had a friend that experienced both abuse and neglect due to her mother’s substance use issues. She ended up being removed from her mother's home during her early elementary school years after her family found out her and her siblings had been left alone for several days. She often described to me the day that her aunt came over to get them and how she felt excited knowing that she would not be coming back to live but nervous that also meant she would no longer be staying with her siblings who she relied on. Who she survived with.
Fortunately for my friend, she was able to remain with family and separation from her siblings didn't happen. Her mother's sister--whom we all referred to as "Aunt"--was able to take her and all 4 of her siblings to live with her and her new husband in another state which my friend always describes with such joy and a noticeable since of relief even until this day. However, although she was happy about her new life with supportive caregivers, as child, when I met my friend, she struggled from serious anger issues. My friend could be so happy one minute and enraged the next. I remember her often being removed from class to go to what I would later find out was anger management therapy.
As an adult, who now leads a life enmeshed in ways to prevent and help people heal from trauma, I realize that my friend's "anger issues" as a child were merely learned survival responses from her "previous life". Her therapy helped her. Even I got invited one day to attend therapy with her, which was exciting at the time because I too got to leave class early. What I now realize is that my invitation to therapy was simply her therapist's way of generating social supports or "resources" for my friend. A lot of what we did in that office mirrors concepts that we learn through CRM. Techniques that I know helped my friend and even me to remain "level headed" which in CRM we refer to as remaining in our “Resiliency Zone”.
Now my friend is married, with children and lives a happy and peaceful life and is able to provide stability and support for her children. Stability and support that I know is a result of learning skills similar to the one's I have learned through CRM. Skills that I look forward to sharing with others.
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