Role of My Culture in Trauma Management

Traumatic events lead to emotional, physical and psychological or spiritual harm on an

individual. From my cultural background in Puerto Rico trauma is not a desirable feeling and it

not considered a shameful feeling. The individual who has experienced distress may have the

feeling of anxiety, threatened or frightened. The person may not want to respond or may deny the

impact of that event. My cultural backgrounds believe that an individual who is a victim of

trauma requires time to recover from the situation and get mental and emotional stability. The

events that are considered traumatic at Puerto Rico include the death of a loved one, divorce,

natural disasters, terrorist attacks, physical injury, rape and other activities that affects an

individual negatively.

I believe that my cultural background will be very helpful when I will be dealing with victims of

trauma. It is because I am a victim of trauma when I was young my parents separated. The

separation led to emotional and psychological harm on me as I was forced to live with my

mother only. I did not have a father figure as my friends and always felt to the odd one out. That

experience from my background will help me to understand my clients. With a combination of

my training, I will be in a position to effectively offer guidance to them. From my cultural

background trauma is an undesired experience. My culture also recognizes the presence of

trauma from bad experiences that understanding will help me to support my clients who may be

from a different background that does not recognize trauma.

Awareness of mental health in different cultures have the potential of influencing trauma

management. In my culture, there is a high awareness of mental health and it is expected that

trauma management is done effectively. It is important to consider the cultural variation in the

presentation of trauma in different cultures. There is also a need to adapt to sensitive tools for
various cultural groups and realize the barriers in seeking help for health mental. The possible

barriers in seeking help for mental health is the culture of an individual. For instance, it may be

considered as a show of weakness for a male to seek help in mental health. My cultural

background will be important to help overcome this perceptive among my clients. I will make

them realize the harm of remaining silent about their trauma and understand that there is no

shame in seeking help.