Over the years I’ve tried to explain and describe what a soul wound is. I can only get close to its essence through movies, music, theater, art, and other sensory, ephemeral explanations. Recently, however, my soul has been brutalized and bloodied by reports in the media on wars and terror attacks, natural disasters, and painful visions of the world in trauma.

My vision of the soul wound is in the terrified or empty eyes of the children who are experiencing the horrors of the world. Those children who bear the outward wounds and filth of a world that allows babies to be harmed in even the tiniest of ways, let alone to bear war—the insanity of others—on their tiny shoulders.

The eyes of the children speak to me of the wounding of a soul. When we are abandoned, neglected, abused, or experience any of the myriad of traumas I’ve described, imagine or vision the eyes of the children, because no matter how old we are when grief comes knocking, it is that wounded child that steps up and receives another layer of pain. The soul wound is found in the eyes, experienced in the heart and throughout the viscera. The soul wound is sometimes quiet and hidden, silenced, and sometimes it screams and screeches and appears bloodied, begging to be acknowledged. The soul wound is a wound of betrayal and shame, a wound of fear and diminishment, a wound so deep that sometimes it hides even from ourselves.

Research surrounding PTSD and trauma has indicated that traumatic events impact the very essence of a person’s vision of the world and their place in it. Early childhood trauma affects the attachment process and can create a lifetime of relationship difficulties, which can begin in utero and be intergenerational. This leaves many trauma survivors searching for a place to belong; attempting to find a tribe; to find meaning for their lives, often in gangs, the military, as first responders, the church.

Traumatic events can impinge on the spiritual, moral, ethical boundaries, and limits of a victim’s soul. This is moral injury, whether imposed by another’s behavior, the code of the tribe, or their own step outside of their moral beliefs. This damage to a person’s vision of themselves becomes far more damaging then the original traumatic assault.

When my husband overdosed and died, I embraced my responsibility that I didn’t save him, that it was my fault that he died. I swam in the deep and muddy waters of shame, remorse, regret, and deep, deep sorrow, believing I was beyond evil and there was no redemption for me. I lived in my addiction for another fifteen years, never sharing with another soul the nature of my wrongs and the deeply held guilt. Fifteen years later, when I read my life story to my group of seven men and our counselor—my confession and all of the actions and behaviors, the pain and brutality throughout my life—I read it like a shopping list, with no emotion. I could always give the “list.”

I finished and looked up to see tears rolling down the faces of those men. They were crying for me when I could not, would not, cry for myself. They heard my confession and absolved me of my sins. I will be forever grateful for those tears. That is the power of the group. Now I can hold sacred space for others and allow tears to flow. That was the beginning of my own trauma work and the healing path of my family.

Traumatic events often create the impetus for coping/survival behaviors and mechanisms such as substance abuse, process addictions, and presumed mental health disorders such as depression, anxiety, OCD, ADHD and bipolar disorder, to name a few. Many of these diagnoses can be traced back to the original trauma event. Then they become exacerbated by ongoing layers of trauma. Add to this moral injury and it creates a therapeutic challenge for trauma resolution. A timeline created by a client illustrates very strongly the concept of moral injury.

As trauma therapists, we provide slow and steady intensive treatment, building rapport and trust, remaining out of judgement, and being present as a witness in a safe and loving space. In that space survivors may begin to heal.

That moral injury that so many experience is never spoken until finally someone asks the questions: What are the things that you believe you can never be forgiven? What does that mean about your place in the world, your vision of yourself? The answers to these questions may change the course of someone’s life.

Excerpted from THE TRAUMA HEART: We Are Not Bad People Trying to Be Good, We Are Wounded People Trying to Heal–Stories of Survival, Hope, and Healing (HCI; Trade Paperback).

Judy Crane is the author of The Trauma Heart: We Are Not Bad People Trying to Be Good, We Are Wounded People Trying to Heal--Stories of Survival, Hope, and Healing. She is a Certified Addiction Professional in Florida, Certified Sex Addiction Therapist, a Certified Hypnotist, EMDR and a specialist for healing trauma and PTSD. Her presentation and seminars on trauma, resilience, PTSD and sexual trauma resolution are known throughout the world. She is the founder of The Refuge–A Healing Place, which grew to become one of the foremost leaders in treating trauma/PTSD and addiction. She is also the founder of Spirit2Spirit Healing, offering trauma training to professionals and healing trauma intensives to clients. Most recently, she established The Guest House, in Ocala, Florida, a luxury treatment center offering cutting-edge treatment for trauma and addiction in an elegant setting.