What doesn't kill me makes me stronger? Post-traumatic growth and the problem of suffering

Abstract

This article argues that the Post-Traumatic Growth (PTG) literature does not support the claim, made most notably by Eleonore Stump, that suffering tends to promote psychic integration that allows for interpersonal closeness with God (or others). Two strains of argument support this conclusion. First, there are problems internal to PTG research, identified by psychologists and bioethicists in the field, that call the strength and reliability of the findings into question. Second, even if successful in what it purports to do, the PTG literature does not support the conclusions that Stump draws from it. Finally, given that we live in a culture that both prizes and moralizes positivity, often at the expense of sufferers, applying this research in prescriptive and normative ways inappropriately circumscribes the post-traumatic journeys of trauma survivors. Before turning to these arguments, I begin by briefly describing the long-term suffering that trauma can inflict in the forms of post-traumatic stress disorder and other physical and mental health effects. This section illustrates the challenge that trauma poses for the projects of theodicy and defence and provides the backdrop against which the PTG literature must be read.