Minimization: Families ignore the impact of the traumatic event(s).Denial: Families refuse to acknowledge that the traumatic event(s) happened.Two common unhealthy coping mechanisms that many families use to cope with intergenerational trauma is: The next generation then learns those coping mechanisms from their parents and so on and so forth. For example, what they may learn is how to cope in face of hardships. How children navigate the world is, in part, a reflection from what they learned from their parents. Parents who have survived trauma may have difficulty bonding and creating healthy emotional attachments with their children. They were more likely to die early after age 45 than those whose fathers had not been prisoners of war.Īdditionally, trauma survivors may externalize their post-traumatic symptoms in various ways. For example, a study was found that male offspring of Civil War soldiers who spent time in prison affected their longevity at older ages. Trauma changes how our genes function in reaction to our environment. Parents who are trauma survivors may transmit genetic vulnerabilities. The mechanisms of transmission of intergenerational trauma are unclear, but it is theorized to be passed down through a multitude of factors including epigenetics, parenting, and repeated patterns of harmful and unhealthy behavior patterns and attitudes. Research has been then expanded on descendants of Japanese American internment camps Native American tribes Vietnam War veterans United States enslavement refugees and other trauma survivors of famine, war, and genocide. Studies have found a number of reported behavioral and cognitive difficulties and disturbances including worries of parental trauma being repeated, low self-esteem from minimization and invalidation of own life experiences compared to parents, over-identification with parents, tendency towards catastrophizing, traumatic nightmares, hypervigilance, shame, guilt, anxiety, and dysphoria. Intergenerational trauma was first identified and studied in descendants of Holocaust survivors. Although individuals may not have experienced the trauma directly, the psychological effects of trauma have been transmitted from generations past. Intergenerational trauma is trauma that was directly experienced by an individual or groups of people (multiple family members community specific cultural, racial, or ethnic group), that gets passed down from one generation to another. Our mind and body react in numerous ways to cope. We may feel disconnected or confused, experience anxiety or depression, have trouble sleeping, or suffer from headaches and/or other types of body aches. Experiencing any kind of trauma leaves us with lasting adverse effects on our day-to-day functioning and mental health and well-being. Some of these experiences can be the loss of a loved one, severe or life-threatening illness, a natural disaster, childhood neglect, living with a loved one who misuses substances, racism, discrimination, or witnessing an act(s) of violence. Trauma is a response to an incident or a series of traumatic experiences that causes serious emotional, mental, or physical harm. You may have heard what trauma is, but what exactly is intergenerational trauma (sometimes referred to as historical trauma, multigenerational trauma, or secondary traumatization)?įirst, let’s begin with trauma. ![]() What Came Before You: Intergenerational Trauma by Lea Nguyen
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