The Importance of Boundaries

We set and follow boundaries with one another all the time, we just may not recognize and label them as such. Boundaries are an essential feature of healthy relationships and a crucial aspect of healing for those who have experienced trauma. Recognizing them in a formal way allows us to be explicit about our boundaries.

Boundaries are rules and guidelines one defines that set the standard for the way they will tolerate being treated and what they will allow to happen to them. They can be physical, verbal, emotional, sexual, intellectual, and financial. There are many different kinds of boundaries and individuals can form them regarding various issues. Boundaries ensure the individual’s well-being and safety and allow them to have more control over what happens to them. Everyone deserves to have as much control as possible over what they experience and should not be subjected to treatment that they find upsetting or uncomfortable.

Establishing boundaries is helpful for everyone and can help improve the health of any relationship. By expressing your boundaries to someone else, whether a partner, family member, or friend, the relationship improves because of setting boundaries.

Boundaries:

-clarify needs and expectations: By setting boundaries, individuals explicitly state what they want from the relationship and their interactions with the other person.

-identify triggers: Boundaries help identify triggers. Which are stimuli, such as words, phrases, situational attributes, or objects that provoke feelings of trauma. Triggers can bring upon severe emotional distress, dissociation, anxiety, and other trauma responses.

-facilitate communication: Being clear with boundaries prevents conflict, as the people in the relationship already know what is not okay with the other person. 

-demonstrate trust and respect: By communicating boundaries, an individual is putting trust in the other person to respect those boundaries. Following a person’s boundaries demonstrates that you respect them and want them to feel safe and supported in your relationship.

Boundaries are important for everyone, however, for survivors of traumatic life events, they are a key element in their support system. Sexual abuse survivors especially benefit from establishing boundaries in their relationships, as sexual abuse involves a violation of sexual boundaries. This boundary violation is traumatic and survivors often feel as though they have no control over their lives after the event. Setting boundaries gives survivors control over what happens to them. Feeling as though they have regained control over their lives is a crucial step in the healing process.

Another way that boundaries promote healing for survivors is through the avoidance of triggers. Many of the boundaries survivors set are in some way related to their trauma. When those boundaries are violated, the individual can easily become triggered, which can cause intense distress. Constantly reliving the traumatic event through triggers is not a healthy healing environment, which is why respecting and remembering a survivor’s boundaries is one of the most important supportive measures someone who is part of a support system can take.

Whether or not you or someone you know has survived sexual abuse, it is always a good idea to assess your boundaries in relationships, as they are a leading factor in a happy and healthy relationship.

To survivors everywhere: we believe and support you. If you are in need of support or resources, please visit Survivors.org!

Written by PAVE’s Fall 2021 Social Media Intern, Elle!