Thanksgiving is upon us and with it comes people sharing a meal and discussing how grateful they are for their lives and their loved ones. However, it is vital to understand that not everyone is grateful, but they feel pain in its place.
This article will explore a different approach to gratitude that is trauma-sensitive.
Thanksgiving Rubbish
Too often survivors of complex trauma are bombarded during the Thanksgiving season with advertisements and other media about how they should be grateful.
Survivors are told to write the things they are grateful for, beginning with their family of origin.
But what if the survivor isn’t grateful for their family of origin? What if they are alone and lonely this Thanksgiving? Does that make them a freak?
When amid healing from complex trauma brought on by parents and family who abused and neglected them, survivors find it exceedingly difficult to be grateful for anything.
The treatment these survivors received when kids have left open wounds and scars that no amount of thanksgiving rubbish can heal.
What Gratitude Is and Is Not
The word gratitude means thanks, appreciation, and pleasing. When one feels gratitude they are expressing that they are pleased with someone or with the results of an action. Genuine gratitude is given freely, and not coerced, and involves no anxiety about having to pay someone else back.
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