Has Harry's book brought up your own trauma?

[Devakai]

It has for me. I feel unwell with it at the moment. Therapy hasn't helped me and parenting my child is constantly bringing up new revelations of how I was failed and treated like shit, and still am. Working towards going NC but that doesnt fix the rage or the feeling that I am not good enough. Not sure if that feeling will ever go away given I've tried to work on it for 16 years and it hasn't helped. I was aware my parents were useless from about age six. Accepting they're flawed humans doesn't fix the emotional damage.

Regardless of the rights and wrongs of what Harry is doing he is evidently traumatised.

Honestly going NC comes with its own set of issues. It can help enormously with some aspects. But brings it own sadness and “what ifs”. So while it’s a solution I’ve successfully employed, I can’t say it got me as far as I needed to be in terms of feeling free of the past.

If you think there might be something underlying, like anxiety and or depression have a chat with your GP. Medication doesn’t work for all of the people all of the time. But personally within three months on ADs I felt like I’d been let out of a mental prison, that I’d been in since the mid 80s. And it’s left me the space to exercise, eat better, do yoga, all the good stuff that can actually make a real difference once your base line come up to a better level.

I know it can be really hard to look away when the deluge of news is pressing lots of emotional buttons. But worth taking a break and checking any hobby/interest channels on youtube looking for a new stream of info or ideas. Sometimes that can feel like coming up for air long enough for the pressure inside to lower quite a bit. Big fat hug. Know how tough it can be.

YES, I'm reading his book now and I recognise things in his life that are similar to things in mine (on a less public scale of course). I posted about it in another thread (copy/pasting it here):

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Harry may not have suffered as much in the way of physical abuse but he has suffered a LOT in terms of emotional abuse and neglect. And these have clearly affected him deeply psychologically. EA and EN are just not talked about enough in general, they are glossed over but can be extremely cruel and destructive to a growing child, sometimes even more so than physical because it creates deeper psychological effects that takes years/decades to unravel.

Coldness, lack of hugs, humiliation, being the scapegoat, being made fun of in public, gaslighting, hypercriticism, being ignored, being over-controlled, being shouted at - in private and in front of people.... all these things can really undermine and destroy a child.

Harry has definitely suffered many of these, especially the humiliation (in the media, on a public scale eg while at school etc), and coldness in terms of his family, and being thought of as second best/spare option. Leaked stories in the paper about his apparent "thickness", etc all these things publicly defined him in a way that he never allowed.

I understand the anger he must feel because I went through similar things (not in the media of course). I grew up with an overcontrolling, hypercritical mother who would loudly criticise me to anyone who would listen and I still feel extreme anger that she defined me to others that made them think less of me rather than allow them to get to know me. It left me with a lot of issues, such as selective mutism, panic, feeling of emptiness and other things that still affect every aspect of my life.

He's clearly been through a lot of therapy and it shows. He's seeing things clearly now and speaking up about it. And I actually applaud him for it. It might sound like he's being childish but I think it affected his development and only now he's becoming to recover. Sometimes you need to call things out in the open, and if it means you burn bridges you burn bridges.
You never know, it might make the RF more self-reflective about their own behaviour as a family.

I wasn't going to read it but I was given. a copy so thought I might as well. I have got as far as when he is about to join the armed forces.

I very much identify with a lot of what he says, and what he doesn't say. Even before reading it I have always had sympathy for Harry on a human level, though I completely dislike the way he has gone about things lately. You can be as privileged as he is but that does not in any way help you emotionally if there is damage and trauma there. He could have had the most stable and emotionally intelligent family in the world and losing his mother would still have been a terrible blow and might well have damaged his mental health. As things are - well...

I see a lot of my own behaviour patterns and thought processes in his.

I am reading the book currently. I feel very sorry for him but I also can’t help think he has ‘victim mentality’, at least that is how it reads to me. Some of the things he says it looks like he’s searching for it to be woo is me.

I completely identify with him as the family scapegoat. It has been my experience that people who aren't the family scapegoat often have a hard time understanding how it affects you. Or even seeing it in action, to be frank, because it is often so slight and happens behind closed doors.

I also understand what it feels like to not be believed when trying to speak out about it. Validation and not feeling like you are crazy is huge.

Estrangement and family dynamics is such a complex topic for any family in the depth of it, it is sad that it had to get to this point.

Luckily for me, I worked through my trauma and am no longer triggered by it. I was even able to end my estrangement. But I am empathetic to anyone who has lived through it.

As the family scapegoat, yes. I've found it quite triggering

Traumatised because his therapist told him so.

EileenAdler · Today 18:28
Traumatised because his therapist told him so.

quite.

I found that my own family history started to impact how I interpreted the book. I swung back and forth from sympathy to disbelief. Once the recollection esp the Queens mother didn’t match reality my own sibling behaviour started to hit. My sibling has had therapy and I’d say over 50% of what they say is false but because as a family we indulged the mistakes it hasn’t stopped and hurt people along the way. It’s strange because they have every reason to be angry and in some case the false memories are trivial and there to cover the more harrowing details. But having your own history denied is difficult and worse they are now doing it to their children. Alcohol has played its part and therapy has not helped as it was a merry go round of therapist and often signed off too early.

I’d had a lot of therapy to little effect until I found a brilliant woman, who changed my life. The birth of my dd affected me deeply being the family scapegoat. I remember being incredibly angry when dd reached about 5 months old and the intensity of the rage was so great that I remember little from that time. I met the therapist when dd was young primary and she taught me many things I didn’t know about being an adult. In a way, she was growing me up in order for me to do the same with my dd.

The therapy Harry is having is not helpful in my view. I can empathise with him. But telling all whilst trying to get the family to understand his pov won’t work. His view of the world is out of focus. Yes, he had a difficult time and if he were treated regularly as less than by the nanny, I can understand his pain, especially as he is a very sensitive character. Idk why the nanny did this. Perhaps it was to try to counter Diana’s behaviour, which I imagine was bizarre. Treating William as her confidante, taking Harry on Williams first day at Eton. Both highly inappropriate.

I don’t find it triggering. I actually find it heartbreaking for all of them. This is a lot of misunderstandings and a bit of rivalry between brothers growing up plus the complexity of losing their mum. Idk how old you are op but Diana was not the idealised mum Harry is depicting. I understand very much why he has these feelings having lost a parent myself as a child.

Yes. I have gone back over things in my head, mulling over every detail - not healthy tbh. I am now "fine". Getting on with things. I did try and reconcile with one family member - no response from them. I don't regret that but I realise now that I do absolutely need to write a line under it all and move on. I can only change me/my reactions to things. I cannot change others.
Nor will "my truth" ever be theirs and vice versa. The objective truth will be somewhere in between.

Erm… yes and no. I was always the scapegoat, the black sheep, the useless one but, looking at h”Harry’s self centred perspective, and mostly, to the tons of comments from the public, it made me think that yes, my childhood was difficult but not so unusual.

When you choose how to look at your traumatic past you have two options:

1. See yourself as a victim
2. see yourself as a survivor

Always chose option two, choosing to be a victim can only disempower you as you cannot change your past or the people who caused the damage.

Choosing to be a survivor allows you to look back at your past as the past and helps you to see how much you have accomplished despite the difficulties posed to you by your upbringing and environment.

Way too many people projecting where this book is concerned. Harry has clear MH problems and his 'truth' is highly suspect. Nothing he says is backed by any evidence. Many children don't come from physically demonstrative backgrounds, but they know they are loved. I can't remember lots of hugs and cuddles but my parents would lay down their lives for me. I was loved. Harry was loved. Harry says he loves his family and they love him, but them comes up with these petty silly things like getting a smaller bedroom and not having an extra sausage. If you're telling me he couldn't ask for another one, I don't believe it. This book is all Harry's warped perception of inequality. It's 'his truth' and as such it is what he believes, but like so much of Harry's 'truth' they are not actual facts

I find people's reactions to this and to emotional abuse in general really upsetting. Loads of people minimise things about Harry just as I see them doing in real life.
Emotional abuse is a difficult experience and a difficult subject. Individual examples can easily be seen as trivial and dismissed, and the cumulative impact dismissed.
I am sorry OP you are having such a difficult time. I agree going no contact or staying in touch - neither is a magic solution. We have to do what makes us feel less bad and try and build a good life.
It does anger me that people expect adults who have suffered abuse as children to show zero evidence of that as an adult. Showing any impact is labelled being a victim. When the reality is difficult experiences, including emotional abuse, are going to have a negative impact on you as an adult. You try and move beyond them, but you can never totally erase your past life.

Yes.
After going NC with my narcissistic father and my mother who never hugged me told me she loved me, I get it but I do think sometimes he’s allowing the victim mentality take over.

Spot on!
It never goes away.