Healing From Childhood Trauma Requires Focus and Direction
“Symptoms of illness and distress, plus your feelings about them, can be viewed as messengers coming to tell you something important about your body or about your mind. In the old days, if a king didn’t like the message he was given, he would sometimes have the messenger killed. This is tantamount to suppressing your symptoms or your feelings because they are unwanted. Killing the messenger and denying the message or raging against it are not intelligent ways of approaching healing. The one thing we don’t want to do is to ignore or rupture the essential connections that can complete relevant feedback loops and restore self-regulation and balance. Our real challenge when we have symptoms is to see if we can listen to their message and really hear them and take them to heart, that is, make the connection fully.” Jon Kabat-Zinn
From Time Travel Exists — Just Ask a Trauma Survivor:
“Somatic — based treatments may be appropriate for complex trauma. The catch, though, is that in order for them to work one must have left the traumatic environment. And for those whose trauma wasn’t confined to an abusive household or relationship, that’s easier said than done.
The trauma of poverty, for example, can’t be overcome unless one is financially stable. Scrambling to eat, stay sheltered, and afford basic necessities (while contending with the stigma of being visibly poor) isn’t conducive to healing. Neither is structural racism and the micro — aggression that accompany it, nor is the omnipresent threat of violence that some trans people live with. Complex trauma is just that — complex, and while not a binary category (one either has it or they don’t), those who definitely do have it need it to abate.
The personal consequences of this are that I can’t trust a therapist who isn’t committed to social justice, both in and out of session. Wellness is political, and if a practitioner assumes their work concludes after 60 minutes I will likely not feel safe. Fortunately I have found someone great (who I can currently afford), and my identity is clearer. My memory and processing issues haven’t gone away, but understanding them makes them feel more manageable. Hopefully this has offered some insight into why you may be contending with the same.”
From Addictions and the “false” window of tolerance:
“Let’s talk addictions.
We all have them.
In his award-winning book, In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts: Close Encounters with Addiction, Dr. Gabor Maté explains the origins of addiction as being rooted in trauma and calls for a more compassionate approach toward addictions or compulsive behaviours.
At the heart of Dr. Maté’s philosophy is the belief that there’s no such thing as an addictive personality. “Addiction is not a weakness of character. It is not a failure of will. It is not an inherited brain disease.”
Instead, he says, addiction is an escape from human suffering. The ‘medication’ of choice may be alcohol, drugs or nicotine, gambling or shopping, sex or self-harming, overwork, extreme sports or computer gaming, obesity, anorexia or bulimia. “In fact, it could be anything we’ve ever craved that helped us escape emotional pain; that gave us peace of mind, a sense of control and a feeling of happiness.”
He explains addictions originate in a person’s need to solve a problem: a deep-seated problem, often from our earliest years that was to do with trauma or loss. This may include physical and emotional neglect, abandonment, violence or abuse.
The addiction or compulsive behaviour, though damaging in the medium or long term, can save a person in the short term. The primary drive is to regulate the nervous system so that we can operate in our ‘window of tolerance;’ a term coined by Dr. Dan Siegel. (Note: Sensorimotor therapist, Dr. Pat Ogden, calls this the ‘optimal arousal zone.’)
“We are all born with brains wired for happiness”, Dr. Maté argues, “but if our happiness is threatened at a deep level in childhood, we resort to addictions as a substitute for the self-soothing brain chemicals (such as endorphins and serotonin) that help make us a happy healthy human being.”
From Trauma Tips for Understanding and Healing:
“Develop self-grounding skills through practice:
If the effects of your trauma include feeling fearful, anxious, rageful, depressed, disoriented, or confused, it can be helpful to practice the following exercises.
- Sit in a chair with both feet on the ground and your hands on your thighs or in your lap. Feel your feet on the ground. Feel your hands on your thighs or lap. Feel your butt on the seat and your back against the chair.
- Look around you and pick out six objects in the room and name them out loud. This will help you to feel centered in the present, anchored in your body, and more grounded. When you do this, notice how your breathing begins to become smoother and deeper.
- You may want to go outdoors and find a peaceful place to sit. As you do, feel how your body can be held and supported by the ground. Notice the environment around you — the sky, the trees, the grass or other ground cover, and name them out loud.
- Wherever you are, take a look around. Don’t look for anything particular or in a specific direction because you need to go someplace. Just look to see what is. Let your thoughts slow down as you name to yourself what you see. Start with the big picture. If you’re inside: desk, walls, floor, ceiling, windows, furniture (chairs, tables, bookshelf, computer, bed, nightstand, etc.) Then begin to take in smaller details: your own hands, your fingers, what they’re touching. Take in the different shades of color and light. Use your other senses, too. For instance, what do you hear? Do you hear the sounds of traffic, dogs barking, or birds outside?”
A Medium publication is an online magazine. I have 4 on which I am transferring all my work.
Addiction Recovery Has Many Paths. Don’t be Afraid to Try Several of Them.
