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Unpopular opinion…. wanting and needing ample alone time IS a trauma response.
I’ve been wanting to say this for a while now. I know, I know, so not like me to hold back. Yet here we are. Maybe I needed some alone time to figure it all out first.
Let’s unpack some of this before you come for me.
What is a trauma response and why are we seeing every millennial talk about trauma all over Tik Tok? (My #fyp is better than yours). Let’s break some expensive dishes first and define what trauma is and isn’t.
Trauma isn’t what happened to you. Trauma is the way your body and mind try to reconcile and respond to what has happened to you. I would bet 10,000 rupees that right now you are thinking “Well, what happened to me wasn’t that bad. Other people have had it much worse.” And to that I always respond with…
A person drowning in 2” of water is still just as much dead as a person who drowned in 6’ of water.
Comparing traumas is like comparing your life to some influencer’s highlight reel on the gram. You don’t know the half of it and it just makes you feel insignificant. It also isn’t real.
A trauma response is how you have learned to well… respond to the trauma (not as complicated as we may think). The way we respond varies and is highly dependent on how we learned to deal with our emotions in childhood. Think, fight, flight, and collapse. But with those popular responses also come the not-so-well-known ones as well.
Here is a brief and basic list:
- Confusion
- Sleepiness
- Depression
- Anxiety
- Anger
- Spinning stories in your mind
- Irrational thoughts
- Self doubt/self deprecation/self sabotage
And the list goes on and on like a Kardashian baby shower.
Now that we have that laid out we can talk about needing alone time. Alone time is crucial for recharging our batteries, thinking, processing, releasing others’ energies, self development work, sleeping, and masturbating. I guess the latter you could do with friends. But I don’t want to…
