Trauma occurs when average coping mechanisms are overwhelmed by helplessness and / or terror. The Fight or Flow survival response is engaged without resolution. There is an ignition of the response ( chemical / neurological ) ( fight / race / freeze ) but when it fails to avert the danger and the body does not discharge / complete the cycle, the reaction is undecided and sits inert in the body, ready to be reignited by other ‘ triggers’ – kin experiences ( or what we even perceive as coincident ). This is a survival / jaundiced response. But when it fails to avert danger, the celebration becomes a trauma.
The body treats physical and emotional traumatic events the same way. The body / mind reacts – the body reacts – the physiological and neurological systems respond – the fight or lope – adrenaline response. But many other things are happening in the brain ( most importantly, the most primitive area, the limbic system ). The amygdala and hippocampus are overstimulated, which can consequence in memories that aren’ t refined correctly – and can look like flashbacks, nightmares, etc.
As ‘ civilized’ humans, we have overridden the unlovely behavior which can help us process and complete this experience. Inasmuch as, the chemical residue from the event ( adrenaline, etc. ) remains in our body, trapping with it the energy that would be expelled if we allowed the cycle to complete. Imagine you’ re in a dangerous locus and you were prevented from fleeing or defending yourself. The movements of escape or defense – which your nervous system has prepared for – need to be concluded. This energy needs a way out. Common body signals of this share are restlessness, clenching, pulling away, bouncing feet, and twitching.
If you were in a where station you had not been able to escape, the body’ s defense is to ‘ freeze’ ( play dead ) - which deceives the predator. When the body awakens from the ‘ freeze’, it shakes. We have inhibited this mechanism as well.
Although trauma arouses strong emotions, many of its far-off effects are physical: sleep problems, hypervigilance and / or high startle response, numbness or hypersensitivity to touch, etc.
We rest to act even when the event ( s ) has passed whereas of ‘ triggers’ ( i. e., sounds, allied events / situation, smells, lights, voices, etc., ) and the cycle reignites in our bodies, retraumatizing us, now the cycle hasn’ t over the first time.
Traumatized people cherish to overinterpret in the direction of threat and fear, accordingly their physical bodies act, not just their minds. Their nervous system tends to stay on alert all the time after a while, even when they are not in danger. ( The sympathetic nervous system as opposed to the parasympathetic nervous system.
) They are always on the ‘ accelerator’, there are no brakes. Their body seems stuck in the traumatic response and physical experience and they become disconnected from real life.
Unhealed trauma can generate conditions such as ‘ tautology compulsion’ locale the person engages in similar behavior to the traumatic event. Why? The body continues to scout a discharge from the overstimulation of chemicals and scarcity of release so the mind unconsciously reproduces situations similar to the pristine traumatic event. It is the mind’ s experiment to replay the rundown to complete it and get it right and no longer be the victim.
People are physically organized to respond to things that happen to themselves with actions that change the station, but when they’ re traumatized and can’ t do fact to stop, reverse or correct the bearings ( frail ), they freeze, explode or subscribe in mindless actions. Then, to gentle their screwy, muddled physiological systems, they start drinking, taking drugs, or striking in fury.
When there is strong energy trapped in the body the emotional and mental parts of the brain explicate this into either intense emotions such as aversion, hatred, humiliation, etc., or ideas of trouble, query or negative ideology.
How Can We Help?
Educate! Normalize the experience. Paraphrase what is happening. Yep, it will still hurt and still be a painful experience, but it does not have to be a fearful, indeterminate experience.
Work with the body! Since trauma affects the body, the healing of trauma begins in the body. The body holds the memories and the scars of trauma. Typic psychological counseling puts importance on the mind, when the body, the physical, is bearing much of the worry. ‘ Something’ s missing’ if you just target on the mind.
Conversation is not always effective thanks to the domination of trauma doesn’ t sit in the spoken understanding part of the brain. It sits in the limbic system and brain stem – setting somatic ( physical ) memory lies.
No ‘ stories’ are told or asked for. The work is done slowly, releasing a bit at a time so it is not far out. We can reteach the body / mind to process events / thoughts properly.
Safety is the first step in releasing this trapped energy. A therapist trained in body - centered therapy knows how to curb what comes up and what they’ re looking at. We help build trust and security, build healthy boundaries, reduce potency of triggers, build new management skills ( ‘ traumatic brakes’ ), and build awareness.
There is no ‘ stigma’ attached to working with the physical body.
‘ Bodywork’ ( therapeutic hard by or predomination of the body by using specialized techniques ) deals with somatic issues. Many people are not easy language about their problems.
You endure clothed at all times.
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