Dear Laura:
What a wonderful question. I'm always thinking about trauma-informed parenting, from the perspective of the parent with trauma but also, what about the spouse or the extended family?
This is from a friend perspective.
http://psychcentral.com/blog/a...r-non-professionals/
On a more personal note, I can say that as someone with ACEs, I get frustrated with my own self, my own reactions, my own defenses. It's helpful to think of the trauma as the cause of the conflict rather than the trauma survivor. What I mean, is if someone is injured in the Boston Marathon, and requires crutches or assistance, that can get be hard and frustrating, for all. But the cause of the hard is known and clear.
I think, when traumas are more invisible or shameful or not talked about, that can be missed and instead we focus a lot on how the person could, should or might be doing better.
I do not mean that if I am in crisis I am not responsible for myself, my choices and understanding how to manage my diagnosis, issues and relationships. However, I also know that is tricky and complicated.
I think of myself sometimes as speaking another language as someone. I'm focused on speaking survival, safety and pain relief and so what is important and gets priorities for me might look a lot different than someone who is not focused on those things and/or who doesn't have years to decades of ways of surviving that are scary to consider letting go while also learning new ways and trying to do that with people who may or may not relate or get it.
I think it's helpful to think, "What do we have to learn from each other?" Like what can they teach me about living to survive and what can I teach them about living while feeling safe and how can we translate and share. That connecting, caring, sharing and learning from one another is the healing. And that can be done doing very fun or light or joyful things not only by "processing" or a loved one having to be "trauma informed." It's EVERYONE being more trauma informed and just acknowledging what traumatic stress does to people but also to relationships.
And it's so hard and it's SO IMPORTANT and I LOVE this question. That's my two cents. Cissy