When we experience a traumatic event, shame and guilt are common survival skills we rely on. Like the flight, fight, freeze and appease response, these coping skills that are often meant for our survival, can leave us paralyzed.
Experiencing a traumatic event can awaken a wide variety of distressing emotions. One of the most challenging emotions that may arise is shame, which many people struggle with as an after-effect of trauma.
Shame has various root causes. Sometimes shame is instilled in early childhood by the harsh words or actions of parents or other authority figures, or from bullying by peers. Shame can stem from a person's own poor choices or harmful behavior.
One such theory was carried out by Nathanson (1992) where he presented a shame management model. According to his model, individuals engage in four maladaptive strategies—i.e., avoidance, withdrawal, self-attack, and attacking other—in order to deal with their sense of shame.
Although all of these emotions may be very distressing, shame can be a particularly difficult emotion to cope with after trauma. So much so that there is increasing evidence that the experience of shame is associated with the severity of post-traumatic stress disorder or PSTD symptoms following a traumatic event.
Shame is an unpleasant self-conscious emotion often associated with negative self-evaluation; motivation to quit; and feelings of pain, exposure, distrust, powerlessness, and worthlessness.
Children who experience abuse at the hands of their parents or other adults may believe that they deserve the treatment. Similarly, kids who experience bullying often blame themselves and develop a lasting sense of shame. The abuse, neglect, or mistreatment you experienced in childhood is not your fault.
Two key areas of the brain are activated by shame: the prefrontal cortex and the posterior insula. The prefrontal cortex is the part of the brain associated with moral reasoning. This is where judgements about the self occur. The posterior insula is the part of the brain that engages visceral sensations in the body.
Intrapersonally, or within your own internal experience, shame can be one of the most painful emotions you may feel. While all experiences are somewhat different, pain and discomfort to some degree are likely involved. Because shame is held in the body, the pain and discomfort can be both physical and emotional.
There is a strong correlation between anger and shame, and for many of us, anger could be a cover for the shame we are trying to ignore and avoid feeling. Why wouldn't we try and avoid shame? It's not as if we are offered “shame management classes.” Shame is not an emotion that is talked about in-depth.
These behaviors include doing things to make yourself feel small, trying to avoid being the center of attention, or not sharing your thoughts or feelings. Concealing yourself is a method of self-protection.
Shame can be a contributing factor to depression, anxiety, and co-dependency. [iii] People who are constantly ashamed may have emotional difficulties and may fight a mental battle each and every day. People who live with shame are less likely to take healthy risks.
Show self-compassion.
It acts to neutralize the poison of shame, to remove the toxins created by shame. The goal is to treat yourself in a loving, kind and supportive way. Think of a phrase to soothe and encourage yourself, look at yourself in the mirror, make eye contact and say this phrase with certainty.
In a social-evaluative situation, strength of cortisol stress responses will be predicted by shame expression responses, and to a lesser extent, by self-reported trait and state shame responses. Individuals with low body esteem will report and show stronger shame stress responses.
Transient shame – this form of shame is very fleeting and often does not create significant problems. For example, when a person makes a mistake at work, they may feel ashamed for a while, but the feeling quickly passes. Vicarious shame – people can feel shame on behalf of another person, known as vicarious shame.
Shame is one of the more painful emotions because it arises when those most foundational of human needs, the need to feel safe and the need to belong, remain unmet.
But there is one emotion that tends to creep in over time after the traumatic event, that significantly hinders the recovery process. This intensifying emotion is shame. Trauma that provokes PTSD is well known to cause deeply rooted feelings of shame that foster over time.
The following are just a few of the common characteristics of adults shamed in childhood: May suffer extreme shyness, embarrassment and feelings of being inferior to others. They don't believe they make mistakes, they believe they are mistakes. Feel controlled from the outside and from within.
Shame, Pride, and Embarrassment
This major milestone occurs sometime between 15 and 24 months of age.
Shame is designed to keep us safe by binding with the other primary emotions, lower their intensity, and keep them from completing in an action, such as grieving, reaching out, or setting a boundary. When shame binds with anger, fear, joy, curiosity, or grief, those emotions cannot finish.
Shame and depression can influence one another. If you're living with a depressive disorder, you may not have the energy or motivation to take care of yourself. This can lead to shame. Sometimes shame comes first and leads to depression.
The history of chronic and complex traumatized patients who may end as dissociative patients demonstrates that the binomial Shame/humiliation can trigger dissociative amnesia, dissociative fugue, DDNOS and DID.