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Family and stress are often comorbidities when a client seeks therapy – trauma is not far behind. Traditionally when we think of trauma it incorporates “'large T' traumas” seen in natural disasters, mass shootings or war. However, trauma is more of a spectrum than that. On the other end of that scale are the “small t traumas” of interpersonal relationships (including domestic violence), car accidents and discovering you are not the biological child of a parent you were raised to believe, known as non-paternal events.
Non-Paternal Events (NPE) report significant trauma experienced from the scope of changes inherent to this type of discovery: manifesting in grief and family dynamic changes, culminating with identity crises. As many traumas are, it is a psychological burden with no visible scars.
Perhaps the worst component of the trauma wound is the effect this discovery has on the fabric of family dynamics. This trauma is generated by the unraveling of decades worth of secrets, often necessary to mitigate the trauma of those first affected - most often the mothers. The threat of exposing carefully constructed narratives to preserve financial and family stability trigger trauma for the family of the NPE – having to face, yet again, something they believed to be hidden forever.
In addition to the trauma of the discovery itself, an NPE shoulders an unfair burden on family expectations, even coercion, to maintain the status quo that is in opposition to the NPE’s desire to understand who they are in a biological and kinship sense. Known families may even threaten to cut off the NPE rather than honestly work through the discovery. In addition, the discovered biological family may also reject the NPE because of the perceived threat that the NPE is seeking money or material support in some way.
From an evolutionary psychology perspective, the need to belong to our group is rooted in our tribalism as early hominids, seeking safety against predators and the elements. Participation in the group was afforded when members offered value and behaved according to group norms. For instance, if a tribe member did not act according to expectations, and failed to show remorse, that member was excommunicated from the tribe. That exclusion meant certain death to an individual that had far fewer chances of survival alone. In a very basic way, this is the operating psychological principle in place for contemporary NPE when family threatens exclusion to maintain control over the closely guarded secret – something that threatened their acceptance into their own group at the time.
Many factors contribute to a parent’s need to keep parentage a secret; the top two incorporate religious and cultural expectations of gender roles and thereby procreation. For example, the pressure to maintain cultural expectations (tribal expectations) influences a mother’s compliance and thereby identity, making them dependent on their own family system (tribe) for survival. This early trauma for the mother is the precursor influencing their own responses to their children’s discoveries – even if at the time of discovery the children are adults in middle age or beyond!
Thankfully, learning about trauma has lead to one of the most successful trauma interventions yet: EMDR. Often described by clients as a miracle, the efficacy of Eye Movement Desensitization & Reprocessing (EMDR) has become more widely accepted through longitudinal studies. EMDR is essential in the treatment of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and trauma due to the efficiency and effectiveness of the intervention. For large and small traumas alike, EMDR uses a client’s own imagery, memories and feelings to consolidate and reprocess the emotions of traumatic experiences. Memories themselves are not erased or forgotten, but rather diluted of the emotional charge, allowing the return of resiliency.
Trauma changes everything; our reactions to the environment around us, our ability to process information, even our understanding of ourselves and our place within the community – aspects comprising identity. The NPE experience has many opportunities for traumas throughout the process. Because family is the closest to us they have the greatest capacity to harm us as well. So when traumas are wrought from family, they tend to cut the fabric of our identity and threaten our sense of survival.
NPE and their families should not ignore the effects of interpersonal trauma such as a DNA discovery, an adoption revelation, etc., because that ignorance will return in later generations. Traumas are scary and life-changing but can be dealt with in counseling to gain control over those changes.
