A couple of months ago I asked ChatGPT to list out for me the top 20 most common traumatic life events that someone can endure. I found the results really interesting.

Looking back at the chat conversation, and reflecting on the past two years I had a couple of realizations. Here is the list…

1. Death of a spouse or partner
2. Death of a child
3. Serious illness or injury
4. Witnessing or experiencing violence
5. Natural disasters (e.g., earthquakes, hurricanes)
6. Personal or family member’s diagnosis of a severe medical condition
7. War or combat experience
8. Sexual assault or abuse
9. Divorce or separation
10. Loss of a job or financial instability
11. Substance abuse or addiction
12. Homelessness
13. Being a victim of a crime
14. Betrayal or infidelity
15. Immigration or forced displacement
16. Miscarriage or stillbirth
17. Childhood trauma or neglect
18. Car accidents or other severe accidents
19. Sudden or unexpected loss of a loved one
20. Experience of a traumatic event, such as terrorism or hostage situations

Many of my family members, friends, etc. have noticed that my luck the past two years has been absolutely shit, and they wouldn’t be wrong. Over the past two years, I’ve experienced 10-12 of the above 20 list items (depending on if repeats count).

What’s worse, because of the sensitive nature of many of them, I haven’t been able to talk about them openly except in therapy which has been very difficult.

After asking ChatGPT to list out 20 more my list got even more depressing, and I had to stop, but just knowing that I was going through some stuff helped me acknowledge things.