...on Trauma

Trauma is an emotional response to events or circumstances that create more stress and/or pain than we are able to cope with. Consequently our survival systems are activated, which can leave our nervous systems overly sensitised and on alert for threat or danger within our environment. We can be traumatised by: one-off accidents and attacks; physical, psychological or sexual abuse; bereavement, abandonment, neglect and/or conflict; the lack of a relationally attuned parent as we were growing up.

Beyond having an awareness of our personal history, what might indicate we have been impacted by traumatic experience? There is an interesting article – Daniela F. Sieff (2017), Trauma Worlds and the Wisdom of Marion Woodman, Psychological Perspectives 60(2) pp.170-185 – which helpfully identifies three internal trauma worlds that can be created as a part of our survival response to traumatic experience. The nature of these worlds are:

• HYPERVIGILANCE, fear and/or anxiety: which can leave us with an over-stimulated nervous system and cause us to have difficulty trusting others and/or resting in a feeling of safety.

• DISCONNECTION and/or dissociation: making it difficult for us to know or be in touch with our emotional and/or somatic realities.

• SHAME: which can leave us with feelings of self-hatred, inadequacy, unworthiness and/or a belief that we are unlovable or, in some profound way, not enough.

If feelings of fear, disconnection or shame colour or dominate our experience, we may be living with the legacy of developmental, relational and/or incident-related trauma. We might also think of trauma worlds as territories within a wider internal landscape, which we move in and out of, and so do not inhabit at all times. We can feel resourced and well for varying amounts of time, but then become activated or 'triggered' (sometimes unknowingly or by the most subtle of cues, for example, the way another person looks at or speaks to us) and we find ourselves inhabiting one or more of our trauma-related territories.

It can be helpful to think of traumatic history creating internal territories because it serves to remind us we are more than just our symptoms and/or our reactivity. We do not have to be wholly identified with the impact and consequence of traumatic experience; herein lies the possibility of making a subtle but important shift away from completely identifying with our experience of self or ‘I’ ("I am unlovable" or our "I am anxious"), towards experiencing self as an ever-changing and fluid process. Making this shift strengthens our observing ego or witness-consciousness and supports our capacity to notice our trauma worlds beginning to spin, to be aware as we fall into the black hole of our shame, and to be mindful when we experience 'other' through the veil of our own fear.

How might therapy support our discovering more choice and freedom if/when we find ourselves dwelling in trauma-related territories? Let’s look at each territory in turn.

• HYPERVIGILANCE: Our experience of this territory might include anxiety or panic-attacks, restlessness, aggression, avoidance behaviours, addiction (often in an attempt to self-regulate), difficulty trusting others/partners including a fear of abandonment. A therapeutic approach might include: bringing awareness to our particular trauma-related patterns, understanding them and developing our capacity to notice when they are arising, whether in the form of emotions, thoughts, sensations or impulses; learning to calm an overactive nervous system through breath, relaxation and movement; building our internal and external resources (including somatic, emotional, relational, creative, spiritual), which can support us to find more internal ground and resilience.

• DISCONNECTION: When sufficiently resourced, and if our therapeutic relationship offers enough safety, we can begin to explore and connect with aspects of our mind-body experience that we have either become numb to or have banished into unconsciousness. An example might be early anger or grief in response to a history of misattuned parent/care-givers who offered fear/neglect in place of safety/nurture. By allowing and connecting to trauma-related feelings - in present-time and within a safe-making relationship - we can learn they do not have to overwhelm us. Connecting to our experience at a greater depth offers the possibility of processing and integrating what was once cut-off, which can in turn release us from fear and/or our need to avoid feelings/situations that might once have felt overwhelming.

• SHAME: The territory of shame is associated with intense feelings of being unlovable, undeserving, defective and/or not enough, which can also settle upon particular aspects of self such as appearance, weight or intelligence. We might defend against our sense of lack by, for example, turning towards perfectionism, having a tendency to blame or control others or by becoming defensive or rageful if/when we feel criticised. We can also become weighed down by feelings of shame, and withdraw into depression, despair and/or addiction. A powerful 'inner-critic' may reside within, who judges, berates and/or acts to undermine us within our intimate relationships, work and/or social life. We can be supported to challenge our inner-critic and develop greater shame-resilience by finding/forming a therapeutic relationship, where we experience the attuned presence of a therapist who reflects us back to ourselves without distortion. We can bring awareness to shaming messages internalised through our childhood and adult lives, and so begin a process of disentangling our truth from the distorted and distorting perceptions of others. Within a relational atmosphere of allowing, kindness and curiosity we can be supported to find a greater acceptance of self and a more authentic way of being as we dare, perhaps for the first time, to let that which shames us be seen and met within the holding field of an attuned and compassionate relationship.

By establishing resource and creating space around our reactivity, anxiety or fear, by coming to allow, know and see ourselves more clearly within an attuned relationship, and by relaxing our defences against feelings of anger, pain, shame and vulnerability we may come to find an easier way of being. Our trauma territories will remain a part of us, familiar places we will inevitably revisit, but in a way that enables us to take greater responsibility for ourselves within them, resting in a knowledge they were borne out of our instinct to survive.