What is trauma therapy? How does trauma therapy work?
Trauma therapy or trauma counseling is treatment in a therapeutic setting that is specifically focused on treating emotional and mental health patterns that have resulted from trauma(s). Many evidenced-based forms of trauma focused therapy go beyond traditional “talk therapy” and incorporate interventions that are also focused on the body, nervous system and thought patterns; mind-body approaches. Trauma therapy is specialized and it’s important that you work with a trained professional that is trauma-informed and utilizes some form of a somatic-based therapeutic intervention.
Why Trauma Therapy has to go beyond traditional “Talk Therapy”
Trauma changes our brains; the way we think, perceive the world and ourselves in relation to others. Trauma is also stored in our nervous systems and our body. In order to heal the roots of our trauma, we have to go beyond talking about the trauma and it’s affects on us and work with the current felt sense experience we have related to the trauma. Therefore, we have to include the mind and the body in the healing process.
“Being traumatized means continuing to organize your life as if the trauma were still going on—unchanged and immutable—as every new encounter or event is contaminated by the past.”
― Bessel A. van der Kolk
What defines trauma?
Trauma (the word is Greek and means “injury”) is a response to a deeply distressing or disturbing event(s) that overwhelms an individual’s ability to cope. This can result in feelings of helplessness, diminished sense of self and ability to feel a full range of emotions and experiences.
Trauma does not discriminate and can be experienced by anyone, any age, any gender, any race, any socioeconomic status, etc. In fact, trauma comes, sooner or later, to all us us. In a recent government survey, about 60% of adults in the US said that they had experienced significant abuse and/or neglect in childhood.
In psychology, we discuss two types of traumas: ‘Big T’ trauma (e.g. life threatening events including natural disasters, poverty, rape, war, assault, car accident, physical abuse, medical emergency, etc.) and ‘Little t’ trauma (e.g. distressing events, but not necessarily life threatening such as bullying, loss of a pet, emotional abuse, break-up, loss of a job, etc.) Despite this difference in whether the traumatic event was life threatening or not, ‘Big T’ and ‘Little t’ traumas can both have significant negative effects over one’s mental, emotional, spiritual and physical well-being and are both created equally important in the treatment.
Trauma can result in multiple mental health diagnosis including, but not limited to: Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), Complex-Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (C-PTSD), anxiety, depression, mood disorders, etc. In fact, it can be said that the underlying root of many mental health disorders is some kind of unresolved trauma. The main difference between C-PTSD and PTSD is that PTSD usually occurs after a single traumatic event, while C-PTSD is associated with repeated trauma, often starting in childhood and can be connected to attachment and developmental wounds.
No one can decide for you how traumatic an event was. Only the person who experienced the event can express the degree to which it was traumatizing for them.
What are symptoms of trauma?
There are many symptoms of trauma and no one person looks the same with trauma. Here I have listed some symptoms of trauma that are broken down in terms of mental, psychological, emotional and physical.
Physical Symptoms of Trauma:
Insomnia or nightmares
Fatigue
Being startled easily
Difficulty concentrating & focusing
Racing heartbeat
Edginess and agitation
Aches and pains
Muscle tension
Emotional, Mental and Psychological Symptoms of Trauma:
Shock, denial, or disbelief
Intrusive thoughts
Confusion, difficulty concentrating & focusing
Anger, irritability, mood swings
Anxiety and fear
Guilt, shame, self-blame
Withdrawing from others & Isolating
Paranoid about others/mistrust in others
Difficulties in interpersonal relationships
Feeling unsafe and hypervigilant
Feeling sad or hopeless
Feeling disconnected or numb
Active or passive suicidal ideation
What are goals of trauma therapy?
The client and the therapist work together to come up with goals for trauma therapy that are specific to the client’s needs and desires. As a therapist, along with my client’s goals, I am also focused on progress that includes an increase in feeling safe both with self and others, a decrease in body activation when thinking about the traumatic event(s), mood stability, increase in mental flexibility, increase in mental presence and an increase in personal agency and self-empowerment.
Getting help for trauma.
Common types of trauma therapy that are somatic-based:
Brainspotting (BSP) or Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR): both BSP and EMDR are therapeutic modalities that include a somatic approach to help integrate the mind and body out of a traumatic response. Brainspotting and EMDR are powerful, focused treatment methods that work by identifying, processing and releasing core neurophysiological sources of emotional/body pain, trauma, dissociation and a variety of other challenging symptoms using eye positions and bilateral stimulation as part of the processing. You can learn more about Brainspotting here.
Somatic Experience (SE): a specific approach to somatic therapy that is based on the idea that traumatic experiences can lead to dysfunction in your nervous system, which can keep you from fully processing the experience and keeping you stuck in a fight, flight or freeze response. Rather than focusing only on thoughts or emotions associated with a traumatic event, SE expands to include the natural bodily (somatic) responses (felt experience).
Internal Family Systems (IFS) or Parts Work or Ego States: parts work focuses on working with our defenses and wounded parts of us that have developed from a trauma or challenging time in our lives. The goal is to help restore mental balance and harmony by changing the dynamics that create discord among the sub-personalities and the Self.
In addition to therapy, there are ways that you can help heal yourself if you are suffering from trauma.
7 Ways to support yourself if you have trauma:
Move your body! Shake it out! Trauma is stored in our body and nervous system. When animals are attacked, they shake afterwards which helps release the stress and adrenaline so that their body’s don’t store the trauma. As humans, we tend to fight the urge to shake after a distressing or traumatic event due to our ego (we’ll look weird or weak), fear (scary to feel out of control), or others stopping us (strapped in a gurney, or being hugged/held after getting hurt). We tend to stop the natural impulse that our body’s need to do to process and release the trauma and stress from our nervous system.
Moving forward, let your body shake when you naturally have the urge to shake. If you’ve had trauma in your past, your nervous system might be stuck in a fight, flight or freeze response, but it’s not too late to restore a healthy nervous system. Start by shaking it out. Put on some music if you need to and start shaking from your feet up through your legs into the upper body.
It’s ok if you feel self-conscious when you start this practice; if you need to, close your eyes and find a safe place to let yourself go. Once you get past the initial awkwardness, you’ll find a flow and you’ll feel a shift.
In addition to shaking, move your body several days a week. Do whatever feels good to you - just get up and move. While moving your body, observe your felt sense - notice muscles that are working for you, sensations, heart rate, quality of your breath, etc.
Don’t isolate. Many have experienced trauma that is rooted in relationships, in one way or another, so connecting with others might feel counterintuitive. And, we heal in connection to others - so, how do we not isolate when this might feel most natural after experiencing trauma? Understanding why it’s important to connect with others is a good place to start: A big part of regulating the nervous system is co-regulating with others (mirror neurons). This is why there are some people you might feel more comfortable or less activated when around, but you can’t really explain why - mirror neurons and co-regulating is most likely occurring. If we don’t have others, we end up having to auto-regulate, which can be extremely difficult if your stuck in a fight, flight or freeze response.
Instead of isolating, identify a few safe people for yourself and connect with them throughout the week in a way that feels safe to you and with the intention to co-regulate and to remember that you are not alone. You don’t have to talk about the trauma or share anything that you’re not comfortable sharing, so take that pressure off of yourself. Just simply talking or being with a safe person can feel good to us and shift our internal state (mirror neurons)
Know the difference between isolation and “me time.” If you need alone time or “me time”, that’s fine and can be important to your healing. However, get to know the difference between alone time and isolating so that you can make healthy choices for yourself and not reinforce a trauma wound. A big difference between the two is that alone time tends to leave you feeling energized or refreshed vs. isolation you might be left feeling more depressed or low and perhaps even some self-punishment involved.
Regulate your nervous system. No matter how activated you feel, you can shift your nervous system’s response. Vagal toning exercises can help regulate your nervous system along with deep breaths, shaking/moving your body and grounding exercises. Click here for specific exercises to regulate your nervous system.
Sleep hygiene. A lack of quality sleep can increase traumatic symptoms due to the body and brain not getting the rest it needs to restore itself. While trauma can negatively effect our sleep, it is important to do what you can to help provide the best sleep environment as possible (internal and external). What can you do to help your sleep? Click here for tips to help you sleep better and you can also check out my trauma-informed guided meditation practices here that are specifically designed to help improve your sleep and reach optimal rest.
Stay hydrated. Because trauma can create a disconnection from your body, you might not be attuned to your body’s needs, including hydration. Make it a habit to hydrate throughout the day while you are learning to connect to your body through your mind body practices. When you are more connected to your body’s needs, you’ll start to be able to hydrate when your body asks for it - intuitively taking care of yourself.
Practice mind body connection. Because trauma tends to disconnect our minds from our body, it’s important that you intentionally work on being more connect to your body in a way that feels safe for you. It can feel scary at first to start this process so you need options to meet your needs and to work within your window of tolerance. Part of integrating our minds and body is so we can feel aligned with what we think and how we feel. You can learn more ways to integrate the mind body connection here.
Meditation. Meditation is the antidote to trauma (Dr. James S. Gordon). According to Dr. Gordon, when we meditate, we are reversing the biological damage that trauma does. Meditation calms the storm. It helps us regulate the amygdala, balances the nervous system to move us into rest and digest mode.
My meditations are an excellent place to start if you are new to mind body connection work because they are trauma-informed in their guidance including language that provides you with choices and a variety of ways to resource and ground during the practice.
I offer a variety of meditations that focus on things like inner child work, sleep, chronic pain, and soothing your nervous system to feel more calm. You can browse my meditations by clicking the button below, or follow me on Insight Timer.
Remember, trauma is not your fault and how you are experiencing the symptoms of trauma are also not your fault - your body and brain are responding in a physiological way to make sure you survived and continue to survive. Although trauma is a part of life, it does not have to be a life sentence. You deserve help and support. We don’t heal in isolation and we also can’t think our way out of this type of psychological pain. I’ll say it again, you deserve help and support.
If you’re in California, let’s see if you and I might be a good fit for trauma therapy. You can connect with me here.
