Defining Trauma and Identifying a Path to Healing

Trauma is a word we hear everywhere these days. From “Therapy Tok” to TED talks, it seems like popular culture has a pretty good grasp on what trauma is and the affects it has on the human psyche. Yet, many of the videos I see and posts I read lack some of the crucial elements to the understanding of trauma that many experts hold now, so I thought I would take some time to clear things up and offer a deeper understanding of trauma and how we heal. 

The study of trauma from a neurobiological lens is a fairly new field, with research being done only for about the past 30 years. In this time, researchers and clinicians have found that trauma is any event that overwhelms the ordinary human adaptions to the stress of life. Stress and our responses to it are a normal part of life and human evolutionary biology. However, when the stress becomes too great, and our survival systems are overwhelmed, our brain encodes these experiences as traumatic. Consequently, if that traumatic stress is not resolved through being able to escape, find safety, and process the event with a safe, compassionate other, we can end up in a state of persistent and chronic stress response. This state adds further stress to our biological systems, and can result in being stuck in a loop of “trauma response”. This can look like persistent feelings of irritability, agitation, anger, fear, panic, and sadness; somatic symptoms of numbness, shakiness, nausea, and dizziness; disconnection from others or from our own body or experience; symptoms of brain fog, trouble with memory, and feeling like the world doesn’t seem quite real.

Now, many of these symptoms and definitions are prevalent in popular culture’s depictions of trauma. However, what often gets missed is the important concept that all of our “trauma responses” are biologically imperative and helpful mechanisms to support our pursuit of safety in dangerous circumstances. Every symptom is originated by systems in your body that are seeking safety, or in other words, homeostasis, which is the body’s natural rhythm and state of rest which it is wired to return to. Often in our efforts to “treat symptoms”, we have robbed the body of its natural resources and the inherent “map” our nervous system provides us to find our way back to safety. If we can learn to listen to and “follow” these responses, we will gain invaluable information which holds the keys to our path of healing. Our bodies hold the medicine, the wisdom that we need, to return to safety, rest, and regulation, if only we will learn to listen. 

So what does it look like to learn to listen to our bodies, as we journey on the path of healing from trauma. The practice of embodiment is a necessary place to start. Embodiment is the experience of becoming consciously aware of our existence in our bodies, and that our awareness of our physical sensations can lead to an experience of emotional depth and powerful meaning making. Even as I write this, I noticed my body slumping over and my eyes starting to drift close, a feeling like I wanted to disassociate from my felt experience. As I took a moment to witness these sensations, I noticed underneath this feeling of “stuckness” was a desire to move and “flee”. So I stood up, moved around my office, noticed all the things I loved in this space, sat on the ground and felt its support underneath me, wiggled my toes and peddled my feet. Before I knew it, I was feeling present, safe, and energized to continue writing. By following our bodies cues of dysregualtion and responses to stress, we can discharge them and integrate stressful experiences and more quickly return to a state of rest and capacity.

If you have experienced trauma and are dealing with the symptoms mentioned, and would like support in fostering embodiment and safety in your body, I would love to get the chance to see if working together would be a good fit. Check out my website to learn more about how I work and schedule a free consultation call to hear a bit about what working together could be like. I looking forward to hearing from you soon. Take good care, dear ones.