Trauma

Understanding Trauma: What It Is, How It Affects You and How Therapy Can Help

Trauma is something we hear about a lot, but what actually is trauma? When most people hear the word trauma, they may think about a major accident, natural disaster, assault or other life-threatening event. These experiences can certainly be traumatic, but trauma can also develop from experiences that may not look “traumatic” to someone else.

Trauma is not simply about what happened to you. It is also about how your brain, body and nervous system experienced and responded to what happened.

Sometimes an experience is simply too overwhelming, frightening, painful or confusing for our brain to fully process at the time. The experience can then continue to affect us long after the event itself has ended. You may know logically that something happened in the past, but your body can continue to respond as though it is happening now. This is one of the reasons trauma can have such a profound impact on our emotions, relationships, body, behaviours and your sense of self.

What is trauma?

Trauma can occur when we experience something that overwhelms our ability to cope or leaves us feeling unsafe, powerless, trapped, threatened or unable to escape. Trauma can result from a single event, but it can also develop through repeated experiences over time.

For example, trauma can be associated with:

• childhood abuse or neglect
• emotional or physical abuse
• sexual assault
• domestic or family violence
• accidents or serious illness
• grief and loss
• bullying
• experiences of rejection or abandonment
• relationship trauma
• medical or birth trauma
• witnessing something frightening
• experiences of war or displacement
• chronic stress
• growing up in an unpredictable or unsafe environment
• repeated experiences of shame, criticism or feeling that you are “not good enough”

Trauma can also be complex or developmental. This can occur when difficult experiences happen repeatedly, particularly during childhood or within important relationships. Importantly, you don’t have to have experienced one “big” traumatic event to be affected by trauma. Sometimes it is the accumulation of many smaller experiences that shapes the way we see ourselves, other people and the world around us.

Trauma isn’t just a memory

One of the most important things to understand about trauma is that it isn’t simply something you remember. When an experience has not been fully processed, parts of the original experience can continue to be activated in the present.

You might intellectually know:

“That happened a long time ago.”

But your nervous system may still respond as though it’s happening right now. This can happen because trauma can become connected with emotions, body sensations, beliefs, memories and behavioural responses. A particular situation, relationship, smell, image, sensation or even something someone says can activate these networks without you consciously understanding why. The reaction isn’t necessarily irrational. Your brain and body may be responding to an earlier experience that still feels unresolved.

What are the symptoms of trauma?

Trauma affects everyone differently. Some people experience very obvious symptoms, while others may spend years wondering why they struggle with certain emotions, relationships or situations.Some common signs and symptoms include:

Emotional symptoms

You may experience:

• anxiety or fear
• irritability or anger
• sadness or depression
• shame or guilt
• emotional overwhelm
• feeling numb or disconnected
• difficulty trusting people
• feeling unsafe even when there is no obvious danger
• low self-worth
• feeling helpless or powerless

Physical and nervous system symptoms

Trauma can also affect the body and nervous system.

You might experience:

• feeling constantly “on edge”
• being easily startled
• difficulty relaxing
• sleep difficulties
• fatigue
• muscle tension
• headaches
• changes in appetite
• feeling disconnected from your body
• strong physical reactions to certain triggers

Behavioural symptoms

You may find yourself:

• avoiding certain people, places or situations
• withdrawing from others
• overworking or keeping constantly busy
• using food, substances, shopping, exercise or other behaviours to regulate difficult emotions
• struggling with emotional eating or other coping behaviours
• becoming highly controlling or perfectionistic
• people-pleasing
• finding it difficult to set boundaries
• repeatedly entering relationships that don’t feel healthy

Trauma and relationships

Trauma can have a particularly significant impact on relationships. If you’ve experienced betrayal, abandonment, rejection or unsafe relationships, you may find it difficult to trust others, become highly sensitive to changes in someone’s behaviour, fear being abandoned, or struggle to let people get close. Other people may respond in the opposite way and become emotionally detached or avoid intimacy altogether. These responses can sometimes be understood as protective strategies that developed for a reason.

Why do these patterns continue?

When we experience something overwhelming, our brain and nervous system do their best to protect us.Sometimes the strategies that helped us survive or cope at the time continue long after the original situation has ended. For example, a child who learns that expressing their needs leads to criticism may become extremely self-sufficient. Someone who grew up around unpredictable adults may become hypervigilant and constantly monitor other people’s moods. Someone who experienced rejection may learn to avoid emotional closeness altogether. These responses may have made sense at the time. The problem is that they can become patterns that continue into adulthood, even when the original danger is no longer present.

Therapy isn’t about judging these responses or simply telling yourself to “stop doing that.” It’s about understanding why the pattern developed, what it is trying to protect you from, and whether it is still serving you today.

How can therapy help with trauma?

Trauma therapy is about more than talking about what happened. A trauma-informed approach considers the whole person and helps you understand the connections between your past experiences, your nervous system, your thoughts, emotions, body sensations, behaviours and relationships.

Therapy can help you:

• understand your trauma responses
• recognise your triggers
• develop greater emotional regulation
• feel safer in your body
• reduce the intensity of distressing memories
• change unhelpful beliefs about yourself
• develop healthier relationship patterns
• build self-compassion
• reduce avoidance
• understand protective behaviours
• process unresolved experiences
• develop healthier ways of responding to current and future situations

The aim isn’t to erase your memories. Instead, therapy can help those memories become memories of the past rather than experiences that continue to feel present. Two of the most common and effective therapies used to address trauma are EMDR and Schema Therapy.

How can EMDR help with trauma?

EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing) is an evidence-based psychotherapy that was originally developed to treat trauma. EMDR is based on the Adaptive Information Processing (AIP) Model, which proposes that distressing experiences can sometimes become inadequately processed and stored in ways that continue to affect us. When this happens, something in the present can trigger aspects of the past experiences, such as emotions, body sensations, beliefs or memories. EMDR uses bilateral stimulation, such as eye movements or other forms of left-right stimulation, while the client focuses on aspects of the memory. The aim is to support the brain’s natural information-processing system so that the memory can become more fully integrated. This reduces the emotional intensity associated with the memory and changes the way you respond when you encounter reminders of it. EMDR can also be used to work with present-day triggers and future situations, helping you develop more adaptive responses moving forward.

Importantly, trauma therapy doesn’t always begin with processing traumatic memories straight away. Preparation, stabilisation, emotional regulation and developing a sense of safety are important parts of trauma treatment. Therapy should be paced according to the individual’s needs and capacity.

How can Schema Therapy help with trauma?

Schema Therapy is another approach that can be particularly helpful when trauma has contributed to long-standing patterns in the way you see yourself, other people and the world, the way you engage in relationships and how you cope with the ongoing impact of the trauma. Schemas are deeply held patterns or beliefs that develop through our experiences, particularly early experiences and relationships.These beliefs can continue influencing our relationships, emotions and behaviours long after the original experiences have passed.

Schema Therapy helps us understand these patterns and the different modes or parts of ourselves that developed in response to them.

For example, one part of you might feel vulnerable and frightened, while another part becomes highly controlling, perfectionistic, detached or self-critical in an attempt to protect you or develops patterns of people pleasing. Rather than seeing these responses as “bad” or dysfunctional, Schema Therapy helps us understand their purpose. We can then work towards strengthening a healthier, more compassionate part of yourself that can respond to these vulnerable parts in a different way.

EMDR and Schema Therapy can work beautifully together

EMDR and Schema Therapy approach trauma from slightly different perspectives, but they can complement each other very well.

Schema Therapy can help us understand:

“Why did this pattern develop, how is it affecting my life now and how can I change it?”

EMDR can then help with:

“How can we process the experiences that helped create and maintain this pattern?”

Together, these approaches can help address both the underlying experiences and the patterns that developed around them. This can be particularly useful when trauma is complex, longstanding or connected to relationships, self-worth, body image or deeply ingrained coping patterns.

Healing doesn’t mean forgetting

Trauma recovery doesn’t mean pretending that something didn’t happen. It doesn’t mean you have to forgive someone. And it doesn’t mean the experience will never cross your mind again. Healing can mean being able to remember something without being completely overwhelmed by it. It can mean having more conscious awareness and control over how you respond. It can mean feeling safer in your body. It can mean developing compassion for the younger parts of yourself that were doing the best they could with what they had. And ultimately, it can mean being able to live more fully in the present, rather than having your past continue to determine your future.

You don’t have to figure it all out on your own

If you recognise yourself in some of these experiences, it doesn’t necessarily mean that you have “trauma” or that you need a particular type of therapy. Understanding what is happening is often the first step. Trauma therapy can be tailored to your individual experiences, needs and goals. Depending on what you’re experiencing, therapy may incorporate EMDR, Schema Therapy, parts work, nervous-system regulation, addressing unhelpful behaviours that have helped you cope with trauma, and other evidence-based approaches. The goal is not simply to reduce symptoms. It is to help you understand yourself more deeply, feel safer and more connected, and develop the freedom to respond to life in ways that feel more consistent with who you are now and help you live a satisfying and fulfilling life.

If you are interesting in exploring the impact of trauma or processing and healing from trauma, seeking the support of a qualified mental health professional is the first step.

You can also find out more information about EMDR or Schema Therapy, through the EMDR Association of Australia (EMDRAA) and the International Society of Schema Therapy (ISST).

References

Briere, J. N., & Scott, C. (2015). Principles of Trauma Therapy: A guide to symptoms, evaluation, and treatment. Sage Publications: Los Angeles.

Herman, J. (1992). Trauma and recovery: The aftermath of violence – from domestic abuse to political terror. Basic Books: New York.

Shapiro, F (2018). Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) Therapy: Basic principles, protocols and Procedures (3^rd Ed). Guilford Publications: New York.

Shapiro, F., & Laliotis, D (2011). EMDR and the Adaptive Information Processing Model: Integrative Treatment and Case Conceptualisation, Clinical Social Work Journal (39), 191-200.

Young, J. E., Klosko, J. S., & Weishaar, M. E. (2003). Schema Therapy: A practitioner’s guide. Guilford Press: New York.