“Was my childhood really that bad?”

In my 13 years as a therapist, this is, without a doubt, one of the most frequent questions I’ve heard.

Sometimes I hear this question in the context of it being the very thing people asked themselves about for years before finally coming to see me as a therapist.

And sometimes, it’s still a question that surfaces because it’s on my clients’ minds even as they’ve engaged in weekly therapy with me as a relational trauma therapist.

It’s a question that ping-pongs as denial ebbs, numbness fades, and the reality of what reality happened and its impact wars with conflicting ideas about what childhood trauma is, love and loyalty to parents despite their deficits, and contradictory awarenesses of what was.

It’s a question that’s central to childhood trauma recovery.

It’s a question that must be confronted to support the healing process.

But it’s a difficult and almost inevitably painful question to grapple with.

As a relational trauma recovery specialist, here are a few points I want you to know if you’ve asked the question and if you’re still grappling.

The answer to “Was my childhood really that bad?" is entirely dependent on your own feelings and emotions. Not the feelings, emotions, and opinions of your parents or guardians, siblings, community members, church members, or the internet.

No one gets to answer this question besides you and you alone. Why is this?

The way we each remember and feel about our childhood is deeply personal, much like a tapestry of memories woven with our individual emotions and experiences.

Dr. Bessel van der Kolk, a renowned trauma expert, beautifully captures this in his book........

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