This is exactly how to deal with trauma in mid-life – and the lessons we should all learn from Freddie Flintoff and his brave wife Rachael: DR MAX PEMBERTON
If you haven’t watched the Disney+ documentary about Freddie Flintoff’s horrific car crash while filming Top Gear in 2022, then I’d really recommend it. It’s an edifying lesson in how an individual copes with something truly traumatic and the complex feelings and emotions which swirl around such an event.
Freddie said he experienced PTSD and anxiety after the accident, in which he nearly died and I have to say, I’m not surprised. It must have been an unimaginably tough experience and he still bears the physical, let alone the psychological, scars from it to this day.
Most of us will never experience something quite as devastating. But many of us – probably all, if I’m honest – will experience major difficulties and upsets in our lives at one time or another. Freddie’s is an extreme, harrowing example, but there are still lessons I think the programme teaches us about coping with adversity.
I was particularly interested in the way he responded psychologically.
‘This sounds awful… part of me wishes I’d been killed,’ he said, and ‘part of me thinks, I wish I’d have died. I didn’t want to kill myself. I won’t mistake the two things.’
This feeling of wishing you were dead is incredibly common, especially when you have been faced with a dramatic, distressing change in circumstances. The more powerless you feel in the situation or during the aftermath, the more likely it is you’ll experience this.
I was interested to hear about how Freddie’s wife Rachael coped with the accident, writes DR MAX PEMBERTON
Psychiatrists call this ‘passive suicidal ideation’. This is different to ‘active suicidal ideation’, where people have thoughts about killing themselves and may even have a plan on how they would do it. Instead, passive suicidal ideation is a wish to be dead. While you don’t intend to take your own life, you no longer want to live. It’s much more common than the active type. For Freddie, this thought was prompted by the aftermath of the crash, but it is not always triggered by something so dramatic.
I have spoken to hundreds of people with passive suicidal ideation over the years. Many feel similarly after a divorce, losing their job or any other upsetting event which leaves them feeling scared, alone or no longer feeling that there is purpose or meaning in life.
They all stress that they aren’t going to kill themselves. But they often describe how if they went to sleep and didn’t wake up, they’d be happy.
It’s extremely upsetting to hear someone you love talk like this. However, asking about it and talking about it doesn’t increase the risk of them taking their own life – it actually decreases the risk.
If you find yourself in a conversation like this with a loved one, you may find yourself trying to find an answer – to provide a silver lining – but resist this. You can still offer support, and care, but don’t try to dismiss their feelings just because they’re difficult for you to hear.
Psychotherapists talk of ‘sitting’ with a feeling: talking about it, thinking about it, experiencing it and feeling it, but resisting the temptation to try to change it. Simply acknowledging that someone is having this feeling and being with them while they go through it, accepting it’s valid, can be very powerful and helps it to dissipate over time.
Freddie said he experienced PTSD and anxiety after the accident, in which he nearly died
I was also interested to hear about how Freddie’s wife Rachael coped with the accident, particularly when she saw him for the first time in hospital after his initial five-hour operation. ‘I totally pulled myself together and I didn’t cry,’ she revealed. ‘I just said, “It’s fine. You’re gonna be OK. Can’t believe how amazing you look.”
‘Before I got home, I did call the kids and said to them, “You’ve got to be as strong as you’ve ever been. I don’t want you to look shocked and horrified, because that’s going to knock him”.’
You might feel that this is being dishonest, but I’d say Rachael took precisely the right tack. Crying and wailing and saying how dreadful something is will only make the person at the centre of the crisis feel worse.
Even if you do want to cry and you really do think something is dreadful, it won’t help the victim. They need you to be strong. Yet it’s astonishing how often friends and loved ones try to make a tragedy about them. They cry and make a scene, when this is the last thing the person needs. This will often push the individual into either not being honest about how they feel, because they fear those around them won’t be able to cope with anything else negative, or they have to console others and worry about them, when all the focus should be on the one going through the trauma.
I’ve seen this with people who have been diagnosed with cancer. They end up consoling their family and everyone seems to forget the person who really needs their comfort.
You don’t have to be Pollyannaish about things. You can be honest, but you should remain hopeful and calm. This is what people need when they are going through a crisis.
Common sense wins on trans
The Supreme Court’s ruling that sex refers to the sex someone was born with is a win for basic biology. I’m relieved there’s now clarification and common sense has prevailed.
However, I do think it must have been upsetting and unnerving for a lot of trans people. I don’t blame them, or the court. I blame the weak, spineless politicians, who have kicked this issue down the road and repeated the lie that trans women are women, without bothering to think it through.
I also blame charities which were so ideologically blinkered that they didn’t use their position to lobby for better facilities for trans people to use.
The finger of blame should also be pointed at gutless institutions like the NHS which repeatedly conflated and confused sex and gender. It has meant a whole generation has been fed a lie. It’s politicians, charities and institutions which failed in their jobs that are responsible for this mess and owe the trans community a grovelling apology.
Sarah Ferguson, who is patron of the Teenage Cancer Trust, has highlighted the situation that young sufferers can be left to cope either on adult wards or children’s wards, when there should be places tailored to their age group. I worked on a teenage cancer ward. Before they had come to us, many had been on adult wards, often with much older people, where they struggled. Worse, though, was when they had been on paediatric wards. The little children had parents staying with them, while the teenagers didn’t, which compounded how alone they felt. The Duchess of York is right to shine a light on the problems this group face.
Adults in an NHS trial will be offered a new blood test which uses AI and can detect 12 known cancers. It’s a great use of tech but there’s a lot still to be said for good old- fashioned care and it’s this that desperately needs to be improved.
