40 Big Ideas

Summary

Trauma-informed care helps people with disabilities to heal. Many people who left institutions dealt with a lot of trauma from that experience. Later, others had negative experiences that came from being isolated or abused. Remember that trauma is what we go through, not who we are.

Trauma-informed care changed the disability experience by acknowledging the high prevalence of trauma and its effects on people with intellectual and other developmental disabilities (IDD). Through staff training, trauma-specific treatments, behavior support, and policy changes, trauma-informed care establishes a supportive environment around the person and builds their sense of control and agency in the healing process.

I (Rasheeda) believe that trauma comes and trauma goes, but only you know how it affects you. No one can tell you how you feel, no one can tell you whether or not your trauma is real. No one can tell you how to heal, but it’s up to you to keep living through the pain, the disappointment, the upsets, the highs, the lows. Don’t let those around you see you fold. Just know that you can and will be healed.

When I (Karen) first met Rasheeda, she had been through foster care experiences in which she experienced abuse. This followed rejection from her family, and she was engaging in self-harming behavior. The staff and a supervisor reported that “she just wanted attention.”

Attention was not the issue. Trauma and the resultant pain were. A behavior plan was designed to keep Rasheeda safe, but she was in greater need of therapy. Therapy helped, and, eventually, a job helped even more. Rasheeda began working with children. She found the courage to move past the paralyzing pain. She made changes to her services. She found a church where she felt she belonged and gained support from that spiritual community.

People with IDD are frequently stigmatized and even shamed for their post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms. Other times, trauma and signs of PTSD are missed completely. Many people who left institutions years ago appeared shell-shocked from spending childhoods in isolation and, at times, abuse. Later, people with IDD who hadn’t lived in institutions displayed trauma symptoms and signs of PTSD after experiencing restraints, seclusion, bullying, and humiliation in the course of growing up, not to mention the high incidence of sexual abuse. Trauma was everywhere, and not everyone has the courage or resources to heal and find a way forward.

I (Rasheeda) was able to rise from trauma’s many shapes, forms, and sizes by realizing that trauma is what we go through, but not who we are. Don’t be discouraged or let humiliation get to you. Don’t let shame change who you are or what you can become. In the end, you are the one who can make yourself feel happy and feel loved. Trauma is what a lot of us go through in life, but it is what we do with the trauma that defines us, not the words, not the pain, not the stress, and not even those who claim to love us.