Actually, my therapist has told me this is a healthy way of processing things. Because you can get the trauma out of your head And you can write the ending you wish it had. The trusted person rescue, the catharsis of getting to kill the one who hurt you.
It’s good for your brain. It’s healthier than bottling it up. Fiction is where we go for emotional release. That can be true with trauma too.
As a therapist myself: yeah. If you can get your trauma worked out that way and need the buffer? Please do.
The worse thing you can do with trauma is keep it locked away past when it’s healthy. Having it pass to a character you view as an outlet or appropriate substitute if it’s too much is healthy.
Sometimes imagining how your hero handles something that’s brought you low can help you realize how to stand up and fight. Sometimes seeing your hero cry can make it alright to cry.
When you engage that character you are also engaging the parts of yourself that you see in that character. You are allowing yourself to process and test what will heal you best.
When I was a kid all my characters I loved were tricksters who used their wits to fight for themselves and those they loved. They weren’t the most powerful, or even the most loving, but when push comes to shove they could talk or trick their way out of anything if it meant their people were safe.
I wanted to be that person, who when the chips are down would pull out one last ploy and have the win. And as I grew I realized why that was : because I had been placed in situations where I wasn’t the strongest or most pleasing person, but where if I wanted to defeat my dragons (metaphorical) I had learned to befriend or bamboozle them.
And then I realized that my characters had been me practicing and striving to be that person. That I had learned from them in ways no older person had ever bothered to teach me. That by stepping into their shoes and acting out my pain it allowed me to /be/ for just a moment.
And knowing that about myself I set about doing good with those lessons.
So yeah. Process that trauma through fiction. Learn from your heroes, find your powers and potential in your creative self.
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