From What's Wrong With You? to What Happened to You

Why the Shift in Language is Changing the Way We Heal

For decades, mental health conversations often began with a loaded question: “What’s wrong with you?”
While it might have been intended to identify a problem, it carried an unspoken judgment—suggesting that the person is the problem.

Today, trauma-informed care is helping therapists, educators, and even medical providers replace that question with a far more compassionate one: “What happened to you?”

This isn’t just a feel-good change in wording. It’s a shift in mindset that can transform the way we see ourselves and the way healing happens.

Why Words Matter

The old question—“What’s wrong with you?”—frames a person as broken or defective. It places the focus on flaws and pathology.
The new question—“What happened to you?”—recognizes that behaviors, emotional patterns, and even physical symptoms often have roots in past experiences, especially those involving stress, loss, neglect, or trauma.

This approach says:

You make sense, even if your pain doesn’t feel logical right now.

Understanding Trauma-Informed Care

Trauma-informed care isn’t just a therapy trend—it’s a framework that guides how we interact with clients, students, patients, and even coworkers. At its core, it’s built on these principles:

1. Safety – Creating spaces where people feel physically and emotionally safe.

2. Trustworthiness – Being clear, consistent, and transparent.

3. Choice – Empowering people to make decisions about their own care.

4. Collaboration – Working with someone, not doing therapy to them.

5. Empowerment – Recognizing strengths and building resilience.

The Impact of the Shift

When a client hears “What happened to you?”, they often feel:

• Seen, not judged – The focus is on context, not character flaws.

• Relieved – It validates that their struggles didn’t appear out of thin air.

• Curious – They may begin to connect dots between past experiences and present challenges.

• Hopeful – If struggles have a root, they can be understood, addressed, and healed.

Tuning Into Trauma Histories

In practice, this means therapists slow down to ask about life experiences—not just symptoms.
For example:

• Instead of: “Why are you so anxious?”

• Try: “When did you first start feeling this way, and what was going on in your life at the time?”

• Instead of: “Why can’t you just move on?”

• Try: “What would moving forward feel like for you, and what might be making that hard right now?”

These questions open the door to deeper understanding, and they shift therapy from fixing to healing.

Why This Matters Outside Therapy

You don’t have to be a therapist to use this approach. Parents, partners, teachers, and managers can benefit from asking “What happened to you?” in moments of conflict or confusion. It helps us respond with empathy rather than judgment, and it can completely change the tone of a conversation.

The Takeaway

When we stop asking “What’s wrong with you?” and start asking “What happened to you?”, we send a powerful message:

Your experiences matter. You make sense. And you’re not broken—you’ve been surviving.

This shift doesn’t erase the need for accountability or personal growth. But it frames those steps in the context of compassion, which is where true healing starts.