Trauma can be emotional or physical. Sometimes  a trauma that was emotional in nature is having a physical effect, or vice versa.  For example, someone who was molested in childhood may, as an adult, be having physical symptoms that seem completely unrelated, like headaches for which a doctor cannot find a cause.
Trauma treatment can include facilitating recovery from childhood abuse:  sexual, physical or emotional, or trauma from an accident, a medical or surgical intervention, domestic violence, victim of a crime, survivor of an act of war or a natural disaster and more.  Trauma can mean many things to many people; what is traumatic for one person isn’t always traumatic for another.

Treatment for trauma in therapy is a complex issue.  The point of therapy is not simply to rehash – or retell – your story.  The point of trauma therapy is to build a safe relationship with a therapist first, create a safe environment where you feel that there is truly someone who can “hold” or contain the story of what happened to you.  People ask, “why do I want to relive that?” or “why do I need to revisit something so terrible?”  That is a very good question. 

Well, trauma is kind of like that splinter.  When you suffer a trauma, it’s normal to want to make it go away, so you bury it deep inside your unconscious.  And it might hurt, or be really uncomfortable to talk about it.  But once you do, you start to let go of it, and little by little, it starts to feel better.  But the idea with trauma is you don’t talk about it until you feel ready, and you only talk about it as much as you want, bit by bit.  Maybe that splinter doesn’t have to come out all at once; maybe it can come out in pieces, a little at a time.  And maybe your trauma can be healed, a little bit at a time.

If you have suffered a trauma and that trauma is having an effect on your behavior or affecting your life, maybe it’s time to talk about it and get it out.

Symptoms of trauma:

Just as the splinter caused painful symptoms – swelling, itching, redness and soreness – trauma can cause symptoms.  You hold trauma in your body; the body remembers what the mind forgets. Symptoms may include flashbacks, depression, sleeplessness, sleeping too much, lack of or loss of intimacy, loss of trust, fear of social encounters, loss of productivity… the list can go on and on. You may have physical illnesses – irritable bowel syndrome, ulcers; you may get nauseous every time you get around a certain odor… The idea of therapy for trauma is to find where, how and why it affects you, and then  find the best therapeutic modality that works for you – somatic psychotherapy (mind/body integration), EMDR, hypnosis… that’s something to work out when you come in for your individual therapy.  Whatever you decide, it’s important that you go at your own speed.  If you feel the process is moving too fast, be sure you speak up and tell your therapist.  If it’s me, I want to know if my client is uncomfortable with something I’m doing.