The holiday season, particularly Christmas, is often portrayed as a time of joy and celebration. However, for some young people, especially those dealing with mental health issues or past trauma, this period can be challenging. The pressure to feel happy, socialize, and participate in festivities can exacerbate feelings of stress and anxiety. Young people may feel overwhelmed by the expectations associated with gift-giving, family gatherings, and holiday traditions. For those who have experienced loss or are separated from loved ones, the emphasis on togetherness during Christmas can intensify feelings of loneliness or isolation.
Christmas can also serve as a trigger for traumatic memories, particularly if past incidents occurred around this time. The sights, sounds, and smells associated with the holiday season can bring back distressing memories, leading to episodes of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
Trauma, its symptoms, and the effects it leaves on a person’s mindset have been making major news within recent years. Trauma is now highlighted in discussions and situations where there used to be no awareness. Mental health is an open topic, and an important one too, as a person’s mindset can affect their work ethic, their ability to socialise, their confidence and self esteem, and their physical health. This conversation is especially starting to be had in regards to young people as more discussions take place around how trauma and mental health can affect a young person. We tend to view the behaviours of young people as a cause, not a symptom, which can cause us to miss out on the effects that trauma has on the situation. So with that said, this article aims to highlight how trauma can influence a young person’s mental health, and thus affect their external behaviours.
The definition of trauma, according to the MIND website, is a “very stressful, frightening or distressing event.” In regards to psychological or emotional trauma, it may refer to “situations we may find traumatic, and how we are affected by experiences.” Trauma is connected to not only the mindset, but it is expressed in the physical body also. Different kinds of experiences can be classified as traumatic. These range from experiences where you feel frightened, abandoned, rejected, humiliated, unsafe, and powerless, just to name a few. It can also consist of situations where you have been directly harmed, have seen people around you harmed, living in a traumatic environment, or have experienced a traumatic situation as a community. Ongoing events such as bullying, long term illness or living through a pandemic can also be traumatic.
The experiences a child has at a young age have a fundamental effect on their growth and mental state over the course of their life. Particularly in the infant years of a child’s growth, any traumatic experiences they go through will have a lasting effect on their development. The NSPCC, using Shonkoff et al’s studies from 2004-2018 as a reference, refers to the development of a child’s brain like the “foundations of a house,” and therefore each experience a child goes through is like solidifying the foundations of a house. Positive experiences influence the brain towards healthy and stable behaviours and mindsets, and negative experiences such as abuse or neglect can influence the brain towards unhealthy behaviours and lead to a greater chance of being impacted by stress-related disorders such as mental health disorders and drug abuse. However, it is also highlighted that the brain can change and transform the initial way of thinking, again, like a house goes through refurbishment. Through using positive tools, the brain’s structure can improve, even in adulthood.
What are the effects of trauma on an individual’s mental and physical health? A study done by King’s College London in 2019 highlights this issue by looking at young people who have had traumatic experiences, vs those who have not. The study showed that 31% of young people at age 18 had experienced something traumatic within their childhood. 7-8% (160 young people) of this number were clinically diagnosed with PTSD.
The most common type of trauma that was revealed was “network trauma”- a type of trauma where the individual was not directly affected nor did they witness it, but someone within their network or community experienced the trauma, and they learned details of it. This type of trauma was reported by 27.9% of youth who had experienced trauma. The second and third most common types were direct trauma, including direct interpersonal assault or threats, and a direct accident or illness.
Youth who experienced a form of trauma were at higher rates for mental health issues than those who had never had a traumatic experience. Those with PTSD were at even higher rates, with over half of the initial 7-8% with major depressive episodes, half exhibiting symptoms of self harm, a quarter with alcohol dependence and 11% dealing with violent offence. This meant that every 3 in 4 young people who had PTSD also had another mental health condition at age 18. However, out of 160 young people with PTSD, only 33 (20.6%) had received help from a mental health professional.
The percentage of the amount of young people who have had traumatic experiences or PTSD is a large number, considering the young people all over the UK. This means that for every 10 young people aged 18 and under, 3 of them would have had a traumatic experience. Adding in the input of network trauma and ongoing trauma, this leaves a large number of our youth traumatised. These numbers are highly vital to know as for most young people, network trauma and ongoing trauma are the types of traumatic experiences that will be most common so far. With the prevalence of bullying in schools and on social media and the ongoing effects of the pandemic, children can be experiencing long term trauma and staff or guardians may not even realise. The lack of clinical support for young people with trauma is alarming, and this shows how large of a problem this is in our society. We can encounter young people who have had mental health struggles, dealt with youth violence, have shown disruptive behaviour in class, and we can see a “problem child”, a young person who has potential but is not applying themselves, or a young person who has behavioural issues that will hinder their progress. However what we may not see is a child who has witnessed domestic violence, poverty, a pandemic, bullying, the death of a relative or close friend or gang violence and is acting based on their experiences.
As we have been looking at what trauma is, how it develops, and how it affects mental health and behaviour, we cannot address the problem without looking at a solution. With the work we do at The Safety Box, we understand the importance of looking at trauma in relation to young people. We recognise how vital it is to expand our knowledge on it, and to make sure that those around each young person are knowledgeable also. Trauma and mental health is not often discussed when it comes to youth, but it needs to be addressed, as once we have those conversations, it opens up a world of understanding that we need in order to accurately build connections and ultimately support a young person. Our Aspire Higher program discusses trauma in a way that is easy to understand. We work with the teachers and each young person themselves to help understand their triggers, any issues they may have had at home or outside of school, their view of themselves, and their mental state. We exercise trust, empathy and vulnerability in our interactions because we know that these three things are paramount to building a stable and trustworthy relationship. We, however, do not leave it there. We discuss a young person’s purpose, their goals, and affirmations to let a young person know that there is freedom outside of their trauma. We have one-to-one sessions, coaching and also work with psychologists so that each young person has access to professional, clinical help. Most of all, our facilitators share their experiences, which can include some troubling times, so the youth we work with know that others have been where they are, relate to their experiences, and have persevered greatly. All these steps ensure that a young person not only understands that they are not alone, but that they are not their trauma, and they can find freedom, success and peace in the future.
Pre-teen to young adulthood are often some of the most challenging years of life. A plethora of events and changes take place in a young person’s life all at once: a new school, puberty, redefining friendships, developing an identity, school and possible career choices, exams, familial changes. These things are tough to experience for any one person. However, different situations and events can heighten the stress and make life and its events much harder to deal with than anticipated. With the support of clinical mental health professionals, teachers and trusted staff, and parents and guardians, a young person is able to develop the skills they need to cope with and overcome their trauma, and lead a life that they feel proud of.