Episode #57 How to know if you have Experienced Trauma

How to know if you have Experienced Trauma

I honestly think there are many people who do not believe they have experienced trauma. However, it is quite possible you've experienced more trauma than you realize. Today I am breaking down another episode of the amazing podcast: The Place We Find Ourselves.

What follows are my notes from listening to the podcast. However, I encourage you to listen to it yourself! These are SO eye-opening. I personally believe nearly every human has endured at least some aspect of trauma. You may have handled it well and not need help. But chances are you, or someone you know, is greatly damaged by it, and you understanding what it is could be greatly helpful. 

What is Trauma?

Trauma comes from the Greek word WOUND and it changes the physical structure of your mind and body. 

In order to experience trauma you must have: 

1. A feeling of helplessness combined with

2. Abandonment by those who could have helped but didn't. 

The event itself is not what determines whether something is absolutely traumatizing. Trauma does not reside in the event proper. Trauma involves not being able to use your body or voice to make the bad thing stop happening. This is followed by the realization that you are utterly alone and there is no one that you can run to or talk to and be there for you and understand you and help you process what happened. You may look back and not even realize these emotions exist. 

Trauma introduces a pair of agonies into your heart. It says: "I can't say or do anything to make this awful thing to stop happening. And the people who are supposed to be protecting me aren't there to engage with me and protect me and protect my devastated heart."

You are alone. 

What DID you need as a child?

So what DID you need a child? Well, this is another episode entirely but Polyvagal Theory is a big thing that can give you a lot of information on this topic. 

All kids need their BIG SIX needs met by their parents (Visit Episode 2 for more information about the BIG SIX.)

1. Be attuned to them. 

2. Be emotionally responsive to them. 

3. Engage their hearts

4. Be willing and able to regulate their affect

5. The parents need to be strong enough to handle child's negative emotions

6. The parents need to be willing to repair when they harm their child

If there is a poverty of any of these things, the brain does not develop properly. 

For example, think about some abuse that may have happened in your life. When you ask the question: "Who did you talk to first about it?" If your answer is that you didn't go to anyone -- that indicates a problem. Abuse victims often couldn't go and ask either parent. 

You will probably be tempted to think "that wasn't my parents' fault. I withdrew from them and didn't tell them." But you are wrong. The most basic human instinct is to run home and tell your parent when something bad happens to you. If you did not run home and tell your parents when something bad happened, there is a very good reason for that. 

Individuals who were present for 9-11 and went home and properly digested with their family, did better than those who did not. This is why trauma at home is the worst kind of trauma. It is developmental trauma. 

Symptoms Do Not Lie

Symptoms don't lie. If you have the symptoms of trauma, you probably have trauma even if you can't remember it. Here are three of the common symptoms of someone who has had trauma in their past? 

1. Problems with affect regulation. Do you get disregulated often and have a hard trouble bringing your body back to.a place of comfort and rest. (Episode #20) "The byproduct of trauma is an unregulated body experience, an uncontrollable cascade of strong emotions and physical sensations. Truamatized people frequently experience themselves at being at the mercy of their sensations as well as their emotions, having lost the capacity to effectively regulate these emotions." People will either fall into (a) panic, terror, rage (b) shame or hopeless despair. Do you feel anger bigger than the circumstance warrants? Do you have disproportionate fear or anxiety that just feels bigger than it should be given the situation? 

2. Problems with interpersonal regulation. Developmental trauma results in insecure attachment.(Visit Episode 5 and Episode 7 for more information on attachment). This can even be that you do NOT have difficulty with people because you avoid that difficulty at all costs. OR there is tons of debris in past relationships. The mark of a healthy relationship is the degree to which the two people can navigate conflict. How does the relationship do after there is relationship rupture? If you have trouble with #2 there is a history of broken relationships or there is never any issues because you have avoided them. When you are deregulated (Symptom #1) it is hard to stay connected to another person (Symptom #2). Disregulation makes us either super clingy because we need the other person to regulate us or it makes us isolate from others so we can self-regulate. Healthy relationships allow you to remain as an individual. But when you are insecurely attached, it is difficult to stay connect to and differentiated from another person especially if there is conflict between the two of you.

3. Problems receiving kindness, care, and comfort. Difficult receiving kindness from others and especially hard giving yourself kindness. (Check next episode 58 for more information about your posture toward yourself in trauma). You will tend to long for kindness from others but at the same time you are suspicious of this kindness or you will feel this nervousness and discomfort about it. Is it hard for you to receive compliments? If it is hard for you to receive offers for kindness and care for others? People with a history of trauma, they have a MASSIVE WAR with being kind to themselves. When you are struggling, what posture do you have toward your heart or body? Or do you tend to push through or endure or push yourself harder or beat yourself up? Is it difficult for you to be kind toward your own body? 

Some of you may be opening to the possibility that you experienced more trauma than you realized. It is very common to get derailed by minimizing your story. "I feel like what you are calling my trauma is relatively small. I'm not starving. I wasn't beaten every night. Those are the kids who have trauma." 

There are people who have experienced more severe trauma than you. Does that mean your trauma is not worthy of engagement? Does a broken arm hurt any less because it is not the worst pain you could be in?