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I'm Trained In PTSD Counselling. Trump Trauma Is Real [1]

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Date: 2024-05-04  

“At least when I’m dead, I’ll never see Trump’s smirking face again.” Jim, a hospice patient, seems to be having a physical response just talking about Donald Trump. He’s fidgeting, appears agitated, and, though typically soft-spoken, has raised his voice several notches.

“I’m so tired of him and his MAGA chorus. His voice feels like broken glass rubbing inside my ears. For eight years I’ve been scared and on edge. It’s exhausting.”

Sitting at Jim’s bedside as his hospice social worker, I invite him to mentally scan his body and tell me what he notices. What he discovers is revealing – muscles tensing, heart rate elevated, tightness in his chest, nervous energy in his legs as though ready to run. I imagine stress chemicals like cortisol and adrenaline are flooding his circulatory system. Telltale signs of a nervous system in a state people usually call fight-flight-freeze. It’s what happens when, consciously, or unconsciously, we feel in danger. Merely thinking about Trump has generated a visceral response, anxiety, and fear.

For people who have post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) like Jim, the nervous system can get stuck in this fight-flight-freeze state. Beneath his awareness, subcortical parts of Jim’s brain are constantly on high alert, searching for sensations, situations, memories, behaviors, or emotions associated in some way, however miniscule, with the trauma of having survived years of violent abuse at the hands of a father he described as a “mean drunk” quick to fly into rages.

These associations are called trauma reminders or triggers. When the brain discovers a trigger during its ongoing surveillance – Trump’s voice, for example – it’s like hitting a neurological panic button. Off to the races.

One key for diagnosing PTSD is that someone has been exposed “to actual or threatened death, serious injury, or sexual violence.” At its core, PTSD leaves a persistent, pervasive sense of fear, often unconscious, that these threats to one’s safety and survival are not over, they are ever-present. That’s why the brain stays on constant high alert.

Some assume PTSD only impacts combat veterans and cops, but it’s far more common. Estimates suggest that around 6% of people in the general population will have diagnosable PTSD at some point in their lives. And this doesn’t count those who have symptoms but not enough to be formally diagnosed.

Among the challenges resulting from PTSD are intrusive symptoms like nightmares or recurrent distressing memories; avoidance symptoms where people avoid places, people, or situations associated with trauma reminders; hyper-arousal symptoms such as difficulty managing strong emotions; and negative mood and cognition like negative beliefs about oneself or depressed mood.

Because the nervous system is, in a sense, rewired to overreact to trauma reminders, people with PTSD can have strong reactions to seemingly neutral experiences (for example, Jim’s brain likely associates the sound of Trump’s voice with being bullied and attacked). It’s easy to get overwhelmed and have reactions like anger, panic, or social isolation. Some turn to alcohol or drugs trying to numb these reactions or mask underlying anxiety or depression.

It doesn’t take a clinical social worker to see how Trump’s pattern of intimidation, violence peddling and verbal abuse (not to mention the pack-like victim-blaming of many of his followers) has been assailing Jim with trauma reminders, intensifying underlying feelings of vulnerability and distress, even re-traumatizing him.

In the last eight years I’ve worked with many patients and caregivers with PTSD and one thing is apparent. Trump’s inescapable presence, and the constant shouting of his anger-addicted allies, has intensified fear and stress for many who’ve survived psychological trauma at the hands of perpetrators that look and sound an awful lot like him.

Imagine having survived chronic verbal abuse, sexual or racial violence, and having to see Trump’s mug, hear his belittling rants, every day. Imagine what it would be like as he repeatedly gaslights those who are targets of his aggression, then galvanizes followers to vilify and pile on anyone who tries to defend themselves.

Survivors of sexual violence and/or domestic abuse with whom I’ve worked have reported anxiety, even panic, when they see Trump’s face or hear his voice. Some have had increased difficulty sleeping, concentrating, and/or regulating emotions. Others avoid the news at all costs or shut down emotionally, dissociating, when he appears on television, often demeaning and insulting women (And let’s remember that men are also victims of sexual violence).

I’ve worked with Black patients traumatized by race-based violence or abuse who report nightmares, generalized distrust, and cynicism about the future related to years of Trump’s race baiting and threats. Not to mention increased anxiety and dread about the menace of those worked into frenzies at his rallies, or “lone actors” or “fringe groups” energized by his racist speech.

It makes sense, right? Not hard to understand. For eight long years, Trump’s behavior has been triggering acute stress for many struggling in the shadows of psychological trauma.

Here’s where it gets tricky. I’ve also worked with traumatized patients and caregivers who were among Trump’s vociferous supporters. Like Jim, these patients lived with hair triggered nervous systems dysregulated by fears about safety and survival.

Chronic fear can impair one’s ability to regulate emotions and critically assess information. It can reinforce negative, black-and-white thinking, and hinder someone from taking in information that clashes with existing beliefs.

Some people respond to fear by hiding behind bluster or rage. Some overidentify with a person or group that makes them feel powerful or protected, even going so far as to adopt ingroup uniforms, rituals…or hats…which signify one’s sense of belonging. Some get sucked in by an orange-tinted grifter running a strongman hustle, claiming “Only I can protect you.”

Fear can hook people into irrational beliefs – “illegals” sneaking across our borders to rape and murder, fantasies that Trump won the 2020 election and is secretly still pulling the strings.

I’ve made the case elsewhere that PTSD is an often overlooked and unappreciated factor increasing one’s susceptibility to the kind of conspiracy thinking that runs throughout Trump’s rhetoric and dystopian storytelling.

In patients who have PTSD and support Trump, and this is simply my clinical observation, he appears to validate, rather than trigger underlying fears and anxieties. Then he channels these fears, enflames them, and presents himself as the protector who will keep his followers safe.

Few people would knowingly support a vicious sociopath like Trump if they felt good about themselves and safe in the world. Viewed through the lens of trauma, if we were to read the secret histories of Maga boosters, beneath the xenophobia and willingness to idealize a bloviating liar, I suspect we would find that many are struggling with anxiety and unhealed psychological trauma. And I think we might feel compassion (which does not mean capitulation or making excuses for their behavior).

Take Burt. He was five years old when his father was killed on the job. His mother, in her grief and disorientation, went into a free fall and Burt was shuffled around for years as she went in and out of psychiatric care and received (or avoided) treatment for drug addiction.

According to Burt, these years were lonely, chaotic, and terrifying. “I never had a friend for long. I had relatives, but no one wanted me, and some weren’t, well, let me put it like this, some weren’t all that nice.” When he reached seventeen, he joined the military and became an Army mechanic.

Wracked by anxiety, poor self-esteem, and distrust, he’d been reassured by the structure and predictability of Army life, its chain of command, and respect for authority. After feeling abandoned and unwanted, he felt needed, part of a team. He felt secure behind the clear lines by which the military delineated good guys from bad. “I had people I thought were friends stab me in the back when I was a kid,” he said. “In the service, I knew where the enemies were, and I finally had buddies who wouldn’t throw me to the wolves.”

Burt wasn’t put off by Trump’s authoritarianism or grandiose assertions of power. He was impressed that, from his perspective, the guy in command was aware of life’s many dangers and focused on protecting him.

When Trump banned Muslims and blustered about building a wall, when he spewed invective against people of color, Burt didn’t see the racism of a neo-fascist intent on exploiting people’s bigotry. He saw a guy who was “tightening the wire around the basecamp perimeter” to keep him safe.

Though Burt claimed to have no animus toward any of these targeted groups (‘claimed’ in an operative word, of course), egged on by Trump and others, these groups came to represent a kind of generalized other. Inscrutable strangers, threats lurking in the dark forests of life, suspicious, dangerous.

When Burt saw MAGA red and heard chants of “stop the steal” he didn’t see an anti-democratic, White supremacist cult idealizing a delusional narcissist. He saw a community where he was safe, where there was a sense of shared mission to make – and he took this slogan seriously – America great again. He felt seen. He felt like he mattered.

Isn’t this also easy to understand? It’s easy to see Jim as a victim of the anger and division Trump and his allies have ginned up these last years. But what about Burt? Where do we plot him on the mental and moral maps which help us live as decent human beings during troubled times? Really, where do we plot him? And once we plot him, where do we then plot ourselves?

Here’s where it gets trickier. Something strange has been going on. Something about which I’ve been increasingly aware, but rarely spoken.

In the last months, I’m no longer feeling like a clinical social worker neutrally observing the dynamics of post-traumatic stress within our current cultural and political moment. I’m showing small but noticeable signs of post-traumatic stress myself.

My nervous system seems to have been rewired during these last eight years. The rise of MAGA politics and the noisemaking of Trump’s allies have combined with surviving a lethal pandemic and exacted a toll on me.

What about you?

Here’s what I’m noticing. My nervous system revs up more quickly and has a harder time returning to a state of relaxation. I startle more easily. I’ve got more generalized muscle tension. I often feel restless for no reason I can identify. I don’t sleep as well.

If I watch the news or start clicking on headlines, I often have spikes of rage and/or grief. There are times when, like Jim, I see that orange SOB’s face or hear his voice and I feel like I’m going to explode.

I’m more anxious about the future, about the safety of family and friends, about what the news of the day will bring. I sometimes have disproportionate behavioral and emotional responses to little frustrations that years ago I’d have navigated without the slightest effort. I’m angry more than I’d like. I distrust and frequently jump to uncharitable conclusions about people with red hats. I’ve begun to lose, and am struggling to regain, my faith that when you go underneath the surface most people are basically good.

Before going further, let me clarify that I’m not laying all this on the MAGA doorstep. I was one of those frontline healthcare workers throughout the worst days of the pandemic. I had coworkers and knew staff at nursing homes who died from it as they served others. More than once, I was put in the morally distressing position of telling family members they could not enter a hospice facility where a loved one was dying because of visitor restrictions.

Like many, I’ve been affected witnessing the endless bloodshed of gun violence, wars around the world, and a pandering media ecosystem addicted to lies, carnage, and cruelty. And let’s not forget those algorithms intentionally designed to addict us to our smart phones, constantly spiking our nervous systems as we reflexively click on stories that affirm existing beliefs or worst suspicions. Or our abuse of the natural world and questions about whether the human species will survive.

It's a big list. If my nervous system has been dysregulated, and I believe it has, I’m not blaming it all on Trump and his supporters. I’m also not claiming to have PTSD, not even close. Just some of its signs and symptoms.

I doubt I’m the only one. I suspect this is widespread. In a 2023 article for the New Republic entitled, We Are Not Just Polarized. We Are Traumatized, Ana Cox asks the question:

What if the horrors of the last seven years do translate into a nation that is suffering more than mere political dysfunction? What if the polarization, paranoia, conspiracism, and hopelessness that bogs us down have a more holistic origin than structural malfunctions or individual malfeasance? What if our entire national character is a trauma response? Before you say “bullshit”, remember: Cynicism is a trauma response.

The concept of collective trauma is hotly debated. But, between the vindictiveness of a republican party hijacked by Maga extremism, a killing pandemic and more, we have all been repeatedly exposed to things apt to turn up the volume on our fear and cause concerns for our safety and that of loved ones. Over time, this can dysregulate our nervous systems and make us more fearful, reactive, distrusting, and/or prone to catastrophic thinking…I could go on.

On a deep level, PTSD can shatter what trauma counselors (and those working with bereaved or morally injured clients) call, one’s assumptive world – the assumptions, beliefs, and expectations that “ground, stabilize, and orient people.”

The assumptive world is the interior mental, ethical, and spiritual framework within which we construct meaning, build relationships, and develop a sense of identity. It undergirds the ways we see ourselves, others, the world, the core beliefs and values that make us, well, us. It helps us interpret the past and anticipate the future. We may face change, loss, and adversity, but the assumptive world contains what we think of as unchanging reference points, enduring rules of the road, that will help us navigate any challenges.

Trauma often rocks this framework off its hinges.

Suddenly, the future one expected is jarred or appears to vanish. The world feels unfamiliar. The systems, norms, and/or institutions we assumed would support and protect us, may falter or come under threat. People we trusted to lead us through troubled times may appear unworthy of, or betray, that trust. Assumptions about values and priorities we thought we shared with others may rupture, exposing deep, unexpected conflicts.

This sense that something fundamental has been lost can combine with the intense reactions of a body, mind and heart that have been traumatized to create what Peter Levine, who developed an approach to PTSD therapy called Somatic Experiencing, calls a “trauma vortex”. Once the vortex starts spinning, it can become self-sustaining, ever ready to pull us into reactivity, fear, or worry, especially in the presence of trauma reminders.

Think about the last eight years. Could it be that this has created a kind of collective trauma vortex?

The key to escaping a trauma vortex is to create a counter- or “healing” vortex that opens our hearts, gives meaning, and counters fear and expectations of inescapable conflict or catastrophe. A counter-vortex helps us pause and refocus before the trauma vortex sucks us in. Helps us pause “between stimulus and response,” as Victor Frankl once put it. And to discover that in that pause “is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.”

When working with clients to build a healing vortex, trauma counselors usually start slow. Maybe teaching skills for settling one’s nervous system or identifying existing strengths and positive coping strategies. Or helping a client practice self-compassion or anchor into things that give meaning, connection, and joy.

But what about when the trauma vortex encompasses all of us? How do we build a collective counter-vortex?

If you’re a person struggling with PTSD, or love someone who is, it may help to know the last eight years have been a perfect storm. If you’ve wondered if you’re going nuts or if you’ll ever get out of the trauma vortex, be gentle with yourself. You are not going nuts. These last years have been tough. It has taken guts and courage. You can still heal.

If a loved one with PTSD has fallen under Trump’s spell, he or she may have a hard time taking in contradictory information or become triggered by attempts to influence his or her beliefs using what you see as reason or facts. Don’t pressure yourself to change their minds, try to see beneath the surface. What do you love about this person? Can you find safe ways to express this love?

If you’re recognizing the possibility that your nervous system may have been rewired like mine. If you are more reactive, losing hope, or feeling overwhelmed, here are a few thoughts – mindfulness, connection, ripple effects, and better storytelling.

Mindfulness means cultivating a state of awareness in which we pay attention to the present moment without getting lost in worries about the past, or fears about the future. Developing a subtle, sensitive awareness of our inner world – thoughts, feelings, bodily sensations – and outer environment, without judging anything as good or bad. Just noticing and accepting.

It’s a way of stepping back, creating that pause between stimulus and response. It allows us to respond more consciously, less reactively, in stressful situations.

When we learn to tune into information coming from our body, and nervous system, we begin to recognize signs of fight-flight-freeze before we get hijacked. This allows us to settle our systems rather than being enslaved to automatic responses.

Here’s an example. Purely hypothetical, of course. Never happens to me, well...almost never.

Maybe you’re driving down the road and you see a MAGA bumper sticker. Here’s what my, I mean, a hypothetical, inner narrator might record. Hum, eyes tightening into a scowl, jaw clenching. Oh, there’s a thought, “What a dumbass that guy is.” And sarcasm, “Thanks for helping destroy democracy, you braindead moron.” Oh, and there’s a feeling, anger mixed with, what is that, hopelessness? Sadness? Oh, and now, stepping back, laughing at himself for going into attack mode. Sending a blessing of peace and friendship to the MAGA driver. Now, pissed off again. Engaging self-talk, “Oh, my, there I go again.”

The inner narrator is just noticing, responding with curiosity and kindness, even humor, knowing this is what we humans often do when on automatic pilot or being triggered. Over time, we notice patterns. We see that a stimulus (MAGA bumper sticker) leads to an instantaneous response (thoughts, beliefs, feelings, or a heightened physiological state).

Whether or not we have PTSD, that’s how trauma triggers work. Once we are aware of patterns, we can learn to pause and, in Levine’s words, “uncouple” the trigger from the heightened state that follows. We can choose peace.

The more we practice mindfulness – and practice is key, no one does it perfectly, no one does it all the time – the less susceptible we become to the pull of the trauma vortex. Ideally, as we observe thoughts and feelings without resisting or judging, we develop kindness, empathy, and compassion for ourselves and others.

Compassion and empathy help us connect across the divisions and finger pointing that characterizes much of our popular culture these days. It helps us see beneath the surface. It’s easy to feel compassion for Jim. Imagine if we had compassion for Burt, sensing his secret history of psychological pain and how it makes him vulnerable to MAGA fear mongering. Yes, he’s responsible for his behavior and needs to be held to account. But this doesn’t preclude understanding and compassion.

In a recent Daily Kos post, I wrote about the challenge of this kind of seeing beneath the surface when it comes to those who arouse our anger, fear, or contempt. Creating connections, recognizing our shared humanity, finding common ground.

I reflected on what we could learn from the work of psychologist, Gordon Allport, on human-to-human contact between polarized groups. Contact as a way of lowering barriers, resisting dehumanization, and making us less susceptible to reactivity, and the manipulation of media desperate to hype and sensationalize, eager to keep us divided.

A trauma vortex reinforces impulses to dehumanize others and paint them as threats; justifies lashing out. Connection, especially with those who see the world differently, can enhance a sense of trust and safety. A trauma vortex constricts our world, and hearts, a healing vortex allows them to expand.

Mindfulness and connection can be transformative when it comes to creating a healing vortex. Our thoughts, feelings, words, and actions have a powerful, often unknowable, ripple effect. When we treat others with kindness and respect, resisting fear-based judgments, hostility, or reactiveness, we create a positive ripple that flows across the lives of those with whom we interact. Even into the lives of people we never meet on all sides of the political map. The more ripples go out, the stronger the collective healing vortex becomes.

This is even true for our nervous systems which have the power to synchronize, or entrain, with those around us (there are fancy names for this like interpersonal neural synchronization or interpersonal neurobiology). Some trauma practitioners I know believe we are part of a collective nervous system that connects us across space. I agree with them. When we learn to settle our nervous systems and stay grounded, this ripples out as well.

Mindful attention, connection, and being aware of our interconnectedness, are ways of building a collective healing vortex. They also allow us to consciously use what historian Yuval Noah Harari calls “our superpower” as humans. Our ability “not just to describe things we can see, taste, and touch, but also to invent stories about things that don’t exist.”

Do you believe democracy is an objectively real thing? Capitalism? The value of a dollar? According to Harari, in his book Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind, these and just about everything else we believe are composed of stories. When enough people believe the same story and act as though it’s true, they bring that story to life as if by an act of collective imaginal will. Over time, the stories we give the most energy are the ones we start to believe are incontrovertible, objective truth. We forget that we created them, and we can change them.

Don’t be fooled by the word story. These are not simple tales told at a child’s bedside for distraction or entertainment. These stories are serious business. These are stories we live by, and by which we sail our vessels against life’s night sky. Remember the assumptive world? It’s a story. Your sense of identity; another story.

Here’s an example of a collective story I’ve been hearing a lot lately:

America is a nation that is – take your pick, it’s basically the same story – on the brink/hopelessly divided/at war with itself/verging on civil war. Reinforced daily by impressive sounding storytellers on television, or at the dinner table, we begin to believe it.

And it’s all made up. But when we act as though it’s true, we fall under its spell. It becomes our “reality” and we come to see it as an established, inescapable, fact. What does a story about intractable division do to our vision of who we are, where we are going? How does it affect our motivation to reach out to others who are different? What exactly do we create, where will we wind up, using this story?

Oh, come on, some will say. We are a nation divided. And they will cite evidence, rattle off stories supporting this larger narrative.

Yeah, I know. We need not blind ourselves to the challenges of our current conflicts. But why entrance ourselves with a story of conflict as though it is definitional of who we are? Why tell a story that discounts the many examples of shared vision and cooperation, or which posits these examples as mere exceptions (the way the nightly news bombards us with skewed and selective storytelling about our disasters, then, manipulatively, in the last minute or two, tacks on a feel-good story about how there are still a few good people out there)?

In the age of Fox so-called “news” with its lies and insidiously destructive storytelling, it may seem futile to tell stories at odds with those shouted from the highest broadcast towers. Futility is what they want. But we can create, and are free to choose, which story we tell about ourselves. If we passively allow politicians and media to create our story and regurgitate it to us as though we are hatchlings – we are toast!

It may seem hard to tell stories over the cacophony of media and politicians who equate shouting with being right. Remember, though, for centuries our ancestors have shared stories in small groups around campfires. It’s in our collective spirit; broadcast satellites are not. Around the campfire there is connection, kindness. That’s where the leverage points are.

When we connect, we tell a story. When we tell a story, we connect. Why not tell one like this:

America’s current divisions and conflict reflect a painful process of moral/spiritual/ethical growth, and evolution in our consciousness, in which we are discovering things about ourselves the hard way. Things long hidden behind lofty rhetoric about freedom, inclusivity, equality, and being a force for peace. Discovering things, however painful, that will ultimately allow us to come together and better align with the values we have long professed.

Some will think this sounds idealized or naive. But it’s a better story. If you don’t like this one, create another better story. Besides, it’s naive and dangerous to blindly let others decide the stories we live by – individually and collectively – especially when they do not serve our higher good.

If the stories we are being told, and which we are telling ourselves, are not working, if they suck us into the trauma vortex, we need better ones. These can be no bullshit stories, infused with backbone that uphold our core values. But they must also be flexible, compassionate, and inclusive not just of our friends, but of our “enemies.”

Stories laced with positive vision and hope. Stories that feed a healing vortex for all of us.

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