Trauma and its effects
Trauma is a fact of life; it does not, however, have to be a life sentence (P. Levine).
Trauma may begin as acute stress from a perceived life stress or as the end product of cumulative stress over a prolonged period of time. Both can seriously impair one’s ability to function with resilience and ease, by which I mean a personal sense of being in control, no matter what life throws in our direction. Trauma may result from a wide variety of situations: accidents, invasive medical procedures, sexual or physical assault, childhood emotional abuse and/or neglect, war, natural disasters, loss, birth trauma, or the overwhelm of ongoing fear and conflict in one's life, such as being in an abusive relationship. Loss of safety and helplessness are the defining elements of events experienced as traumatic.
Trauma creates fragmentation in the coherence of the experience and how we 'remember' it. The personal inner experience literally begins to fall apart to the point where one loses the sense of self. It is fair to say that trauma causes a disconnection from self and from others, rendering meaningful relationships difficult, if not impossible.
For such reason, traumatised individuals go through the motions of life without truly engaging with life itself, often experiencing numbness, shutdown, detachment, helplessness, depression and shame; or, conversely, a state of hyper-arousal characterised by constant hyper vigilance, anxiety, alertness, fear or rage. The main sensation for such an experience is that of being split into different parts, some of which are not accessible, while others become overtly prominent.
Trauma may begin as acute stress from a perceived life stress or as the end product of cumulative stress over a prolonged period of time. Both can seriously impair one’s ability to function with resilience and ease, by which I mean a personal sense of being in control, no matter what life throws in our direction. Trauma may result from a wide variety of situations: accidents, invasive medical procedures, sexual or physical assault, childhood emotional abuse and/or neglect, war, natural disasters, loss, birth trauma, or the overwhelm of ongoing fear and conflict in one's life, such as being in an abusive relationship. Loss of safety and helplessness are the defining elements of events experienced as traumatic.
Trauma creates fragmentation in the coherence of the experience and how we 'remember' it. The personal inner experience literally begins to fall apart to the point where one loses the sense of self. It is fair to say that trauma causes a disconnection from self and from others, rendering meaningful relationships difficult, if not impossible.
For such reason, traumatised individuals go through the motions of life without truly engaging with life itself, often experiencing numbness, shutdown, detachment, helplessness, depression and shame; or, conversely, a state of hyper-arousal characterised by constant hyper vigilance, anxiety, alertness, fear or rage. The main sensation for such an experience is that of being split into different parts, some of which are not accessible, while others become overtly prominent.
I have been working with Ottavia for almost 2 months now and she has been incredibly helpful. She is a very intuitive practitioner with excellent insights and therapeutic techniques. With her warm and caring nature she provides a safe space for healing and developing more awareness about emotions held in my body. I also appreciate all the extra information and explanation she gives me throughout and also outside the sessions. With her help I feel like I am gaining a new perspective on my healing journey and can actively work on myself. (D. Nagy) |
The essence of trauma is that it is overwhelming, unbelievable and unbearable. Each patient demands that we suspend our sense of what is normal and accept that we are dealing with a dual reality: the reality of a relatively secure and predictable present that lives side by side with a ruinous, ever present past. (B. Van Der Kolk) |
Trauma resolution
As long as trauma is not resolved and integrated, one is bound to re-experience the traumatic events over and over again through re-enactments, flashbacks, nightmares and overwhelming somatic sensations and emotions. It is also worth remembering that there is mounting evidence that unresolved traumas, especially childhood and developmental trauma, are linked to the insurgence of a variety of diseases and syndromes like IBS, chronic fatigue, fibromyalgia, migraines, acute and chronic anxiety and auto-immune diseases among others. Therefore the body becomes the battleground of trauma.
Somatic Experiencing is a body-oriented approach to the healing of trauma and other stress disorders, based on the life work of psychologist Peter Levine. According to Levine, trauma is not in the event itself, but in the reaction of our nervous system to the event and when a traumatic event has not been integrated, the nervous system acts as if danger was still ongoing and the same survival responses of fight, flight and freeze keep repeating when aspects of the day to day experience act as trigger of the trauma experience.
The SE trauma resolution method does not require the traumatized person to re-tell or re-live the traumatic event. Instead, it offers the opportunity to engage, complete, and resolve—in a slow and supported way—the body’s instinctual fight, flight and freeze responses. This resets the nervous system, restores inner balance, enhances resilience to stress, and increases people’s vitality, equanimity, and capacity to actively engage in life.
Somatic Experiencing is a body-oriented approach to the healing of trauma and other stress disorders, based on the life work of psychologist Peter Levine. According to Levine, trauma is not in the event itself, but in the reaction of our nervous system to the event and when a traumatic event has not been integrated, the nervous system acts as if danger was still ongoing and the same survival responses of fight, flight and freeze keep repeating when aspects of the day to day experience act as trigger of the trauma experience.
The SE trauma resolution method does not require the traumatized person to re-tell or re-live the traumatic event. Instead, it offers the opportunity to engage, complete, and resolve—in a slow and supported way—the body’s instinctual fight, flight and freeze responses. This resets the nervous system, restores inner balance, enhances resilience to stress, and increases people’s vitality, equanimity, and capacity to actively engage in life.
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Somatic Experiencing is about creating new experiences that contradict overwhelming feelings of helplessness and replacing them with a sense of agency and ownership of physical reactions and sensations...Only after we become capable of standing back, mindfully noticing our sensations and emotions without getting overwhelmed, can we find the right space to breathe and respond, rather than automatically react.
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