<story><title>A possible link between childhood trauma and Alzheimer disease</title><url>https://padiracinnovation.org/News/2021/06/a-possible-link-between-childhood-trauma-and-alzheimer-disease</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>throwaway803453</author><text>I&amp;#x27;d like to share a perspective that I can&amp;#x27;t reconcile. I&amp;#x27;ll start with a quick list of personal childhood(6-16 year old?) trauma: sexual abuse at 12 by a sadistic man 3 times my size that I feared, getting hit with a baseball bat in two separate incidents the second time fracturing a vertebrae, at 12 having an adult hit me so hard it fractured my sternum (to this day my chest has a bony ridge), losing 3 close childhood friends starting at age 10, watching a woman&amp;#x27;s head get run over by a city bus at age 6. Getting beaten so badly by a gang that my eyelid has a permanent droop (the girls mocked my new asymmetry) Watching a neighbor who I liked get stabbed in the neck and then beg for mercy (he had gambling debts) when I was 10. I could go on.&lt;p&gt;Oddly, at the time none of the above &amp;quot;traumatized&amp;quot; me because the media, movies about NYC and the mob, Catholic school (lots of torture pictures in our study book), other friends experiences, etc. set my expectations that violence and sadism against boys&amp;#x2F;men is normal and that I am lucky to not have gotten worse.&lt;p&gt;I didn&amp;#x27;t start to feel anger or trauma until I went away to college in the early 90&amp;#x27;s  and no one seemed to have similar stories. Not even close. Oddly living somewhere safe with decent people made me bitter and resentful.&lt;p&gt;What I can&amp;#x27;t reconcile is that my new friends genuinely felt bad for me in a way that my NYC buddies didn&amp;#x27;t. And that somehow created the trauma. Is that typical ? And does that imply that an avoidance strategy, or a wise-cracking support group, might have better mental health outcomes than time with an empathetic therapist ?&lt;p&gt;&amp;quot;Overall, education seems the most important mediator.&amp;quot; according the article.&lt;p&gt;Good thing I got that Masters degree.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>buro9</author><text>&amp;gt; I didn&amp;#x27;t start to feel anger or trauma until I went away to college in the early 90&amp;#x27;s and no one seemed to have similar stories&lt;p&gt;I&amp;#x27;ve got stories like yours. And I too thought I wasn&amp;#x27;t traumatized, at least not too much.&lt;p&gt;But I was wrong.&lt;p&gt;The trauma was a weakness below the surface and given the right mix of pressure (the pressures of startups don&amp;#x27;t by default provide a safe environment for mental health) it gave way almost 35 years later almost ending my story.&lt;p&gt;A year of therapy later and I live a simpler life now. I survived my past, few could and there&amp;#x27;s strength in that.&lt;p&gt;I concur with you that a kind of anxiety exists due to people who just shrug it off, and this was worse and seems to keep the past more present.&lt;p&gt;A few kind individuals heard me, didn&amp;#x27;t dismiss, and didn&amp;#x27;t judge, and have been more support than leagues of others. And being heard by those few people who are softer and gentler, has been absolutely restorative.&lt;p&gt;I&amp;#x27;m glad others don&amp;#x27;t have stories like ours, but sad that means most people can&amp;#x27;t connect with survivors who do have these stories.</text></comment>
<story><title>A possible link between childhood trauma and Alzheimer disease</title><url>https://padiracinnovation.org/News/2021/06/a-possible-link-between-childhood-trauma-and-alzheimer-disease</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>throwaway803453</author><text>I&amp;#x27;d like to share a perspective that I can&amp;#x27;t reconcile. I&amp;#x27;ll start with a quick list of personal childhood(6-16 year old?) trauma: sexual abuse at 12 by a sadistic man 3 times my size that I feared, getting hit with a baseball bat in two separate incidents the second time fracturing a vertebrae, at 12 having an adult hit me so hard it fractured my sternum (to this day my chest has a bony ridge), losing 3 close childhood friends starting at age 10, watching a woman&amp;#x27;s head get run over by a city bus at age 6. Getting beaten so badly by a gang that my eyelid has a permanent droop (the girls mocked my new asymmetry) Watching a neighbor who I liked get stabbed in the neck and then beg for mercy (he had gambling debts) when I was 10. I could go on.&lt;p&gt;Oddly, at the time none of the above &amp;quot;traumatized&amp;quot; me because the media, movies about NYC and the mob, Catholic school (lots of torture pictures in our study book), other friends experiences, etc. set my expectations that violence and sadism against boys&amp;#x2F;men is normal and that I am lucky to not have gotten worse.&lt;p&gt;I didn&amp;#x27;t start to feel anger or trauma until I went away to college in the early 90&amp;#x27;s  and no one seemed to have similar stories. Not even close. Oddly living somewhere safe with decent people made me bitter and resentful.&lt;p&gt;What I can&amp;#x27;t reconcile is that my new friends genuinely felt bad for me in a way that my NYC buddies didn&amp;#x27;t. And that somehow created the trauma. Is that typical ? And does that imply that an avoidance strategy, or a wise-cracking support group, might have better mental health outcomes than time with an empathetic therapist ?&lt;p&gt;&amp;quot;Overall, education seems the most important mediator.&amp;quot; according the article.&lt;p&gt;Good thing I got that Masters degree.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>PragmaticPulp</author><text>It’s a delicate subject to discuss, to say the least. There has been some tangential research in this area, but most researchers want to avoid the perception of questioning anyone’s response to or definition of trauma.&lt;p&gt;We do know that the language used to describe a situation can have profound effects on the perceived severity. There is a famous study in which subjects were shown footage of cars crashing into each other and asked to estimate the speed of the collision. It turns out that the way the collision is described has a significant effect on the estimate of the speed. For example, asking someone how fast the cars “smashed” into each other results in more severe estimates than if you ask how fast the cars “collided”. There has been extrapolation to suggest that merely reframing events as traumas is enough to amplify their severity, which could unfortunately create unhelpful negative feedback loops when others are merely trying to help.&lt;p&gt;There is also a trend toward younger generations feeling that their lives are more due to fate or random chance than their own actions. Reframing outcomes as traumas inherently shifts the outcome to something that is inflicted upon us. Is it possible that prior to your friends’ reframing of those events you viewed the outcomes more as your own successful navigation out of (obviously terrible) random events? Reframing events as traumas can shift the perspective to one of being a helpless victim rather than an active navigator.</text></comment>