Trauma and It's Effects

A few years ago while undergoing a sinus surgery, I woke up to the noise (and feeling) of my sinus cartilage being sawed apart. I must have made some sound because the doctor realized I was awake and quickly put me back under. Even though it only lasted a few seconds, it is a moment I will not soon forget.

Because life is imperfect and unpredictable, we all experience trauma in one form or another. Trauma is defined by James Finely, in his CD series called Transforming Trauma, as “the experience of being powerless to establish a boundary between you and that which is about to inflict serious harm.” Whether it be a soldier returning with PTSD, an invasive medical procedure, or being the witness of a gruesome accident, one episode of trauma can have lasting effects on an adult. This is true because the pain and fear which result do not just reside in the past- they revisit you whenever something triggers the memory, consciously or unconsciously.

When we are traumatized as a child, it can have an even greater impact. This is because it can become internalized into the very infrastructure of the self. When we are abused by someone we trust and not protected by those that are supposed to be the protectors, it does something to the brain that can have a life-long impact. That impact increases in direct proportion to the following factors:

• How young you were when the abuse started
• How little remorse the perpetrator showed
• Lack of a safe rescuer
• How often it happened

To endure ongoing physical, emotional, and/or sexual abuse from an early age and not have a safe harbor to speak the truth about what is happening to us creates a kind of brain trauma that is extremely difficult to recover from. No wonder we are likely to succumb to drug and alcohol addiction, develop relational problems, and even become a victim of mental illness and suicide. The lives and creative input into society that are lost to the impact of child abuse are absolutely heart breaking.

The things that we as survivors do in attempts to contain the trauma and soothe us from what we couldn’t escape become internalized as the ongoing survival strategies that we eventually need to outgrow. If they are not outgrown, they become symptoms of a dysfunctional life-style. Anything that is used in the service of the psychological defense that distances us from the unfinished pain in our own hearts becomes unhealthy. Some of these things might be:

· Disassociation (disconnection from self and surroundings)

· Food and chemical addiction

· Watching TV, computer use

· Rage

· Religion

I find it easy for me to use disassociation and food to create a buffer for myself when I start to feel overwhelmed. These are the patterns I developed early on in response to the abuse I suffered starting at the age of three. The way I survived the severe abuse I was enduring as a child was to compartmentalize the part of me that held the abuse memories and the feelings associated with those memories. That pattern of disconnecting my core self from my pain continued as an adult when I thought I didn’t have the resources to deal with what was happening. My brain did it automatically, without even being aware of what I was doing. A big piece of my healing journey has been to identify those parts of myself I had cut off and to love them back into health.

As we experience a present event in our lives that triggers the memory held in every cell in our bodies, our entire autonomic nervous systems re-experience the original trauma. Certain sounds, smells, or sights can remind us of a time and place that we had no control over bad things that were happening to us. The smell of pipe tobacco is one of those triggers for me. We may come to believe unconsciously that we are the sum total of nothing more than what happened to us as children. All of life is then seen through those glasses. Perhaps we were told (or shown) that we were not worth taking care of. Within that belief system, we make choices that impact our adult relationships, parenting, careers, and self-care. Our egos- the parts of us that hold those memories and attempt to keep the pain at bay, get caught up and carried along in our own reactivity, leading us to become other than who we really want to be. Instead of taking care of ourselves when we need some down time, perhaps we live out our unconscious belief about our worth by continuing to drive ourselves into the ground.

This presents two problems. First, we come to believe (through the influence of our ego) that we are only the culmination of our own thoughts and feelings. Whatever we think and feel has ultimate authority over what we perceive to be true. If something feels a certain way to us, we easily allow that to subvert even the reality of what we see and hear. Second, it perpetuates a cycle of violence that we perpetrate upon ourselves, shaming and beating up the parts of us that need love the most. In my life, I told the “part” that experienced ritual abuse at three that she was dirty and had to stay hidden in my closet for the rest of my life. I unknowingly entered into collusion with my abusers in shaming and rejecting myself. This self-rejection then sets us up for life-long abuse by our own hands (or minds) and the hands of others.

The PTSD that adults suffer from as a result of a temporary trauma can be challenging to heal. We all know of Vietnam veterans who still are unable to enter into life fully without being tortured by their experiences from the war many decades ago. Victims of natural disasters may have many triggers that send them into a fear response though there is no impending storm currently. Complex PTSD that many people suffer from as a result of ongoing childhood trauma can seem impossible to recover from. Enduring many years of abuse at the hands of those we trusted without an adult to help us understand what happened creates havoc with every part of our minds, bodies, and spirits.

There are many people now working to help those with complex PTSD heal and live thriving lives. These resources cover a large variety of issues including physical, emotional, and spiritual healing. The good news is that we are not alone and there is help! Despite the reality that our brains have been traumatized in a variety of ways, there is great hope for healing. We live in a time where we are gaining understanding of how our bodies, minds and spirits are affected by trauma and increasing resources daily for addressing those traumatized parts of us. The first, middle, and last thing we need to remember is that we cannot do it alone. Because our egos fail to inform us of the truths outside of our own thoughts and feelings, it is imperative for our healing that we have input from outside sources.

One source is the upcoming Living from the Heart video conference course beginning Monday, January 30th, 7 to 8:30 p.m. Pacific Time. The course is 12 weeks and each session includes 45 minutes of excellent content and 45 minutes of group coaching to apply that content to your everyday life. Check out the free introductory session MONDAY, JANUARY 23rd to hear more about the course and meet Misa. Send an email to inspire@misacoach.com for sign in information.

My prayer for this new year is that you will find the resources you need to be transformed from one wounded by trauma into the truth of the beautiful creature that lies inside you, waiting to be discovered.