Just over a year ago, my twin sister moved to Texas, which, for all intents and purposes has been THE WORST! The one exception to my plight is her proximity to NASA. While planning some activities for my first visit, we were delighted to learn that NASA was hosting an Apollo 13 exhibit!
Of course, two young birds like my sister and I have no recollection of the actual events of Apollo 13. But we've seen the movie no less than 100 times. In fact, sometimes we forgo the beginning entirely, fast forward to the ending when-*spoiler alert*-the ill-fated spacecraft triumphantly re-enters Earth's atmosphere. The music swells, the parachutes open, the static crackles, and an agonizing 4-minutes of silence is disrupted by Jim Lovell’s proclamation, “Hello, Houston. This is Odyssey. It’s good to see you again.”
My heart skips a beat just thinking about it! Tears fill my eyes and chills run up and down my spine- They made it! Against all odds, they made it back!
The closing scene reveals that the Apollo 13 mission came to be known as the “successful-failure,” in that the astronauts returned to Earth but failed to reach their goal of landing on the moon. Of course, anyone who is familiar with the events of Apollo 13 would probably not consider the word failure appropriate at all. A shift in plans? Absolutely. But a failure? No. I mean, they quite literally made a square peg fit into a round hole in order to maintain safe oxygen levels. C’mon, guys. That is no failure.
Often in my practice, I see the misappropriation of the word failure, particularly in regards to traumatic experiences. Those who have experienced trauma often agonize over their reaction to trauma- sometimes fantasizing about what they could have done differently. Or, conversely, we sometimes project our own judgments onto others. This looks like, “If I was in that situation, I would have [fill in the blank].” The problem in this line of thinking is the assumption that your executive functioning, or decision-making ability, is “online” in moments of trauma. In fact, it is most decidedly switched to off.
In our normal activities of daily life, we’re able to function with mental clarity, evaluating possible options and actively choosing the one that best fits our circumstance. In trauma, the choice no longer belongs to the thinking part of our brain- it becomes hijacked by the survival brain. The minute our brain perceives a threat, the alarm bells ring throughout our body.
Houston, we have a problem.
In that very instant, our ability to choose goes out the window. Our body evaluates its options: to fawn, fit-in, fight, flee or freeze (a conveniently alliterative reaction, might I add). It’s an animalistic response primed solely to ensure our survival to the neglect of anything else. Surviving becomes priority number one. Our bodies quickly select the best choice- sometimes even trying on one mechanism and then another- to give ourselves the best chance of survival. In other words, our priorities shift from, say, landing on the moon, to just getting home alive.
Understanding this about our bodies allows us to make sense of why we- or someone else- didn’t do what we thought one should do during a traumatic situation.
Why didn’t I fight?
Why didn’t she just leave?
Why didn’t he speak up?
When we understand the survival mechanisms of our nervous system, we can begin to give ourselves grace and understanding for situations where our responses don’t seem to line up with what we would have expected from ourselves.
We typically think of trauma in terms of shock trauma- perhaps a one-time situation or incident that involved a physical risk. But, if we expand our understanding of trauma to include attachment wounds, constant systemic oppression, relational trauma, or poverty, the odds are that you have likely found yourself in a traumatic situation. Learning to view our reactions to this trauma differently can be a game-changer for our mental health. We learn to view ourselves, not as failures, but as survivors- finding our way back home, even when every odd was stacked against us.
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