The Trajectory of a Bullet

Way back in the 90s, I met a trauma therapist who was far ahead of his time. He was a medical doctor, a classical psychoanalyst, and a Jewish war survivor who had fled Nazi-occupied Paris as a teenager. He had to make his way to the coast alone, with a child in his care. I worked with him on my own trauma, off and on for two decades.

The Good Doctor taught me carefully about the mechanisms of trauma. He explained how when he tried to return to his studies in Cambridge, MA, he couldn’t do his physics work because they wanted him to calculate the trajectory of a bullet; his mind would freeze up. I particularly remember him specifically teaching me about something called “Trauma Repetition Compulsion,” something I was prone to, re-creating traumatic situations in my own life.

Eventually, I became a trauma therapist myself, and I often gaze at the world through his lens. When I view the pictures coming out of Gaza, all I can think of is what he taught me about the operation of trauma repetition compulsion in individuals, families, and cultures, and how much these pictures remind me of things we saw at the end of World War II. I wish he were here so I could ask him what he thinks - though I am pretty sure I already know.