The Difference Between Trauma and Suffering

<p>Trauma is a word that we hear a lot, and some people might wonder, “It seems like everyone has trauma… so if everyone has it, is it even really a thing?”</p><p>I’ve even wondered about the difference between trauma and the suffering that Buddha spoke of in the 4 Noble Truths. Is it qualitatively different, or is it just on the continuum of suffering that is part of being human?</p><p>In Buddhism, suffering is discussed as a truth to embrace as a truth of being human, as part of the human experience. If we believe that suffering isn’t supposed to even exist or think we can learn to control it or prevent it, we create even <i>more</i> suffering.</p><p>While I haven’t arrived at a definitive conclusion myself, in my gut, it feels like there <i>is</i> a difference between day-to-day human suffering and trauma.</p><p>Dr. Gabor Mate told of his experience in medical school that the word trauma as it relates to emotion and psychological trauma wasn’t mentioned once in his 4 years of training. I know in my own training at USCF as a family nurse practitioner, I don’t think we discussed it directly either.</p><p>So what is trauma, and how might it be different from suffering? Some may say trauma is an interference with how we’d normally operate. Or that it’s when we disconnect from the physical body.</p><p>These are <i>elements</i> of it, but trauma isn’t just something terrible happening to us. Sexual assault or abuse is not the trauma. An earthquake or tsunami is not the trauma. The car accident or medical procedure isn’t the trauma. Parents being indifferent, depressed, or abusive is not the trauma.</p><p>The trauma is what happens <i>in</i> us as a result of that external event. And to expand further, like Peter Levine said, it’s what happens inside us in the absence of an empathetic witness.</p><p>Trauma happens inside us on a somatic level in our bodies <i>and</i> in our psyche.</p><p>Gabor Mate talks about 4 aspects of trauma, which I think help further differentiate it as something distinct from human suffering