Finding evidence of the start of generational trauma in military records
Repeat a lie often enough and people will believe it is the truth. They will fight to defend this “truth”. It’s as if logical thinking has gone out the window. Society has been so programmed for generations to believe the only people impacted by war are those who fought. We have been told only veterans can have PTSD. Only veterans can suffer from anxiety due to combat or war. And for generations, people were told little to nothing could be done to help the veterans.
Well, this is a lie. It isn’t only veterans who suffered as a result of war, but also children, wives, parents, and others left at home. Civilians experienced their own sort of trauma when a father, husband, uncle, grandfather, brother, or nephew left to fight. They experienced trauma when those men and women, who served, never came home. Or came home mentally, emotionally, or physically changed. But no one wanted to talk about this then and family historians today prefer to ignore it because it’s too triggering and hurtful.
I think at this time of great transformation on the planet with the great shifts in concsicousness, we must talk about these issues within our families. It is time to face the darkness, the triggers, the shameful, the embarrassing, and bring it to the light to heal. As long as we continue to ignore these things, our family’s war trauma, we cannot become as great as we are here to become. We cannot end old negative and toxic cycles. All of life is a choice – so do you choose to continue the energies of war, hate, anger, shame, and grief, or do you choose to stand in the light and heal – even when it is uncomfortable?
The Children Suffered
I am reading an IDPF for a WWII soldier who was Killed 8 December 1944, just a few months after he was sent overseas. He left behind a wife and three young boys. This man was about 30 years old when he was drafted.
In his IDPF there is a letter from his wife, who was at that time still legal next-of-kin. She asked if her husband’s remains could stay overseas even though his mother wished for them to be returned to the U.S. In her letter she explains how the death of her husband impacted her boys, the oldest in particular.
This is a clear sign of childhood trauma related to war, that may have gone untreated due to the lack of mental health services back then. It is possible because there was no treatment, that this anxiety, grief, and other emotions were tucked away and passed down through the generations.
How Do We Heal?
Not everyone is given to explicity, the origin of family trauma like we see in the letter above. For most of us, myself included, we had experiences and relationships that triggered deep unresolved beliefs, behaviors, and patterns that needed to be examined. This work is not for the faint of heart and those unwilling to take accountability and responsbility for their lives and make the changes.
Change comes slowly as healing is like peeling an onion – one layer at a time. Patience is required as you dive through each belief, experience, family pattern, perspective, and have to readjust who you think you are and who you believe others are. In the end, you may discover all you thought you knew, was actually a lie and the truth lies within the healing. As we heal, we will be tested to ensure we have done the inner work required to not have to repeat an experience or relationship again.
In some ways I wish I had been given a letter like this at the start of my genealogical journey. It would have explained many things about my grandparent’s lives. But that “letter” or medical document came over a decade after I began my journey. Even with the documentation that explained war trauma, it was still up to me to explore how it impacted the family. Even then, it took a relationship with someone very ill overseas to fully show me my family’s trauma and the inherited trauma i was living out.
No matter where you begin your family trauma journey, I can say with certainty that there is great peace at the end of each cycle of healing. I can say with certainty that your entire life, relationships, and existence will change with each layer you heal. You only have to choose to start the inner work.
Has your family ever been so plainly given information about a family trauma? How did you deal with that information? How did it help you start doing your own inner work and heal?
© 2025 WWII Research & Writing Center
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