I’ve been waiting to write this blog post since a couple of weeks ago when I first heard that the late Sinead O’Conner suddenly passed away at age 56. She was an amazingly gifted and complex individual who screamed out for help through her songs and her actions. Whether you agreed with and understood her cries or not, she had a voice that couldn’t be ignored, and she spoke to millions of people about her pain and theirs through her song. Her voice vibrated at a frequency so many could relate to, and her words resonated at a similar frequency. The cry was “Help Me!” but she would never have been so direct.
Sinead faced many hardships in her life that began with an abusive childhood. She was a beautiful woman with a tremendous voice who did not shy away from controversy. In fact, she stepped right into it. She took all her pain and rage and poured it into her songs and then belted them out from her vocal chords. Her music was highly personal, reflecting her intense feelings. It could be chilling. She refused to be the “good girl.” She would not lie about who she was. She had a right to be angry, and she channeled it constructively through song. She had a huge platform for that cry for help, and she made the most of it. No one listened to her as a child, if she even had the ability to speak up, and all that pent up fury has to go somewhere. In trauma, it goes into the nervous system and causes us to fight, flee or freeze. Sinead fought and fought, but sadly was terribly misunderstood. I don’t know about her other DSM diagnoses, but there is no doubt that Complex PTSD was on the top of that list.
Abuse and its repercussions of rage do that. Anger when voiced in such a raw manner scares people. It’s too much. They become too much. “Tone it down,” others say, but what about when you can’t. I’m not sure if Sinead O’Connor ever worked with a trauma therapist to help her nervous system metabolize and digest that rage. I doubt it. Had she, she would still have the feelings, but they would be more manageable. Perhaps she didn’t want to manage them. Managing them may have meant being the “good girl,” and perhaps signaled defeat. And she knew the kind of horror that fuels fires. Sinead spoke, no screamed truth to power, even when some held their ears. She shaved her head years ago; purposefully destroying any image as a beauty. She did her best to control her story, but the force of her overpowering feelings kept getting in her way.
The cause of Sinead O’Conner’s death as of today is still not known. Sadly, she lost her 17-year-old son a year and a half ago to suicide. No mother or parent should ever have to live with losing a child, and one so young. It goes against the natural cycle of life, and yet we all know people who have. Their lives are never the same.
If there’s anything we might learn from these tragic losses, it’s that we need to believe people when they’re crying out for help and learn to listen for their cries.
Their cries aren’t always direct. We can also learn that when hate is inserted into children and teens, they hate back. As an adult they must learn to manage these feelings in order to live a productive balanced, life, but this is a tall order, and not always possible. As a society we need to face the reality of the prevalence and affects of child neglect and abuse, so we can better prevent, understand and treat it.
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