Trauma can be understood as an event or events that when experienced create such intense feelings of fear, helplessness, powerlessness, loss of control and often perception of some threat to life, that it can leave us feeling overwhelmed physically, emotionally and mentally and can often overpower our ability to cope or respond in the moment..
It is this overwhelming nature of a traumatic event that effects the way our brain processes the information at the time and interferes with how and where the brain stores the memory of the event. This can mean that the event itself becomes almost frozen in time.
Interpersonal trauma can be defined as experiences involving disruption in trusted relationships as the result of violence, abuse, war or other forms of political oppression, or forced uprooting and dislocation from one’s family, community, heritage, and/or culture. (Bierman, Mason et al., 2010)
It is these experiences over time that can:
‘produce profound and lasting changes in phsysiological arousal, emotion, cognition and memory’
Some significant and common events that can effect us in a traumatic way can include:
We can experience strong physical or emotional reactions immediately following the experience of a traumatic event. Many people will notice that their feelings dissipate over the course of a few days or weeks. However, for some people, the symptoms of psychological trauma may be increasingly severe and last longer.
Here are some of the physical and psychological signs of trauma. If you are experiencing any of these signs on a regular basis it may indicate that you may be affected by some of the traumatic events you have experienced in your life and accessing trauma informed therapy may be helpful.
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