Are You a Professional Victim?

Hi, my name is Barb and I’m a recovering professional victim…

It seems as if there is an entire society of Americans who make it their business to be victims. There’s a good chance you or someone you know either has suffered from this same affliction or unknowingly suffers from it right now. Here are some of the symptoms of what I call Professional Victim Syndrome (PVS):

• Consistent statements like, “I just can’t catch a break,” “Why does all of this keep happening to me” or “It’s not my fault that…”

• The inability to listen to another person’s problems without minimizing them as “not as bad as what I’m going through/have gone through.”

• Dependency on validation

• Continually allowing yourself to be put down by others.

• Complacency in your work because “I don’t have the same chance other people do.”

• Tolerating the presence and impact of people who intentionally bring you down.

• Copious amounts of time on social media support groups posting your pain reaffirming the unfairness in your life.

• Over: eating/drinking/gambling/

• Lack of motivation

• Your tragedy or disease remains your identity

This is not an exhaustive list. And just like every other malady out there, not every symptom in and of itself means you suffer from PVS. But it’s safe to say that if you recognize yourself in two or more of these examples, you should at least take a moment to run an internal assessment.

I’m told that one of the biggest hurdles for addicts to overcome is recognizing they are, in fact, an addict, and taking responsibility for committing to treatment. My own experience in a nightmare relationship with an addict backs that up.

The same holds true for professional victims. It happens before we even realize it. At first, it’s a natural response. Something terrible has happened and you have in fact been victimized. The hidden danger in that assignment is that while it has a clear point of origin, it has no such clear point of conclusion.

It’s been about 10 years since I finally, painfully, accepted responsibility for what I had allowed to become of my life.

Let me frame this moment in time for you

I’ll use my own example here - My husband was murdered in Iraq by a fellow soldier. I had four very young children ages 6,5,3, and 1. I was 32 years old, thrust into a nightmare that was on national news. I spent 3 ½ years back and forth to court-martial proceedings, in the same room as the man who murdered my husband, listening to testimony that ripped my soul apart.

My entire identity was proudly, wholly, and fully founded on being Lou’s wife. With that identity stripped from me, I became Lou’s widow.

Within a week after my husband was murdered, I was brought into meetings with various military personnel who referred to me as a “victim.” It didn’t take long for my new identity to stick.

It’s incredible how our minds interpret information like this. For someone like me who struggled me entire life with insecurity and self-esteem issues, there was safety to be found in the “victim” labeling. It gave me an excuse to become dependent on the extraordinary organizations that stepped up to support families like mine.

They told me how “strong” I was. How “brave.” Their encouragement reaffirmed my new belief that less was expected of me now that I was forever shackled to this tragedy. I had permission to set low expectations for myself, and I ran with it.

I’ve seen lots of people fall into this: The grieving mother who spends her life making sure everyone knows no one has suffered like her, the widows (like I was for too long) who “ride the widow train” or free events and pampering by kind-hearted Americans who want to help, the people who never find their way out of the land of victims and into survivors.

Much like so many people are doing in our country today - rather than accept responsibility for their own success and well-being, they expect taxpayers and the government to excuse their student loans, pay for their abortions, and demand that all of society reads from the script they write.

But I digress.

This victim mentality took such a hold on me that for a solid decade after Lou was killed I believed I could never stand on my own two feet- I believed I wasn’t strong or capable enough to raise my kids on their own, so when two childcare assistants fell through on me I let myself be swept into a relationship with a big strong man I thought would fill that role I needed filled.

When that fell apart I found another relationship with a man who I believed was the answer: he played with my kids, taught them sports, introduced them to music, told me all the things I wanted to hear, and “saved me” from figuring out how to be strong enough to guide four boys through adolescence into men.

Or so I thought. But the victim mindset was running me, and he knew exactly how to exploit it. Five years of escalating manipulation and addiction sucked me deep into a rut of believing I had tried everything but since all of this kept “happening to me” I would never really get my life back.

“No one gets my struggles.”

“It’s not my fault.”

“I never had a chance.”

Until the day I finally broke, dropped to my knees, accepted responsibility, and prayed for help.

I wrote about that moment and everything I did next to rebuild my life in my book, What Not to Wear to a Murder Trial (and other tips tragedy taught me).

I’m proud of that book, the lessons I’ve learned, and the life I’ve built today. It is imperfect- as am I. I have an impressive list of mistakes and failures and setbacks. But more impressive than those are the triumphs I turn those into, personally and professionally.

I am also embarking on a new challenge- I am determined to turn my fiction book, How to Woo a Widow - into a film that inspires anyone who is grieving to fall in love with life again.

Because I was victimized more than once in my life. But I am no longer a victim.