As we ring in the month of May, we also celebrate Mental Health Awareness Month! Over the years, stigma and opinions on mental health have shifted. Despite this shift, many people still struggle to understand just how influential mental health is on everyday experiences. As a whole, mental health shows us just how much our brains dictate our emotions and responses to traumatic experiences.
Mental health plays a large role in victim services, not only in understanding victims’ responses to trauma but also how advocates process the information they receive. Here are some ways that mental health impacts victim services.
1. Threat Responses Determine Cooperation
Most of us have heard of fight or flight, but trauma experts have recently discussed a third natural response to threats: freeze. For years, experts were troubled or confused as to how victims could just ‘not respond’ - judges in many court cases would throw them out because there was no evidence the victim tried to fight or flee from the offender. Many reports showed testimony that the victim, in fact, ‘did nothing,’ which made the court look down on their experience. Trauma experts then did some research, finding out that what was once thought as just two responses (fight or flight) actually holds three. The freeze response, which your brain calculates is the best within milliseconds, means your brain has recognized that neither increased adrenaline to fight off the offender or flee from them will work - it probably means that your brain thinks that, if you do nothing, then the offender will lose interest in you. We see this a lot in animals such as the possum, where they ‘play dead’ to disinterest predators.
This is important when determining how victims will cooperate in the court process. Because of how society has felt towards those who ‘do nothing,’ many victims who froze during trauma might not come forward or be as open with prosecutors or advocates about their experience. They won’t feel believed, or they’ll preemptively feel judged because they’re worried we’ll consider them ‘helpless’ or ‘weak.’
2. Advocates are Always Counseling
Most jurisdictions do not require their advocates to have certifications in counseling. Some do, and some also require social work degrees or other credentials different from a standard degree in human services or social sciences. For the jurisdictions that don’t, advocates quickly learn that they are always counseling. Let’s be clear, though: advocates are not legal counsel. The kind of ‘counsel’ advocates provide is not legal. Though they may ‘guide’ victims through the criminal justice system (explaining processes, updating them about court cases, discussing impact statements, etc), they do not advise victims on how to proceed within the criminal justice system. Advocates give surface-level counseling: a listening ear, a person to help come up with plans for ‘what to do when’ or even someone who gives them advice for who to contact in different circumstances. Even if it’s not formal, advocates are always providing some level of counseling to victims - and even witnesses.
3. Vicarious Trauma is Real
Advocates deal with vicarious trauma - All. The. Time. Vicarious trauma typically refers to the idea that individuals experience the trauma others have when they are surrounded by it constantly. Advocates, law enforcement and any one else who works with victims of crime that detail their traumatic experiences frequently are often exposed to vicarious trauma. For many individuals, that vicarious trauma manifests itself almost as though they went through the trauma themselves.
Advocates receive training on vicarious trauma constantly. For some, it seems tedious and repetitive. It’s an occupational hazard; advocates know that they’re going to see, hear and be exposed to some serious stuff when they sign up for the job. However, that doesn’t mean they won’t be affected by what they see others go through. In fact, this is probably one of the many reasons law enforcement officers, attorneys and advocates tend to marry others in the same field they are - they all know what the other is experiencing, because they experience it themselves.
Vicarious trauma is real. It happens when advocates least expect it. Sometimes it culminates over years of suppressing emotions towards what happens to victims, and sometimes it happens when one case doesn’t work out in the way they thought it would. In many ways, vicarious trauma is what makes the bonds between those who work in the field stronger. It doesn’t mean that advocates do their job better because they experience vicarious trauma; in fact, when advocates experience vicarious trauma, they tend to reach burn out faster.
Mental health is just as important to advocates as it is to victims. The important thing is that we all work on our mental health, regardless of what our position is in life.