Paris 2022: history and trauma repeating itself

Like many people connected with Liverpool Football Club, I've spent the last three days thinking about past trauma. 

We may not all be conscious of it - although some clearly are judging by their heartbreaking social media posts - but we've been relieving deeply affecting past experiences in the light of events in Paris on Saturday evening at the Champions League Final. 

My connection with Liverpool FC goes back to 7th March 1984, when, aged 5, I went to my first match at Anfield. Benfica. European Cup. Quarter Final. Rush. 1-0.

In those 38 years, I've been to watch Liverpool all over the country and all over Europe, including at two Champions League finals. My last final was in Athens in 2007 when, but for some good fortune and the desperate clinging to the hand of my mate, Kenny, I feared I was going to be seriously injured or worse. I vowed never to attend another match like that again. Chaotic organisation. Inadequate policing. A crush outside the ground. Deeply unsettling. Too reminiscent of the days before football was big business and we were constantly herded like animals. 

From the safety of my sofa on Saturday evening, I felt my heart sink when history started to repeat itself in the hours before kick off in Paris. In the time that has followed, my feelings as a fan (anger, sadness and sickening deja vu) have given way to my feelings as a therapist: feelings for those who are experiencing trauma related to their previous experiences. 

I wasn't at Hillsborough - my dad and I gave our Upper Leppings Lane tickets to a friend whose life was ruined by the trauma of what he saw and experienced on that horrific day - an event which left 97 Liverpool fans unlawfully killed  - but my mind has spent much of the last three days flashing between Paris and Sheffield - and seeing UEFA and French government following in the footsteps of their 1989 British equivalents in shifting the blame immediately to the Liverpool fans with lie after vile lie. The biggest difference this time is that the lies have been exposed by the social media testimony of those present, before the media has had chance to put the boot in. 

Tragically, many people who survived Hillsborough, were bereaved at Hillsborough, or bereaved later because of Hillsborough, were present in Paris or were watching the unfolding horror at the ground and in the aftermath on TV and they are now facing the horrible prospect of re-living their previous trauma. It's a trauma they have lived with every day since 15th April 1989. It's a trauma that they have been forced to face again in the last 72 hours. 

I have read accounts already by a number of Hillsborough survivors and family members who lost loved ones at Hillsborough and it is clear that Paris has brought it all back. For some, it was a trauma they have spoken about and tried to deal with - sometimes through counselling. For others, it was a trauma they have bottled up and hidden from view, perhaps even from themselves, trying hard to deal with what they experienced in silence. Paris has made that even harder. 

In the coming days, weeks and months, more and more people connected with Liverpool Football Club will be feeling not just the pain of Paris and the things they witnessed first hand or have seen through TV and social media, but the pain of past trauma it has reignited. The days ahead will be very tough for very many.

As a therapist, I am contacting the club and the groups who support Hillsborough survivors and family members and friends of those lost, to offer to help. I hope many other counsellors will join me. This is a time when nobody involved should walk alone.