Honestly, the whole trauma dumping thing always has us a bit anxious when talking with new people. Our autism makes us struggle with knowing what is and isn’t appropriate to talk about, and I think it’s the same for a lot of people who trauma dump. They don’t mean it as a manipulation tactic, it’s just… hard to know what is and isn’t okay to tell someone sometimes. Admittedly I dunno if we *actually* trauma dump, but we always worry when we talk about personal stuff or our childhood 💔 – Maggie
Sorry to have taken so long to answer this.
Struggling with what is and isn’t appropriate to say is common with autism, and something we struggle with as well.
While trauma dumping on someone is never ideal I think it’s been blown out of proportion and demonized lately.
Unless someone has a habit of unloading on people, there isn’t anything unusual about occasionally going overboard talking about yourself, including about upsetting things.
One just has to be mindful to respond to the needs of others. Trauma dumping can be manipulative– so can accusing people of trauma dumping.
People just need to be open to honest communication with one another, accept genuine criticism, and learn to recognize when “criticism” is being used as a manipulation tactic.
Discussion ¬