I'm wondering if people could tell me of their experiences, when "running" services for ACEs (or if you're up to it, your own experience of difficulty), in getting people to disclose / describe / describe fully their experiences of experiencing ACEs.
New Zealand / New Zealanders seem to have great difficulty acknowledging such experiences -- in whatever area of abuse, trauma etc. This country has the highest, or one of the highest, rates of intimate partner violence in the world, and many people would still like to keep that "under wraps". This could be one of the ongoing reasons for this country being so desperately far behind some other countries.
I'm sure people are "well acquainted" with the literature of prevalence of stigma / shame associated with these experiences, and the need to address it early on in "therapy". People might also be familiar with things like the statistics on self-referral in those seeking assistance from organisations like the former (it's been renamed) Australia's Adult Survivors of Child Abuse organisation -- that those seeking such assistance are, on average, over 50 years of age, indicating that many need some development and consolidation of personal resources before starting to work on these issues. (ASCA, now renamed the Blue Knot Foundation, has published these statistics online if people wish to check them).
From my own experience, I can say that I disclosed "bits of it" to trusted colleagues at work in my early 20s, but that most of it I also haven't disclosed until after turning 50, especially my history of sexual abuse -- never disclosed in my relationships with women (I'm hetero) -- that was always too "shameful" and confusing. However, I always felt different from others, and in my earliest school years was "ashamed" of the separation of my parents -- could never talk about what my parents did for work, despite that being a "normal" part of what children of that age talk about. So, it's been a very slow, roundabout journey, but finally, now in my 60s, can "almost" talk about most of it without too much difficulty.