Some people have a vacantness in their eyes that shows they’re on autopilot. Their self is somewhere secure, deep inside them. Even as we talk, there’s no reaching them.
Other people simmer with resentment. There is a boiling moat of emotion I’d have to navigate across to reach them.
I thought of these moments while reading an essay by Kate Manne:
“the symptoms of PTSD—anger, withdrawal, numbing—may lead to an erosion of social support, which in turn worsens the symptoms.”
People who are most in need of their friends are often difficult to be around. Of course, I’m not saying people with PTSD are not responsible for pushing people away. The relationship is not so simple. Manne points out:
“the inverse association between symptoms of PTSD and social support “is one of the most consistent relationships observed in trauma research,” according to the researchers Joshua Clapp and Gayle Beck. In other words, the less social support you have during and after a traumatic event, the more likely it is that you will develop PTSD symptoms, plausibly due to feelings of abandonment, betrayal, loneliness, alienation, and isolation.”
People who navigate life’s challenges without a community who’s there for them are more likely to develop PTSD symptoms. Then, people with PTSD symptoms may go on to push people away. Given their past experiences, being wary seems wise.
Certain kinds of people are generally less likely to get societal support. Rhaina Cohen points out how a surprisingly wide range of people assume that people with low socioeconomic status (SES) are less bothered by hardships. Because people with low SES face hardships regularly, we assume they can navigate them just fine. They’ve done it before, so they can do it again. In reality, navigating more challenges with fewer supports is not easier than navigating fewer challenges with more supports. As valuable as experience is, it only gets you so far.
Even within groups of the same SES, some people are tasked with giving a majority of community support. Think of how the busier you are, the more likely you are to be asked to help. The person who is already providing caregiving support to one person is more likely to be asked to support a second than someone else who has never been a caregiver. Busy caregivers are seen as people who are capable of supporting an entire community, rather than as people who could use support themselves.
Caregivers are left feeling alone as they navigate layers of grief, medical trauma, and loss. They’re alone as they navigate an endless series of impossible challenges. They are told there’s help out there, if only they asked for it, even as help is impossible to get.
Manne acknowledges, “often, women are all too painfully aware that not only is nobody coming to save us, but the sympathy is running in the opposite direction.”
It’s easy to see how people boil with resentment and then shrink into themselves. It’s no mystery why so many caregivers are incredibly isolated. When their community is demanding support rather than giving it, it’s safer to go it alone.
How do we roll back this dynamic? How do we create a home that will welcome their reality? How do we make it safe for them to return to a world of connections and community?
Manne calls on us to be outraged. To reach the unreachable by being angry with them. As much as I recoil from the way the news seems determined to get us to rage-click, Manne’s suggestion resonates with me. As much as I don’t want to be angry all the time, I don’t want to pretend what’s happening is okay. We can drop the “everything happens for a reason” cliches, make space for anger, and demand change.
We can keep pointing out the injustices. We can keep speaking up. We can keep listening to each other. We can keep reminding people that things could be different.
