Trauma is a wound that shapes our worldview, our brain, our nervous system, and our relationships. It creates rigidity and shame. It separates us from our gut feeling and from the sense of who we are. There is wisdom in trauma. Not that we want to inflict trauma on someone as a learning experience, but in the sense that our traumas, which have disconnected us from our essence, contain the keys that can lead us back to ourselves if we can maintain an attitude of curiosity and not dwell in self-condemnation. So what does it really mean? Gabor Maté writes in his seminar, referring to a quote by A.H. Almaas or Hameed Ali, who wrote somewhere that "the fundamental thing that happened, and the greatest catastrophe, is not that there was no love or support in childhood. The greatest misfortune caused by this initial misfortune is that you have lost the connection to your being. This is far more important than whether your mother or father loved you or not." The fundamental trauma, therefore, is the loss of connection to oneself. When we talk about trauma, this separation from the self is the deepest wound. Trauma is a somatic phenomenon; it goes "under the skin." It also builds upon earlier traumas. For every traumatic experience an adult has, there is a prior separation from the self that occurred in childhood. Traumas are somatized through epigenetics, telomere shortening, inflammation, and altered brain development. Traumas are passed down through generations, through epigenetics and unconscious messages. It is transgenerational and collective. Mental illnesses are an adaptation to trauma. The way we carry life experiences in our minds limits our ability to respond to life. The topic of trauma is certainly not easy, and our own inner resistance, in particular, makes it very difficult to confront. The desire for healing is strong, but so too is often the fear of falling back into a deep hole and losing control over one's life again. Your self-healing powers may seem buried, but they are there! Trauma means a loss of connection to ourselves, our bodies, our families, other people, and the world around us. It is healing to gently rediscover these connections. Working with trauma activates your innate self-healing abilities and strengthens your resources. I support you gently and purposefully to reconnect with these powers. The immediate symptoms after a trauma can include: over-arousal – racing heart, sweating, cold sweats, rapid and shallow breathing, a feeling of not being able to breathe, hyperventilation, racing thoughts; tension – at a muscular level, as the nervous system switches to emergency mode so that all the body's resources can be mobilized to be able to fight or flee; Muscle activity increases, triggering a state of absolute fight-or-flight readiness, which is why everything is so tense and oxygen-rich blood is directed to the arms and legs, while digestive activity is inhibited because it is not essential at that moment. This can lead to a dazed, trance-like state of dissociation – this protects us from being overwhelmed by fear and pain. Certain areas of perception in the body and mind are shut down to endure things that would normally be unbearable; it's a survival strategy of the nervous system. Dissociation can also occur through the body, meaning that certain body parts and areas may be perceived as disconnected or imperceptible. Most of the women I work with who have experienced birth trauma perceive their lower body region as nonexistent and unable to feel it. It's like a numbness, as if that area simply isn't there. Dissociation can also manifest as chronic pain, a way for certain body parts to draw attention to themselves through the pain. Denial is a form of dissociation, a separation between the person and their memory. They simply can't remember the event, like a blackout. In some cases, it even goes so far as to deny that a particular event ever occurred. Especially in cases of severe childhood abuse, it is now known that the experience is hidden in the subconscious and never surfaces into consciousness or memory. The reason for this is that the event was experienced as so extremely traumatic that it remains buried there. The person behaves as if it never happened because the pain and the fear associated with it would overwhelm them. Helplessness and immobility—the freezing or immobilization—arises from the overstimulation of the nervous system in a traumatic situation. It's like pulling the emergency brake to slow down. The feeling of being completely incapacitated, totally powerless and frozen, is not imaginary in this situation. Many people describe it as completely real, and it is. The nervous system essentially "shuts down" in this situation because otherwise it would be too much for the entire system. Delayed symptoms after a trauma include: heightened alertness – the feeling that the body simply can't calm down and that one can't even fall asleep. There is a tendency to jump and hyperactivity. This can lead to abrupt mood swings, sudden outbursts of anger, or uncontrollable crying. Intrusive images or flashbacks can also occur, where one sees actual scenes from the traumatic event playing out before their eyes. Extreme sensitivity to light and sound also indicates how overloaded the nervous system is by the trauma. Nightmares, nocturnal panic attacks, and sleep disturbances show that there is something in the subconscious that wants to surface and be resolved. Naturally, this puts a strain on the entire organism and completely depletes vital energy. One becomes incapable of coping with stress, feels empty and weak, self-esteem plummets, and shame grows for feeling this way and for being in such a bad place. Symptoms long after a trauma can include panic attacks, developing anxieties and phobias, or the development of addictive behaviors for various things. Another symptom is the feeling of not being fully present and experiencing a kind of mental emptiness. Avoidance behavior is common, where certain people and places are avoided for fear of reliving the original event. Then there is the addiction to dangerous situations. In this case, people want to relive the feeling of threat and emergency, because their entire system hopes to bring the emergency situation to a positive conclusion. Other symptoms can include heightened or decreased sexuality, memory loss, and forgetfulness. But there's also the inability to feel love, where you realize your heart is completely numb, and it's incredibly difficult for traumatized people to open their hearts again because they've been so deeply wounded. Then, of course, there are the symptoms that can appear after a very long time: such as excessive shyness around people or new situations, chronic fatigue, a weakened immune system, hormonal problems, chronic pain (headaches, migraines, neck and back problems), asthma, skin and digestive issues. Depression is also a significant symptom, as are apocalyptic anxieties and a general feeling of alienation and isolation. There's a feeling that life and the world are happening without you; you're left out, and you feel alone and isolated in the whole situation. All these symptoms can be stable, meaning they're constantly present, or they can be unstable, which is actually more common. This means they only appear occasionally, especially during very stressful times when they become acute. These symptoms often occur in groups that become increasingly complex over time, eventually making it impossible to establish a connection to the original traumatic event. This is why many traumas are hidden and so subtle.
Trauma / Embodiment
