What is Trauma and How Does it Affect Me?

LET’S START WITH SOME BIG TRUTHS.

The DSM-5-TR defines trauma as facing actual or threatened death, serious injury, or sexual violence (American Psychiatric Association, 2022). But trauma includes much more than just these events. Trauma can come from many sources. It might be medical, religious, or racial. It could also stem from community violence, divorce, or abandonment. The list goes on and on—much longer than we can cover in this blog. So, if you take anything away from this blog, let it be this: your trauma is as valid as someone else’s trauma. 

Stop. Rewind. Read that highlighted, italicized part again. Yep. And again. And again…

I want to point this out because I know many of you feel guilty for having trauma. You feel bad because of your trauma. But now, you also feel guilty. Someone else has it worse than you, so you think your pain isn’t valid.

Big nope there. Stop. Let’s take a beat. Do you see how that is the opposite of the basic book on How to Heal? 

Your trauma is valid. Full stop. You deserve healing. Full stop. Your story matters. FULL STOP. 

Now that we’ve got that clear, let’s get back to defining trauma and the ways it affects our lives, bodies, and brains. First, we need a quick definition: acute vs. complex trauma. Take a look at the visual here below to get started on our trauma journey.

IT’S ALL ABOUT TRAUMA 

Let’s start with the body. Trauma disrupts our systems in huge ways. To understand these ways, we need to dig in a little deeper about how our bodies' systems work. Have you ever heard of the parasympathetic and sympathetic nervous systems? You likely have, but you might not know the difference. We are going to break this down in a way that you’ll never forget again. 

We can think of the parasympathetic nervous system (PNS) and the sympathetic nervous system (SNS) like a car. When someone suddenly pulls out in front of you while you are driving, you hit the brake, right? But you don’t hit the brake forever. You hit the brake, then (if you’re like me) you say a bunch of f*cks, take some deep breaths, then ram the a**hole off the road…. Just joking! (But sometimes we do want to do that, don’t we? Hehehe.) 

After a minute, we take a breath and speed up again. We brake, then speed up, and repeat. We use the pedals in the proper way. That’s how the car’s system works. Simple enough, right? Well, what would happen if the person pulled out in front of you and your brakes didn’t work at all? What if you were stuck in acceleration ALL THE TIME? Oh sh*t right?

That’s essentially what happens when trauma takes over our systems. In this analogy, the SNS is our accelerator, and the PNS is the brake. In a non-traumatized individual’s system, the PNS brake works. It slows down after the threat has diminished. The individual is able to rest and relax. Their system is no longer in fight/flight/freeze mode. In a traumatized individual's nervous system, the PNS, or brake, no longer works. There are different ways to say this. We could say that they are stuck in fight/flight/freeze. Or that they are always in a heightened stage of arousal. Or that their window of tolerance is small. It all means the same: the accelerator is pressed down, and the SNS is always alert. Sounds exhausting? It is exhausting. Incredibly so. It also brings fun things in the car, like anxiety, dissociation, and irritability. These feelings affect both the brain and the body. Not exactly the passengers we want along for the ride (of life). 

So, back to our car and the guy pulling out in front of us. We’ve narrowly avoided the accident, but because of past trauma, our bodies never get an “all clear”. Instead, our heart races, muscles tighten, digestive system slows down, blood reroutes. And we stay like this. We call this chronic dysregulation, and it affects:

1. The Vagus Nerve. The Vagus Nerve is the main central nerve running down your PNS. Remember how we don’t have that working properly with trauma? We need this nerve to work well. It controls many important functions, such as heart rate, breathing, and digestion. It also impacts immune response, vocal tone, facial expressions, social engagement, and safety signals, among other areas. If you see areas on this list that are tough for you, it’s no coincidence. That’s trauma. I’m not a doctor, but I've seen many people with hard-to-diagnose immune disorders and digestive problems have trauma. That’s no joke, and that’s how trauma is living in your body. Hard to feel safe in social situations? There you go. Your safety meter is broken. Trauma makes it SO hard to feel safe emotionally and physically. It’s not you. It’s the trauma, love.

2. The Hypothalamic–Pituitary–Adrenal axis (HPA axis). The HPA axis puts your body in survival mode. It works through a feedback loop. This loop involves your hypothalamus, which is the brain's command center. Then, there's the pituitary gland, your hormonal dispatcher. Finally, the adrenal glands act as your stress-hormone factory. They create your body’s main stress response. This response raises cortisol and adrenaline levels. As a result, your heart rate goes up, you feel more alert, and digestion slows down. After trauma, your HPA axis can react in two ways. It might overreact, leading to high cortisol levels. This can cause anxiety, insomnia, and immune problems. Alternatively, it might underreact, resulting in low cortisol. This can leave you feeling numb and fatigued. Constant dysregulation can cause serious health issues. These include fibromyalgia, weight gain, IBS, chronic inflammation, and more. No bueno.

3. Your fascial system. Picture a living, moving layer of fibrous tissue that’s under your skin. Now picture a sudden accident, like a car wreck. Your body clenches itself tight. Most of your muscles will return to normal, but your shoulder won't. That shoulder stays tight. Whenever you feel triggered, it locks up and causes you a lot of pain. That’s the fascial system at work. The fascial system is smart. It’s a fibrous and moving tissue. It almost sounds like something from a horror movie! It remembers the trauma and stores it right there in that tissue. People store trauma as both physical and emotional pain. Some people react with strong emotions to somatic therapies, such as massage.

   
   

Let’s put this all together. When trauma stays in our bodies, the body tries to protect us. It activates systems that are already worn out from constant use, as we've seen. If you have many body (somatic) symptoms of trauma, healing should focus on the body, not the brain. We call this bottom-up processing, and we get into it in our third blog on trauma recovery. 

(Have you ever heard of the book “The Body Keeps the Score?” It’s by trauma therapist Dr. Van der Kolk, and you should read it. It goes into all the ways in which our bodies are trying to protect us via these now dysregulated systems.)

WHY DOES MY BRAIN PROCESS TRAUMA THROUGH FIGHT/FLIGHT/FREEZE? 

Certain parts of the brain are programmed to keep us alive, which causes this to happen. But first, you have to know that that’s your brain’s job: to keep you alive. Everything it does is to keep you alive.

In the past, that looked A LOT different than it does now. In the past, we had to find alternative ways to obtain our food instead of going to a grocery store. We had to hunt. And to hunt, we had to be on alert, because, well, animals would also hunt us. So our brain, in all its wisdom (which sometimes feels like zero wisdom, doesn’t it?) developed a center called the amygdala. 

1. Enter stage right: Amygdala: the smoke detector from hell.

If you think I’m being facetious, well, a little. The amygdala can cause big problems when it malfunctions, often after trauma. Instead of warning you about a bear attack, like before, it’s now always alerting you. It’s like the world’s most tipsy alarm clock. Amygdala hyperactivity makes you more sensitive to perceived danger and emotions. This includes feelings like fear and anger (Rauch et al., 2000).

So like, you’re not sensitive or emotional. You're in a war zone. All the time. 

2. Enter stage left: Hippocampus: The World’s Worst Timekeeper.

Trauma affects another fun region of the brain, the Hippocampus. The hippocampus allows us to figure out what’s happening now vs. what’s happening in the past. After trauma, this brain region shrinks. This shrinkage messes with your ability to place memories in context (Bremner et al., 2003). If you’ve been through trauma, you may find it straightforward to imagine this scenario:

You are having a normal night with your significant other. You’re washing dishes and they are emptying the dishwasher. Your partner mentions their coworker messed up the filing at work. You feel anger, sadness, or another strong emotion that clashes with the situation. Your heart races. You feel a strong urge to both scream and cry. You might yell at your partner for being too critical. Or, you could rush to defend that coworker. This is the same coworker you agreed is tough to work with. Shocked, your partner gets defensive, and before you know it you’re in a full-blown fight. Later, when you calm down a bit, you might see that you overreacted. Now, you need to apologize. Bleh. During the apology, make sure you blame your hippocampus. It’s the real villain here. Stupid hippocampus!

But did you overreact, or did you respond in a suitable manner, only 25+ years in the future? Someone power up the DeLorean! (That’s a Back to the Future reference for those of y'all under the age of 35. See, it’s about this teenager who travels in a time machine car to the future and…well…nevermind). 

The hippocampus had faced complex trauma from criticism before. You had a mother who was never happy with you or anything you did, for example. When your partner made a critical comment, your hippocampus reacted. It felt like you were 8 years old again, reliving a moment with your mother. It reacted as it needed to react then—with anger, sadness, rage—only it’s a whole lot of years too late. 

DISSOCIATION: WHY DO I FEEL FLOATY OR UNREAL?

Dissociation occurs when you aren’t able to fight back or flee. It’s the freeze part of the fight/flight/freeze mechanism in our brains. Dissociation can be trippy. It might feel like your body isn’t yours. Or, it can feel like you're underwater. Everything now seems distant. We also call it depersonalization, which means feeling disconnected from your body. Another term is derealization, where the world seems unreal. Dissociation can occur anytime. A tiny trigger, like a voice or a gentle touch on your arm, can send you into a dreamy, unreal state. It’s like you’ve gone offline. 

3. Enter stage right: many brain parts help with this escape mechanism. Here, we will focus on the brain’s Default Mode Network (DMN). 

Default Mode Network: Rocket to Outer Space

Our default mode network (DMN) is active when we daydream, relax, or think about ourselves and others. It helps us build our life stories. Usually, this part of the brain is calm and pleasant. But when trauma is involved, the DMN fails to work as it should. Several centers of the brain make up the DMN that have to do with this kind of functioning. When faced with trauma, it can react in a few ways. It might become hyperconnected, which means it is overactive or chaotic. It could also feel hypoconnected, experiencing disconnection or numbness. It may also fragment. This can cause parts of the DMN to fail in communication. 

When this occurs in the DMN, a person with dissociation may feel like they are losing time. They might feel disconnected from their experiences and body. They can struggle to remember things and have a fragmented sense of who they are. Remember, dissociation is our body’s last attempt at escape. It’s doing what it can to survive. We need to show great compassion. We should understand that what’s happening to us is partly about our brain and how it's wired. The good news is our brains can change. Therapy can rewire them due to their high plasticity. 

WHAT DOES TRAUMA LOOK LIKE IN CHILDREN AND ADULTS (WHAT’S THE DIFFERENCE?)

Trauma often begins in childhood, but it can appear quite different in kids and adults. Check out our next blog in the trauma series for a closer look at this relationship. For now, we will briefly touch on what trauma looks like in children vs. adults.

First, if you experienced trauma as a child, I’m sorry. I know this has stuck with you and caused some tough times. I'm really sorry for that. But please know that you are not alone. Between 60 and 80% of children experience trauma. You can throw a rock and hit a child who has faced trauma. This means you could discover or even cause more trauma. (Sorry, terrible joke). It’s not a laughing matter; but I want to emphasize that humor serves as an advanced coping mechanism. That’s a huge number of us wading in the shit, friend. At least we are in it together, amirite? So what does trauma look like in children? 

Children often lack the words to express trauma. Trauma can cause behavior problems, developmental delays, or nervous system issues. Let’s take a look at some examples of how trauma presents in children. 

Trauma in children often overlaps with other developmental disabilities. It is also linked to generalized anxiety and various childhood disorders. It can be hard to tell what’s caused by trauma and what’s caused by something else that’s affecting the child. Because of this, it’s important to see a professional for help. Take a look at our practitioner page here to see who is available and ready to help your child. You don’t have to do this alone.

TRAUMA IN ADULTS: THE WORK AT THE BOTTOM OF THE HILL

Ok, so once upon a time we were children at the top of the hill, untraumatized. Something shook our world, and we fell off. Now, we’re at the bottom, bruised and bloody. And we know we need help. But how do we know we have trauma? 

Well, if you know you need help, have you bloody asked for it? No? That’s a sign of trauma. 

Trauma in adults is different from trauma in children. Adults have faced it longer, so we often use unhelpful ways to hide it. 

Let’s take a look at some trauma personas that we all take on right now.

Step right up...

1. Hyper Independence! That’s right, here’s what I’ve won! A lifetime of never asking for help, even during moments of great need! Here’s my prize for exhausting myself and feeling bitter most of the time... oh, wait! The producers say there’s no reward for that. Sorry!

2. The Strong One! Do I deeply identify with Luisa from Disney’s Encanto? Can people finish my sentence: “I’ll do it by my…”? Am I an eldest daughter? If so, I may, in fact, be the Strong One. What’s the issue? Oh, that I’m in chronic pain and I’ve pushed everything down so far that I can no longer recognize myself.

3. The Perfectionist! I can’t even try to do a project with anyone else. And no one wants to work with me either, because they already know what’s coming. Was it my goal to end up alone? OF COURSE NOT. Where did everyone go (for real though)?

4. The Ghoster/Avoider! Conflict? Forget it. I’m not answering texts for the next millennium. Unless you send memes. Because that’s all my system can handle.

5. The Empath! I’m wearing myself out trying to be there for you. If I keep fixing you, then you’ll love me. It’s okay that I’m a ball of goo on the bed 99 percent of the time and my hygiene is in the toilet. I’m saving the Earth through water conservation.

6. The Chronic Illness! I can no longer go anywhere or see anyone because everything flares up in my whole body. See you, never. 

7. The Dead Inside! I’ll make up horrible jokes about adult trauma so that no one will realize how dead I am inside. Dissociation level? MAX. 

   
   

Ok, so we know some of these. We are some of these. But babe, this isn’t a calling out. It’s a calling in. It’s time to do your healing work. I’m calling you in: to love, to healing, to compassion, to knowledge, and understanding. We are shining the light.

Here are some ways to tell adult trauma apart from childhood trauma:

• Adults might struggle with substance abuse.

• They may experience dissociation or engage in people pleasing.

• Some show signs of violence, shame, or guilt.

• Cycles of abuse can continue, leading to a lack of motivation.

• Depression and anxiety are common.

• Eating disorders and OCD may arise.

• Health issues, especially with immunity and gut health, can occur.

• Trust issues often surface as well.

  
  

There are many more ways that trauma can manifest in adults; by no means is this a comprehensive list.

That's all we can cover today. Please stay tuned for parts 2 and 3 on trauma. In those, we'll discuss relational trauma and attachments, plus recovery options. And remember, trauma recovery is possible if you put in the work. Visit our therapists here for help today. And let’s keep rocking this life and our growth, sweet one. 

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APA References: 

American Psychiatric Association. (2013).

Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders (5th ed.). American Psychiatric Publishing.

Bremner et al. (2003)Bremner, J. D., Vythilingam, M., Vermetten, E., Southwick, S. M., McGlashan, T., Nazeer, A., Khan, S., Vaccarino, L. V., Soufer, R., Garg, P. K., Ng, C. K., Staib, L. H., Duncan, J. S., & Charney, D. S. (2003). MRI and PET study of deficits in hippocampal structure and function in women with childhood sexual abuse and posttraumatic stress disorder. American Journal of Psychiatry, 160(5), 924–932. https://doi.org/10.1176/appi.ajp.160.5.924

Rauch et al. (2000)Rauch, S. L., Shin, L. M., & Phelps, E. A. (2000). Neurocircuitry models of posttraumatic stress disorder and extinction: Human neuroimaging research—past, present, and future. Biological Psychiatry, 60(4), 376–382. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0006-3223(06)00969-1