First steps to Peace After Trauma

A quick google search found that “Trauma is when we experience very stressful, frightening or distressing events that are difficult to cope with or out of our control. It could be one incident, or an ongoing event that happens over a long period of time. Most of us will experience an event in our lives that could be considered traumatic.”

For me, the words that stand out here are “out of our control.” The fact that you are taking the time to read this blog shows that you are on the hunt for answers, information, anything really that will shed light on why your ‘now’ is still being negatively affected by your ‘past.’ Even though I may not have met you, I’m pretty sure you have had moments during which you felt out of control. Not a nice feeling. Your senses; what you see, what you hear, feel, taste and smell are overloaded. Powerlessness goes along with that.

You see it’s the powerlessness that we feel that stays with us. Even though the upsetting event is long over, it hangs around like an annoying person. Every now and then when things are going well, it taps you on the shoulder and says, “Hi, I’m still here. I haven’t gone away you know.”

‘It’ shows up in a number of ways. You might get a flashback to the upsetting event, such as a colour or black and white movie of the whole experience. It could also be a snapshot almost like a photograph of what happened in the past.

Or it might turn up in the form of a sound such as a person’s voice or your own voice when you said to yourself “Oh s**t!” Or maybe you get a feeling in the pit of your stomach, a tense feeling in your neck, shoulders and jaw.

You may get a smell or even a taste that reminds you of the unwanted event.

Now here is the interesting thing. You most likely curse your mind and body for feeling all of these things. It’s like your being teased or taunted by your thoughts that won’t just let go, and you’re being bombarded by a past, that is messing up your now, your today, your every waking moment. “But why does this keep happening,” you’re probably asking. “How come I can’t put it out of my head? Why do I keep getting reminders of what happened all that time ago, especially when my life begins to settle down again and I’m wanting to move on? Why??”

Well the answer is simple, but most likely not what you expect to hear.

Consider this. When you get the replay in your mind of the traumatic event; when you get the noise in your head, the feeling in your body, the fear, the dread, the smell or taste perhaps; these all make you do one thing. You are jolted back to being on guard. Being on high alert. Being ready for what might happen. Because to drop your guard, to relax, to chill out and be carefree in the moment is seen by a part of your brain as being a dangerous and stupid thing to do.

No, it’s best to remain on high alert, best to be prepared in case anything else bad happens. The purpose of all of these thoughts and feelings is to keep you SAFE! This is all about safety.

Let’s recap. One of the first steps to Peace After Trauma is understanding that your body, not just your mind, is super-intelligent. Your mind and body join forces to keep you safe. To keep you out of harms way. To keep you from experiencing anything that will hurt you. How? By making you feel jittery, unsettled, giving you racing thoughts, keeping you awake at night, losing your appetite, or binge eating. Making you fearful. All done in the name of self-love. All done in the name of safety. All done in the name of survival.

But chances are you curse your mind and your body for bringing up all of these reminders that the world is a scary place. Consider this. Your mind will do what I did at the very start of this blog. It will ‘google’ for answers as to what to do in any given scary situation. If you have stored in your mind past events that were unexpected, dramatic, when you felt isolated with no strategy of getting out of the way to safety, then your mind will throw you into panic, overwhelm, and in a split second give you four main ways through the chaos. So, what are these four options?

Fight: you can physically confront the person or whatever it is that is causing you stress. Flight: you can run or flee the danger. Freeze: you can stay still, play dead and hope the frightening event will be over soon. Fawn: you can people-please your way out of the problem, be submissive and like a doormat, hoping you’ll be left alone.

Ok, another recap. When you think of an upcoming event like a social gathering, a presentation you have to give, a difficult conversation you need to have for example, you’ll get triggered. Your mind ‘Google’s’ what way you should behave and your internal google search will bring up results like; ‘stand your ground and confront the situation; run like hell and escape; freeze and hope it’ll all go away soon; or people-please everyone.’ Add to this the flooding of adrenaline and cortisol into you body to help you quickly do one or a combination of these four and hey presto! You’ve been triggered. All with the aim of putting you onto high alert so you will end the fearful situation and move to a place of safety.

Obviously there will be varying degrees of what you consider is danger. Equally there are varying degrees of trauma you will have experienced in the past. There’s no one size fits all. But the good news is there are methods and tools now available to take you from overwhelm and panic, to emotional freedom, so that you can let go of the past and live a happier and healthier life now.

That’s enough information for now. But I’ll leave you with this. You’re not broken. You’re not going mad. It won’t always be like this. The fact is there’s a part of your brain designed to keep you safe and it’s doing it’s job perfectly. I will help you quieten that part and return your mind and body to normal healthy balance.

In a monthly group live session I’ll take you through processes which will lessen your panic. In another live monthly group session I’ll answer all of your questions about achieving peace after trauma and how to use the tools I’ve given you.

You’ll change through time and feel much better. How do I know this? Because I once was where you are now. Allow me to be your guide until you no longer need me. Let’s move through this together to set you free of the past to live more and more in the moment. Read this blog often. Then read it again. Congratulations on taking the first steps to having Peace After Trauma. See you soon……