PTSD and Trauma
PTSD and Trauma
Do you find yourself avoiding situations or preparing for the worst? Are you frequently scanning for danger? Likely to feel triggered?
Do small events or roadblocks sometimes cause you to have a large reaction? Perhaps people in your life have told you that your responses to things seem out of proportion, or don’t make sense. You might be quick to anger, or easily frightened, or experience a panic attack at the smallest provocation (or for no apparent reason at all).
Maybe you feel numb or dissociated from your body, your self, or your life. Perhaps you find it hard to stay focused and present.
It might be extremely hard for you to feel safe. This could be in particular situations, around people, or more generally.
If any of this sounds familiar, it’s possible you are experiencing the effects of trauma.
Trauma is widespread and unique to each person’s experience. Generally speaking, trauma occurs when someone lives through an intense, potentially life-threatening event—for example, a car crash, rape or other acts of violence, natural disaster, serious illness. Trauma can also occur from the death of a loved one, or witnessing a traumatic event second-hand.
Further, a type of trauma called complex trauma can occur from the accumulation of smaller incidents that accrue over time. This frequently occurs in a relational dynamic, such as in someone’s family, romantic relationships, or wider social circles—for example, emotional abuse, neglect, and persistent bullying—as well as from financial insecurity and the inability to have one’s basic needs met (food, sleep, shelter, social acceptance).
Many of us have some form of trauma. Terrible things happen. Life is messy and painful. None of us are ever perfectly safe.
Some would argue that we have all been living through a collective, or shared, trauma in the form of Covid-19 and its subsequent impacts. Perhaps we’re living through an even deeper, yet subtler trauma of the ongoing climate crisis.
Yet, people are incredibly resilient. Even our response to traumatic events (such as PTSD) are our nervous systems’ adaptive attempts to survive and keep living.
The problem comes when our response to trauma has outlived its purpose. It could keep you from feeling fully alive, or ever feeling at peace, or keep you feeling disconnected from your own body, or from other people—physically, mentally, or emotionally cut off, guarded.
Fortunately, there are ways of treating PTSD and other traumas. It is possible to heal from things that have happened to you. PTSD treatment and trauma therapy are effective ways to process the impact of what you’ve been through, and learn to feel more alive, connected, and resilient as you move forward more fully into your life.
What does PTSD treatment and trauma therapy look like?
The first step is cultivating a sense of safety and acceptance that is often lacking in our lives outside of therapy. Whatever you’ve been through, wherever you are currently experiencing, I start by greeting you with warmth and compassion. Therapy is a relationship where all of you is welcome.
From there, trauma therapy and PTSD treatment vary from person to person. Some people find healing through verbal processing of the event (whether singular or recurrent), allowing themselves to share their story and feel the associated feelings with the support of a caring, non-judgmental professional. Other people benefit from examining how their lives are currently being impacted, exploring ways of increasing resiliency and utilizing coping skills tailored to your own strengths. Some clients benefit from integrating mindfulness and body-awareness, working through the remnants of the trauma in a body-focused way with present-moment awareness.
I don’t want to give any more thought or energy to what happened. What’s the point of dwelling on the past?
Good point! However, whether we consciously want to give attention to what’s happened in the past, our bodies and our nervous systems contain the accumulated information of what’s happened to us in our lives. Many times, this leads to living less fully engaged with one’s life, eternally poised for danger, reactive to any perceived threat. So, while we needn’t necessarily “obsess” with what has happened, it can be helpful to acknowledge the trauma, while finding ways of healing the stored information so you can proceed with your life less burdened by the residue of your painful past.
One of the leading experts on healing trauma, Bessel Van Der Kolk, put it this way: "Trauma treatment is not about telling stories about the past. Trauma treatment is about helping people to be here now, to tolerate what they feel right in the present.”
