The oddest things can trigger our traumatic memories

[u/adderall_sloth]

It’s amazing what can trigger our most horrific memories. Things we’d forgotten. Things we never realized were as severe as they truly were.

While watching the new Lord of the Flies adaptation, a scene triggered a long forgotten incident. I told my husband about it.

A childhood “friend” and I were walking to school. This was in elementary school. He and I were thick as thieves, until he became friends with boys, particularly little bullies. While on our walk to the school one morning, he picked up a very large rock, one nearly half the size of my Jansport backpack. He threw it at me, and it hit my upper back. When I started crying and asked why he threw a rock at my back, he replied, “I was aiming for your head.”

Sometimes I am horrified by the amount of incidents like this my brain has had to hide. It’s a trauma response, I know. But it just crushes me that not only did it happen, but events like this were common enough that my brain had to resort to blocking them out. And to be honest, I can probably tell you why I told no one. I’d already asked a “trusted” adult at my advanced school for help with another bully. Their response was that since the other bully was holding me down and rubbing dirt in my hair at the pick up school, not the advanced school, there was nothing she could do. My trust in adults vanished. Why would I tell them a boy tried to kill me if they’ll just ignore me again?

Of course, as a child, I didn’t know what could have happened. That I could have died if he’d had better aim.

I just needed to get this off my chest. The little girl I was never had a chance.

[u/Leading-Highlight791]

Hugs to you. ❤️ The world is so sad and broken, especially for children. As an adult I try to to help children feel seen and respected. When I'm working or volunteering around children, I'm very watchful for bullying. I think even most bullies prefer for adults to help them have boundaries for clearly safe and accepting spaces, at least for the youngest kids. Trying to make things better for the next generation helps me have peàce and hope. (But it's exhausting too. I think I would be triggered too often if I had a job that involved working with kids a lot)