This article introduces a specific and potentially harmful type of trauma-stress syndrome, typically experienced within family systems. To date, this syndrome — domestic emotional distress disorder (DEDD) — has not been submitted for consideration as a formal diagnosis by the psychiatric community.
Post-traumatic stress disorder or PTSD delayed (symptoms of PTSD displayed beyond six months) are defined as the results of experiencing single catastrophic life-threatening events (DSM-5: Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders)
The original criteria for PTSD emerged from observations of combat veterans who, following life-threatening experiences on the battlefield, alternated between states of emotional numbness and emotional over-reactivity.
Current research indicates that PTSD also results from single-episodic events such as life-threatening accidents and illnesses; witnessing or being the victim of extreme acts of violence or other criminal acts; and natural disasters.
PTSD, however, is not consistently derived from single events. Post-trauma stress or trauma states may be compounded by the emotional revisiting of original traumatic experiences, or “trauma repetition.” This creates a painfully resilient memory loop.
Domestic emotional distress disorder, suggested as an additional diagnostic tool, highlights layers of trauma states existing within average U.S. families. These states, both persistent and enduring, remain untreated and unrecognized by the therapeutic community.
DEDD, experienced daily in homes across all income levels and ethnicities, is born of the often-unintended emotional neglect of children. Its roots are in the hidden long-term stresses experienced by these young people.
Parents and other key caregivers often find themselves caught up in the demands and pressures of daily life. They lose sight of the necessity of a “relational home” — one in which empathic listening, validation of emotions and flexible, creative support make for a child’s bright world view and a healthful path forward in life.
Absent a relational home, neglected children (and later adults) exhibit over time unstable and often crumbling emotional foundations. They emerge ill prepared for the vicissitudes of life’s single-episode traumas and its ongoing stressors.
As youth separating from childhood, with an inevitable desire for independence, many become overwhelmed when confronted with life’s inevitable traumas, or even phase-of-life transitions.
Lacking a solid emotional foundation, these individuals simply cannot process and bear deep personal loss. Or even the threat of it. Their responses, as a result, are frequently of catastrophic and extreme proportions. Terror is the often-underlying condition.
Destructive thoughts and behaviors may result. Degenerative beliefs take root, interwoven with shame: “My experience does not matter, therefore I don’t matter. I am not important.” These thoughts become embedded as a person’s “organizing principles” (beliefs based on the experiences of one’s self and others).
If human vulnerability and emotional dependency fail to be cherished and nurtured, compensatory rage and shame may fester and grow — at first repressed, then slowly emerging, often resulting in destructive behaviors against property, the self or others. Unaware of what they seek, these young people experience profound loneliness and isolation, which continue to erode their developing minds and bodies.
Parents and caregivers of DEDD children often gravitate to values espoused by media and contemporary society. In addition to basic requirements such as housing, education and food, their children receive in some combination: entertainment systems, sporty transportation, stylish clothing, computer and cell phones, and even trust funds. As essential as some of these may be to the well-being of youngsters, their well-intentioned providers sometimes focus too narrowly on providing this type of material custodial care.
As an external value set prevails, with the child’s emotional needs minimized, the concept of a relational home becomes weightless in the family ecosystem. Trauma states steadily emerge. They often manifest in familiar symptoms such as chronic pain, depression and anxiety. In younger children, attention deficit disorder becomes the most commonly diagnosed disorder. In teens, oppositional defiant disorder. Often these behaviors are therapeutically misdiagnosed because of a lack of complex understanding of how trauma weaves into underlying aspects of the child’s home life.
Unfortunately, unless we realign core family values to include emotional care with contextual meaning (R.D.Stolorow), we will continue to find ourselves on a trajectory of more medications, more personal electronics replacing human contact, and more children and teens crying out in defensive rage and shame.